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Crash course world history the columbian exchange
Crash course world history the columbian exchange
Crash course world history the columbian exchange
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As waves crash against the shores of a small South American island, the horizon is broken by the fervent flapping of Spanish flags. As European feet land on the now South American soil, they revel with joy, for they had found their land of spice. Or had they? It’s now known that rather than finding their new path to India they had found something much greater. A new world, a new land, one in which they could spread the word of god and find new wealth unknown to Europe. The Spanish had landed in the “New World” rather than their desired destination, however, this land was not without its fair share of profits. The landing of Spanish ships in South America had kicked off a major event referred to as the Columbian Exchange, a period of
In Alfred J. Crosby’s book, The Columbian Exchange, the author examines the impact of the New World on the Old World, but also the impact the Old World had on the New World. One key distinction Crosby notes is how the discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus challenged the intellectual systems of Christianity and Aristotelianism. Most notably, the discovery of a world that was, in fact, “new” was so contradictory to scholarly work of the past, such as Aristotle or found in the Bible, that assumptions were made on where to fit the New World into a Christian and Aristotelian world. For example, previous findings under Aristotle, which were still utilized into the 15th Century, had “quite logically supposed the equatorial zone of
Encomiendas: An encomienda was a grant of Native American labor given to prominent European men in the Americas by the Spanish king. This grant allowed European men to extract tribute from natives in the form of labor and goods. The value of the grants was dramatically increased with the discovery of gold and silver in the Americas. The significance of this term is that although this system was eventually repartitioned, it initiated the tradition of prominent men controlling vast resources and monopolizing native labor.
As we all know from the memorable song, in 1492 Columbus sailed to find the New World, commonly known as the Americas. Many idolize Columbus for his accomplishment in colonizing the Americas and starting the Columbian Exchange. The Columbian Exchange is the sharing of plants, animals, diseases, human populations, technology, and ideas between the Western and Eastern Hemispheres as a direct result of Columbus’ arrival to the Americas. However, we often oversee the downfalls of the Columbian Exchange. Some consequences of the exchange are the spread of disease to the Native people and settlers, the destruction of the Native population, and the disappearance of the Natives custom’s, beliefs, and way of life.
It is hard to believe that even the Spaniards imagined that one journey in 1492 will change theirs and world’s history so dramatically. The moment that Spanish foot stepped on American soil started years of prosperity and glory for the Spanish empire but at the cost of the destruction of American societies. The encounter with the new world was controversial historical moment that created one united history instead of two world histories. The discovery led many Spaniards to the new world with the intention of settling the lands but eventually this was the start of devastating of cultures, human populations and traditions. Using power and coercion they spread fear and destruction in the aim of gaining wealth, social precedence and Christian conversion. The justification for the massacres of the indigenous people in the name of religion was no more than greed to gold, fame and status. The actions of those who claimed to be “the most humane and excellent nation” was no more than cruel actions made by savages that had no moral sense.
The Columbian exchange was the widespread transfer of various products such as animals, plants, and culture between the Americas and Europe. Though most likely unintentional, the byproduct that had the largest impact from this exchange between the old and new world was communicable diseases. Europeans and other immigrants brought a host of diseases with them to America, which killed as much as ninety percent of the native population. Epidemics ravaged both native and nonnative populations of the new world destroying civilizations. The source of these epidemics were due to low resistance, poor sanitation, and inadequate medical knowledge- “more die of the practitioner than of the natural course of the disease (Duffy).” These diseases of the new world posed a serious
Columbian Exchange or the big exchange was a great exchange on a wide range of animals (Horses, Chickens, sheep, swine, Turkey), plants (Wheat, barley, corn, beans, tomatoes), people and culture, infectious diseases, and ideas, technology (Wheeled vehicles, iron tools, metallurgy) all these things happened between Native Americans and from Europe after the voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492. Resulting in communication between the two cultures to initiate a number of crops that have led to the increase in population in both hemispheres, where the explorers returned to Europe loaded with corn, tomatoes, potatoes, which has become one of the main crops in Eurasia with the solutions of the eighteenth century. At the same time, the Europeans crops, cassava and peanuts to Southeast Asia with a tropical climate.
In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. However, even after centuries later, little is truly known of the mysterious voyage and findings of the new world.1 By examining “Letter from Columbus to Luis Santangel”, one can further contextualize the events of Columbus' exploration of the New World. The letter uncovers Columbus' subtle hints of his true intentions and exposes his exaggerated tone that catered to his lavish demands with Spain. Likewise, The Columbian Voyage Map read in accordance with the letter helps the reader track Columbus' first, second, third, and fourth voyage to the New World carefully and conveniently. Thus, the letter and map's rarity and description render invaluable insight into Columbus' intentionality of the New World and its indigenous inhabitants.
The Colombian Exchange was an extensive exchange between the eastern and western hemispheres as knows as the Old World and New World. The Colombian exchange greatly affects almost every society. It prompted both voluntary and forced migration of millions of human beings. There are both positive and negative effects that you can see from the Colombian Exchange. The Colombian Exchange explorers created contact between Europe and the Americas. The interaction with Native Americans began the exchange of animals, plants, disease, and weapons. The most significant effects that the Colombian Exchange had on the Old World and New World were its changes in agriculture, disease, culture, and its effects on ecology.
The Columbian Exchange is the exchange of plants, animals, food, and diseases between Europe and the Americas. In 1492, when Christopher Columbus came to America, he saw plants and animals he had never seen before so he took them back with him to Europe. Columbus began the trade routes which had never been established between Europe and the Americas so his voyages initiated the interchange of plants between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres, which doubled the food crop resources available to people on both sides of the Atlantic.
Colonization of the new world had may aspects behind it, including but not limited to the of exploring of new sectors of the world, to the expansion of empires, and the hopes of gaining wealth and higher social standings. These same principals of colonization are illustrated in both Castaways, Cabeza De Vaca’s personal narrative of his journey to the new world and Andres Resendez’s A Land So Strange an interpretation of Cabeza’s expedition. Both pieces of literature excellently demonstrate the hopes of people journeying to the new world and the shortcomings and tribulations the expeditioners did not anticipate or were prepared for. Within the two books Cabeza De Vaca and Panifilo Narvaez demonstrate this very struggle people faced. While it
After briefly explaining the origins of the book in Restall’s experience of teaching the history of the conquest period, he first addresses the notion that a few “exceptional” individuals - Christopher Columbus, Hernando Cortes, and Francisco
The first chapter begins in 1513 with the Spanish making first landfall on American soil in San Augustin, Florida and chronicles the many failed attempts that preceded their final success of establishing settlements along the East coast of North America during a span of fifty two years. From there, the book is divided into three parts with part one of the story picking up in 1565 and focuses on the European’s success in establishing five major settlements that would further serve as points of their continued invasion into North America. These five critical bases for European invasion included the Spanish in Florida, the French in Quebec, the Dutch in New York and the English in Virginia and Massachusetts; consequently, for the next one hundred and twenty-five years these bases would serve as interaction points that consisted of feuding and finally integrating one another into each other’s social problems. Next, part two of the book takes place from 1687 and follows the war between the French and English for dominance of North America and explains what it all meant for the Amerindians in their quest to maintain the war between the invaders . The second part of the book covers a span of fifty-one years and illustrates the degree of violence and bloodshed that took place in the settling of the
The Columbian exchange was the exchange of goods and products that occurred when the Europeans came to America. Some of the items exchanged included potatoes and tomatoes, which originated in America, and wheat and rice, which originated in Europe. Because of this exchange, certain dishes are possible to be made. For example, tomatoes are a popular ingredient in Italian dishes, but they originated in America. Because of the Columbian exchange, Italians were able to adapt tomatoes to be included in their dishes. Similarly, there are many dishes which also cannot be possible without the exchange. This will go in-depth into a few dishes and see if they could be made without the Columbian exchange.
A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies is one of the earliest written sources that serves as evidence of interaction between the Europeans and the New World during the Spanish conquest of the 15th century. Not only does the work provide evidence of a historical event but it also illustrates the growing connectivity of the world at this time period. While the expeditions from Spain to the New World were sent with the purpose of spreading Christianity and collecting gold, the Spanish broke the rules they had with the king by killing millions of native peoples and taking most of the gold for themselves.
We first start by looking at the individuals who participated in the conquest, primarily Columbus, Cortes, and Pizarro. We often place these people on pedestals so to speak and admire what they were able to accomplish. However, when we delve into it all, Restall notes that in many cases, in particular Columbus, we realize that his greatest accomplishment, supposedly “discovering the New World,” was an accident. “In fact, the most exceptional thing about Columbus’ geographical vision was that it was wrong. His achievements were the result of historical accident and his role in the historical process was far larger than he was. ” Restall puts tremendous focus on the role that the predecessors to Columbus, Cortez, and Pizzaro played in the success of the conquests. Many writers ignore this factor and place much, if not all of the success in the hands of these few. The reality is that many of these “successes” were in fact accidents, and those that were not were aided by years of prior attempts and failures. In Columbus’ case, he failed dozens of times and had a very small network of people. The fact that he was able to get another chance at an expedition is a miracle.