Guns, Germs, and Steel
The book Guns, Germs, and Steel is about how many different things attributed to the succession of societies versus the destruction of other societies. The book starts out with the author, Jared Diamond, in New Guinea talking to a New Guinean politician named Yali. Yali asked Diamond "Why white men developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea where we black people had little cargo of our own?" Diamond was determined to seek an answer to Yali's question. Diamond surrounds his answer on how "History followed different courses for different people because of differences among peoples' environments, not because of biological differences among peoples themselves" (Diamond 25).
Diamond first looks at the Maori and Moriori civilizations. The Moriori were an isolated civilization that lived on an island about 500 miles east of New Zealand. They were primitive hunter-gatherers, who always settled altercations peacefully. The Maori were from New Zealand's north island and were always engaged in combat which forced them to create more advanced weapons and also forced them to have strong leadership skills. Weather and geography also played a big role in the two totally different lifestyles. The Maori's tropical climate made it possible for them to produce their own food. The Moriori's lived in a much cooler climate which made it almost impossible for them to produce their own food which is why they had to resort to being hunter-gatherers and had no extra people to work on specialty jobs. The Maori also had a much bigger island to live on which means they were able to have more people live on the island. The big population difference along with advancement in weapons and technology greatly helped the Maori people conquer the Moriori people.
Diamond next looks at Francisco Pizarro's capture of an Incan monarch. The monarch, Atahuallpa, was at Cajamarca square after battles with other Indian tribes. Along with Atahuallpa was his 80,000 man army. Following Atahuallpa was Pizarro with 168 Spanish soldiers. While his men were greatly out numbered, Pizarro's troops had far more advanced weaponry and military technology in their cavalry and guns. Because of this advantage Pizarro was able to capture Atahuallpa while most of the monarch's soldiers, so spooked by the firing of the soldiers' guns, retreated back. The Spanish, who had domesticated the horse, and a variety of crops, were able to employ more people to research new technologies and weapons.
“History followed different courses for different peoples because of differences among peoples ' environments, not because of biological differences among peoples themselves” (Jared Diamond). In the book Guns Germs and Steel he accounted a conversation with Yali, a New Guinean politician that had asked “Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own?”. Diamond tries to answer this by describing the difference in use of government throughout history by bands, tribes, chiefdoms, and states.
The reason Jared Diamond wrote this book was to answer the question of his political friend Yali, why did some societies like Eurasia were able to develop Guns, Germs, and Steel that were able to dominate major parts of the world, and why New Guinea was not capable of doing this? This question is certainly not a small picture kind of question because it covers a broad realm. Diamond is a book that has tried his best to cover a whole pattern of history, starting from before the Ice Age to the modern period. But Diamond's all-time famous and award-winning book was really successful in explaining the broad question. Such a type of question is critical to gain a stronger understanding of Diamond’s argument and its effect on the field of history.
Slide 3- on the new expedition Pizarro brought with him a man by the name of Diego de Almargo in 1532 and used Ecuador as the staging point for new invasion of Inca Empire.
Why did certain early civilizations thrive and some fail? Jared Diamond, a famous author and scientist, explains in his book Guns, Germs, and Steel. He believes civilizations like the ones in Europe thrived because of geographical luck. Geographic luck is the idea that people in some areas got luckier than others. For example, the Fertile Crescent had a warm, moist climate, and fertile soil to grow wheat and barley, while people that lived in places like Papua New Guinea had to hunt, and forage for their food. Geographic luck aided the European empire, and was the reason they became so powerful. One of the key reasons Europe did so well was farming. Another reason they were able to conquer so much of the world was their well-placed civilization. Finally, Europe’s weapons, made from steel, were much more advanced than the weapons possessed by the rest of the world, and they came from their good geographic placement. Understanding geography’s role in Europe’s technological advancement is important, and to do so you must look at how they became powerful in the first place, which is because of farming, and domestication.
“History followed different courses for different peoples because of differences among peoples’ environments, not because of biological differences among people themselves.”(Diamond 25) This statement is the thesis for Jared Diamond’s book Guns Germs and Steel the Fates of Human Societies.
Francisco Pizarro: Spanish explorer who discovered and conquered the Inca Empire, nowadays Peru. Hernán Cortés: Spanish explorer who discovered and conquered the Aztec Empire, nowadays central Mexico.
Atahualpa was convinced by the nobility Incas of Quito and Tumibamba that he had to fight against Huáscar. So a great army was prepared that was in charge of generals Quisquis, Calcuchímac and Rumiñahui, and they also did a ceremony, to put it on a red mascaypacha, for recognize Atahualpa the new sovereignly of Tahuantinsuyo.
The Europeans colonized most of America because they saw the land they had available where they could expand their influence on the world. Also, they were able to establish colonies that sent raw materials home which would make them money. Through the analysis of Jared Diamonds video Guns, Germs, and Steel, this essay will show that the Europeans were able to conquer the Native American’s so easily because of their geography, weapons, and diseases.
The light skinned and bearded Spaniard led his men into territory occupied by the Aztec civilization. Little did Cortes know, but that happened to be the same year in the Aztec culture when a white and bearded deity was expected to arrive. Montezuma, the Aztec’s ruler, greeted Cortes with honors fit for a God and opened up his empire for Spanish invasion. Cortes and his followers, equipped with the most up to date technology of the time, successfully caused the demise of the Aztec civilization. However, the most contemporary weaponry and technology did not solely destroy the Aztecs.
First, in 1521, Hernán Cortés and a small Spanish army captured the Aztec emperor along with the empire’s capital city of Tenochtitlan. Later, in 1533, another conquistador, Francisco Pizarro, executed the Incan emperor and plundered the Incan capital of Cuzco. The Spaniards’ gunpowder weapons and steel armor easily outmatched the more primitive weaponry of the indigenous Americans, who had a very limited knowledge of metallurgy. Furthermore, after taking decisive control of much of the Americas, the Spanish Crown brought over Iberian legal codes and established a bureaucratic empire, appointing officials and instituting courts. Finally, under the encomienda system, the Crown granted conquistadors large tracts of land and a number of Native American laborers, who were forced to work in plantations or mines. Under Spanish governance, indigenous groups lost a large degree of
Before the 15th century, the Indians in the Americas were not connected with the world and would remain that way until Columbus's exploration. In the beginning of 15th century, the Aztecs were the dominant group in Mesoamerica leaded by Montezuma, the last leader, before the Spanish conquest. In 1519, Hernan Cortez led the Spanish mission to explore and conquer the New World. This paper will compare three primary sources about this event. First, an informing letter sent from Cortez to King Charles V, the king of Spain. Second, the Broken Spears which is an Indian recollection about the conquest of Mexico. Lastly, Bernal Diaz’s (one of Cortez’s men) account was written by him to share his experience with Aztec civilization. Moreover, this paper will show the credibility of Diaz’s account compared to the other sources because the objectivity of his tone, written after a while of the event, and the author’s great experience and his independent purpose of the source.
The first examples are used to support the lack of progression of society. The “civilized” man of the Americas and Europe is compared to the “savages” of New Zealand.
Throughout history, the way civilizations have changed over time have varied greatly, in the specific environment civilizations where located. Civilizations can be located near rivers, trough arid land, and with predictable or unpredictable climate. With the environment being anything form the surrounding vegetation, to neighboring villages that may pose a potential threat. Civilizations need to establish themselves within the environment has led many to warfare and others to collapse. The specific environment civilizations lived in can be either an advantage or disadvantage. Changing the way the political and economic structure of the people’s specific civilization varied greatly on the resources that was
The history of New Zealand begins between 800 A.D. and 1300 A.D., when the Māori people arrived from Polynesia to the mountainous island they called “Aotearoa.” The people “lived in tribal groups” fairly peacefully (Wilson). However, life began to change for the Māori people when they first came into contact with a European in 1642, when Dutch explorer Abel Tasman “discovered” the island. In 1769, “[James] Cook successfully circumnavigated and mapped the country” (History). These explorations marked the beginning of Europeanization for the young country of New Zealand. Whalers and traders soon arrived, and missionaries arrived in 1814. When the Māori met with Europeans, events followed a similar path to the colonization of America and the decimation of the native populations-- “contribution of guns…, along with European diseases, led to a steep decline in the [population of] Māori people.” (History). Consequentially, “their chieftains entered into a compact with Britain, the Treaty of Waitangi, in which they ceded sovereignty to Queen Victoria while retaining territorial rights,” in...
The Neolithic Revolution while fantastic did one thing that would change the course of history, it was at its heart the domination of humans over everything else. As the author explains, “ The Old World Neolithic Revolution, for all it's dazzling advantages in metallurgy, the arts, writing, politics, and city life was at its base a matter of direct control and exploitation of many species for the s...