The “New World”1491-1607

Essential Questions:

• What impact did the Columbian Exchange have on both American Indian and European societies?

• How did Spanish, French, Dutch, and British differ in their treatment of American Indians? Causes?

Cultures of Central & South America• Archeologists believe first migrants

arrived 40,000 ago from Asia via Bering land bridge

• Advanced civilizations: Maya (AD 300-800) in Yucatan Peninsula, Aztecs in central Mexico – Tenochtitlan pop. of 200,000, Incas in Peruvian Andes

• Highly organized, trade routes, calendars, and agricultural systems

Cultures of North America• Population of N. America (U.S. & Canada) in 1490s

historians est. between 1 to 10 million or higher• Mostly small societies of 300 people or less – hunting (men)

& gathering, & farming (female)m, many matriarchal, and were animists

• Language: diverse more than 20 language families and 400 languages – largest Algonquin in Northeast

• Southwest: Pueblo – farming, cliff caves, brick buildings• Northwest: longhouses – hunting & gathering, fishing• Great Plains: nomadic, tepees, buffalo hunters – horse from

Spanish in 1600s• East: woodland – hunting & gathering, fishing, farming

permanent settlements – fur trade. Iroquois Confederacy in Mohawk Valley of NY most powerful

Causes of European Exploration• Technology improvements: gunpowder

(China), sailing compass (China via Arabs), shipbuilding, mapmaking, printing press.

• Religion: Spreading of Catholic faith (Spain & Portugal) after conquest of Spain by 1492. Protestant Reformation (England & Holland) -spreading rival versions of Christianity

• Expanding trade routes to Asia & development of slave trade for labor

• Development of nation-states that relied on trade and the church

Early Exploration & Contact• Columbus 1492 (Ferdinand & Isabella of Spain)

arrived in Bahamas the “Indies”• Columbus controversial legacy?• Columbian Exchange: transfer of plants, animals,

and germs/diseases. From America: beans, corn, potatoes, tomatoes, tobacco & syphilis. From Europeans: sugarcane, pigs, horses, wheels, iron tools, guns & variety of diseases smallpox, measles.

• Treaty of Tordesillas 1494 Spain & Portugal• Spanish conquistadores – search for gold

“requerimiento”• Encomienda system: land grants & natives to

Spaniards• Asiento system: slave trade from W. Africa taxes

supported monarch

English, French & Dutch• Both England & France behind Spain

occupied by European wars & internal religious conflict

• England: John Cabot explores Newfoundland 1497. Queen Elizabeth I in 1580s Sir Francis Drake raids Spanish ships, Sir Walter Raleigh failed colony of Roanoke in 1587. Jamestown in 1607.

• France: Jacques Cartier (1534-1542) explored St. Lawrence river (Canada), Samuel de Champlain “Father of New France” founds Quebec in 1608 settlements extend down Mississippi River down to Louisiana by 1682 – fur trade “coureurs de bois”

• Dutch: Henry Hudson in 1609 “Hudson River” establish “New Netherlands” and “New Amsterdam” trade of Dutch West India Company (joint-stock company)

Spanish Settlements in N. America• Florida: St. Augustine founded 1565

oldest permanent European settlement

• New Mexico: Santa Fe 1610, imposing Christianity led to Pueblo Revolt led by Pope in 1680 controlled until 1693

• Forced Spanish to compromise• Texas: small settlements – grow in

early 1700s• California: San Diego 1769, San

Francisco 1776, Mission system set up by 1784 Father Junipero Sera

European Treatment of Native Americans• Clashing views of nature & land: animism vs.

culture of capitalism• Spain: rigid caste “casta” system. Bartolome de

Las Casas critical of treatment led to “New Laws of 1542” end Native American slavery. Valladolid Debate: Las Casas vs. Juan Gines de Sepulveda 1550-1551

• England: initial coexistence and trade in certain areas but eventual warfare & expulsion of “savages” – some “praying towns”

• French: coexistence – fur trade, intermarriage, alliances – Jesuit missionaries.

• Dutch developed trade alliances especially with the Iroquois – fur trade.

• Native American reaction: some tribes opened trade networks, some formed alliances with Europeans against other tribes, some resisted or migrated west away from Europeans