Exploration and Colonization Motives, Means, Adventurers, Administration, Results
Jan 18, 2016
Exploration and Colonization
Motives, Means, Adventurers, Administration, Results
Psalter map, 13th century
Medieval T-O map
Johannes Schöner map, 1520
Motives
Desire for wealth (gold, silver, silks, spices, profits to avoid Ottoman/Arab middlemen)
Missionary (Prince Henry, Jesuits) Glory (conquistadors) Curiosity
Means
Navigational Advances (compass, astrolabe, quadrant, dead reckoning, caravel/lateen sail, problem of longitude)
Organization (requires….) Centralized States (Portugal, Spain, no Italy) Determination (Columbus, Magellan) Military Technology (cannons, steel, etc.)
Explorers and “Ruthless People”
Prince Henry “the Navigator” (Sagres) Columbus (4 voyages) Vasco de Gama (1000% profit) Magellan Cortez and Pizarro St. Francis Xavier (and de Las Casas) fate of Balboa, Hudson, Pizarro, Magellan,
Cabot
Control
Spain--most centralized of all powers Council of Indies (Seville) Vice-Royalties and Captaincies-General Audiencias Encomienda (leads to exploitation/slavery) Catholic Church and missionaries de las Casas and reforms of 1542
“A Tectonic Shift in History”
Dietary Changes---”Columbian Exchange” Disease and Slavery (native pop. Disaster) National Rivalries Increase (later…
commercial wars) New Views of the World European sense of superiority and also
relativism