1. Europe at the Dawn of the 16 th Century An overview of factors leading to the European Age of Exploration

2. Phoenicians in America?

3. Irish visitation? ► St. Brendan ► ca. 510 ► Welsh prince Madoc, ca. 1170 – Mobile Bay

5. Scandinavians ► Eric the Red, Leif Ericson ► Iceland, Greenland, Vinland ► Colony in Newfoundland

7. Crusades ► 1095 – 1291

8. Interaction of Christianity and Islam Establishment of Crusader States Growth of trade (Templars) Shift in European power structure Learning, money, and new ideas lay foundation for the Renaissance

9. Renaissance ► “Rebirth”; 14 th -17 th centuries ► Wealth allows for patronage ► New instruments and knowledge ► Strong interest in classical culture ► Secular worldview ► Scientific advancement ► Printing Press

10. Zheng He ► Enormous fleets in the Indian Ocean during the Early Ming Dynasty (ca. 1421) ► Gavin Menzies (1421: The Year China Discovered the World) claims ships under Zheng He’s command circumnavigated the globe. ► Certainly traded in Africa, India, and with the Arabs, but the Americas?…not so much: Menzies claims that Chinese mariners explored the islands of Cape Verde, the Azores, the Bahamas, and the Falklands; they established colonies in Australia, New Zealand, British Columbia, California, Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Rhode Island; they introduced horses to the Americas, rice to California, chickens to South America, coffee to Puerto Rico, South American sloths to Australia, sea otters to New Zealand, and maize to the Philippines. In addition, Chinese seamen toured the temples and palaces of the Maya center of Palenque in Mexico, hunted walruses and smelted copper in Greenland, mined for lead and saltpeter in northern Australia, and established trading posts for diamonds along the Amazon and its tributaries.

11. Religion in Medieval Europe ► Western Europe – Catholic  Popes in Rome, Avignon  Only form of Christianity in Western Europe for 1000 years  Deeply involved in secular affairs ► Eastern Europe – Orthodox  Patriarchs in Constantinople, political interference in Russia  Ramifications for people living near Russia ► Eastern Mediterranean, Balkans, North Africa – Muslim  No central religious authority  Ottomans run a pretty secular state ► Scattered throughout the above – Jews  No central religious authority; formed communities around synagogues  A culture within a culture

12. Religion ► Spain: Reconquista & Inquisition ► Protestant Reformation (1517) ► Calvinism (ca. 1540)  Reformed/Congregational/ Presbyterian ► Counter-Reformation  Jesuit Order (est. 1534) ► Church of England (Anglican & Episcopalian) (1534)