1. NEW WORLD BEGINNINGS

2. THE BEGINNING
Cross from Eurasia via Bering Bridge for 25,000 years, although…..
10,000 years ago – became Bering Strait
54 million in Americas by time of Columbus’ arrival
Sophisticated Indian civilizations – why?
Cultivation of maize… turned nomads into settled peoples
…there is some controversial evidence that some early settlers came by boat.
What is the geologically oldest mountain chain in North America? Appalachians (350 million years – Rockies, etc. 135 to 25 million years)
Advanced Indian civilizations in spite of fact that they had no wheel, no horses, oxen, etc.
Agriculture was reason for their success. Turned nomads into settled peoples—starting with Mexico and South America.

3. MAYAN CIVILIZATION 500 B.C. Yucatan Peninsula (Belize, Guatemala…)
System of numbers - concept of zero
Calendar, Astronomy
Temple Pyramids
Mostly wiped out by the Spanish in the 1500s
Mayan Ruins of Tulum

4. INCAS 11th Century Peru & South America
Vast empire of > 12 million people; longest empire in the world – Colombia to Chile (1,850 miles); totalitarian
Very advanced engineers: 10,000 mile long road system; suspension bridges
Reincarnation; cranial deformation
INCAS
They achieved cranial deformation by wrapping tight cloth straps around the heads of newborns in order to alter the shape of their soft skulls into a more conical form; this cranial deformation was made to distinguish social classes of the communities, with only the nobility having cranial deformation.

5. AZTECS 13th Century Central Mexico Aggressive; warriors
Daily human sacrifices
Valued gold highly – why?
Advanced architecture that used much gold
Leader, Montezuma - destroyed by Spanish (Cortes) in 1521
Spanish built Mexico City at that site
Note though: Aztecs valued gold for its durability – not as a form of $. This lack of concern for material goods will cause many Europeans to view them as childlike and not to be treated as equals.

6. AZTEC CITY OF TENOCHTITLAN
Religious center of the city
City’s population was more than 300,000
10 sq. miles – larger than London, Rome or Venice

7. NORTH AMERICAN INDIAN CULTURE
No dense populations like Aztecs
Significance for Europeans?
Became agricultural villagers with spread of corn cultivation from Mexico
Reached southwest
Anasazi, first
1200 B.C.
Irrigation
PUEBLOS
North America’s lack of dense Indian populations is one of reasons Europeans will defeat them so easily when they come.

8. PUEBLOS are the oldest standing buildings in North America – located in the “Four Corners”
Anasazi built a 600 interconnected room pueblo at Chaco Canyon, NM.

9. PUEBLOS, Mesa Verde, Colorado

11. North American Cultures developed according to geographic regions:
Iroquois – NE farmers
Greatest American Indian “nation”
Hiawatha
Iroquois Confederacy
Longhouses
Creeks, Cherokees, Choctaws, Seminoles, Chickasaw - SE
“Three-Sister Farming”
“Civilized Tribes”
Democratic; dense populations
Plains Indians:
Central U.S
hunter-gatherers
buffalo
Mostly small, scattered, impermanent settlements by time of European arrival. EXCEPT FOR IROQUOIS. Iroquois are closest in NAmerica to the great Indian “nation states” created by Aztecs & Incas. Well organized politically; military alliance.
The Iroquois lived in large bark-covered, barrel-roofed longhouses which extended up to four hundred feet long and twenty-five feet wide. A single longhouse could shelter up to a dozen families through a harsh winter, each with its own private space and a fire it shared with others. Longhouses had either one or two entrances, each adorned with the clan animal of the resident family. Doorways were covered with hide or bark doors. Roofs had covered fire holes that could be opened to provide ventilation and light. The family sections contained raised platforms covered with reed mats or pelts that served as seats during the day and beds at night. Articles of clothing were hung on the walls or stored in bark bins and baskets along with food and supplies. In the warmer months, cooking and other domestic activities took place outside the longhouse.
“Three-sister farming” = maize, beans & squash
Beans grew on trellis of cornstalks & squash grew on the planting mounds.
Creeks, Choctaw, Cherokees – high population densities as a result.

12. A CLASH OF VALUES NATIVE AMERICANS EUROPEANS Monotheistic Polytheistic
Women’s roles stronger
Male-dominated society
Valued prestige more
than possessions
Materialistic – high value
on $ and possessions
Believed the land
belonged to all
Strong belief in land
ownership
Indians dismissed by Europeans as “heathens” or servants of Satan.
Others saw them as incapable of becoming Christian
Others as incapable of rational judgment so they could be excused for not knowing better – childlike.
Families defined by
blood lines
Families defined by
marriage lines

13. First Discovers of North America
Vikings / Norse
1200 A.D.
Newfoundland
a/k/a “Vinland”
Eric the Red
Leif Ericson
No government support….no permanent settlement
“Newfoundland” = Vinland / named so by Norse for all the wild grapes there.

14. Other discoverers of the New World:
Christian Crusaders…how?
Marco Polo – book stimulated European desires for cheaper route to treasures of the East
Portuguese create caravel
& sail along West Africa
Prince Henry the Navigator
Become slave traders
40,000 slaves to sugar islands in last half of 15th century
While Crusaders trying to take the Holy Land from Muslim control in 11th to 14th centuries, acquired taste for Asian exotic goods like silk, perfumes, spices (SUGAR), dyes, etc. – led to desire to find a less expensive route to Asia.
Polo – 1295 back to Europe; travels took 20 years (did he really ever go to China?)
Caravel is a ship that can sail more closely into the wind – needed along the coast of West Africa.

15. SHIFT IN COURSE OF HISTORY:
Fueled by:
Spain becoming modern nation-state
Desire for more and cheaper products from lands beyond Mediterranean
Africa – a source of cheap slave labor for plantations
Portuguese demonstrated feasibility of long-range ocean navigation
Spirit of the Renaissance
Spain had become united: Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile and had gotten rid of Muslim Moors from Spain after centuries of Islamic-Christian warfare. Became nation state with unity, wealth & power to embark on New World exploration and colonization.
Renaissance bred spirit of adventure – optimism, ambition…

16. ENTER COLUMBUS … Genoa, Italy Financed by Spain…rulers?
Born in right place, right time
Financed by Spain…rulers?
Devout Catholic, good salesman
What was he promised?
Political Control over islands he discovered
10% of profits of trade
Title: Admiral of the Ocean Sea
San Salvador, Bahamas, Oct. 1492
Made 3 more voyages
Right place - Connected to Asia, Africa, Europe gold, slave and spice trades
Right time – Fall of Constantinople, rise of Muslim Ottoman Turks – spice trades, seeking new routes to East
Also, Brother was mapmaker in Portugal, married a captain’s daughter
Convinced Isabella with mixture of classics, myths, sailor’s tales
6 week voyage before landing at San Salvador. Probably the worst sailor on his ship – almost a mutiny.
“…Columbus did not ‘seize the times,’ rather he reflected the times and he was not especially learned.”
“…Columbus never allowed facts to stand in the way of theories”

17. Columbus never recognized a new continent;
Third voyage
On 30 May 1498, Columbus left with six ships from Sanlúcar, Spain, for his third trip to the New World.
Columbus led the fleet to the Portuguese island of Porto Santo, his wife's native land. He then sailed to Madeira and spent some time there with the Portuguese captain João Gonçalves da Camara before sailing to the Canary Islands and Cape Verde. Columbus landed on the south coast of the island of Trinidad on 31 July. From 4 August through 12 August he explored the Gulf of Paria which separates Trinidad from Venezuela. He explored the mainland of South America, including the Orinoco River. He also sailed to the islands of Chacachacare and Margarita Island and sighted and named Tobago (Bella Forma) and Grenada (Concepcion).
Columbus returned to Hispaniola on 19 August to find that many of the Spanish settlers of the new colony were discontented, having been misled by Columbus about the supposedly bountiful riches of the new world. An entry in his journal from September 1498 reads, "From here one might send, in the name of the Holy Trinity, as many slaves as could be sold..." Since Columbus supported the enslavement of the Hispaniola natives for economic reasons, he ultimately refused to baptize them, as Catholic law forbade the enslavement of Christians.[53]
He had some of his crew hanged for disobeying him. A number of returning settlers and sailors lobbied against Columbus at the Spanish court, accusing him and his brothers of gross mismanagement. On his return he was arrested for a period (see Governorship and arrest section below).
The Court appointed Francisco de Bobadilla, a member of the Order of Calatrava, but not as the aide that Columbus had requested. Instead, Bobadilla was given complete control as governor from 1500 until his death in Arriving in Santo Domingo while Columbus was away, Bobadilla was immediately peppered with complaints about all three Columbus brothers: Christopher, Bartolomé, and Diego. Consuelo Varela, a Spanish historian, states: "Even those who loved him [Columbus] had to admit the atrocities that had taken place."[59][60]
Columbus before the Queen, imagined[61] by Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze, 1843
As a result of these testimonies and without being allowed a word in his own defense, Columbus, upon his return, had manacles placed on his arms and chains on his feet and was cast into prison to await return to Spain. He was 48 years old.
On 1 October 1500, Columbus and his two brothers, likewise in chains, were sent back to Spain.
According to an uncatalogued document supposedly discovered very late in history purporting to be a record of Columbus's trial which contained the alleged testimony of 23 witnesses, Columbus regularly used barbaric acts of torture to govern Hispaniola.[53]
Columbus and his brothers lingered in jail for six weeks before busy King Ferdinand ordered their release. Not long after, the king and queen summoned the Columbus brothers to the Alhambra palace in Granada. There the royal couple heard the brothers' pleas; restored their freedom and wealth; and, after much persuasion, agreed to fund Columbus's fourth voyage. But the door was firmly shut on Columbus's role as governor. Henceforth Nicolás de Ovando y Cáceres was to be the new governor of the West Indies.
Columbus never recognized a new continent;
he was convinced he was in India, China, Japan or Ethiopia.
Query: is it more important to find some place or to know what one has found?

18. Columbian Exchange MAJOR EFFECT of Columbus’ “discovery”
Interdependent global economic system results from Columbus’ voyages
Europe provides markets, capital, technology & New World provides raw materials
Major negative effect of exchange is transfer of diseases
Syphilis to Old World
Smallpox to New World
Entire cultures wiped out by entry of the Spanish
Click on chart for video on importance of the Columbian Exchange:
Interdependent system: Europe provides markets, capital ($) and technology / New World provides raw materials – metals, soil for sugar cane…
3/5 of crops in world today originated in Americas.
ANIMALS
TURKEYS, GUINEA PIGS, RATTLESNAKES, BUFFALO, RACCOONS from Americas to Europe.
HORSES, CHICKENS, PIGS, COWS, GOATS, SHEEP, RATS, OXEN from Europe to Americas.
Columbus brought horses to Hispaniola (Haiti/Dom.Rep.) in horses soon spread as far north as Canada & were adopted by Plains Indians.
Columbus brought sugar cane – “sugar revolution” in European diet – millions of Africans come to work fields and mills.
Effect of diseases – good example is Hispaniola – from 1 million to 200 people within 50 years of Spain’s arrival.
Depopulation caused by Spanish so severe that entire cultures wiped out.

19. TREATY OF TORDESILLAS
To resolve dispute between Spain & Portugal after Columbus’ return
1494 Treaty:
Spain gets all of New World but Brazil
Portugal gets Brazil – continues to concentrate on Africa
Line of demarcation halfway between Cape Verde Islands (already Portuguese) & islands discovered by Columbus on 1st voyage
Even though the treaty was negotiated without consulting the Pope, a few sources call the resulting line the Papal Line of Demarcation

20. SPANISH CONQUISTADORES
Their mission?
“God, Gold and Glory!”- to serve God & King & get rich
“Conquistadors first fell on their knees & then on the aborigines.”
Indians saw Spanish as “gods”
Horses & gunpowder quickly overpowered Indians
New race of “mestizos” developed
Mixed Indian & European
Spanish missions established
“Encomienda” system ….Indian slavery
Spain is THE major exploration and colonizing power in 1500s.
Encomienda technique used in West Indies – trial run before use to try and subdue great Indian civilizations in Mexico/Peru.
It allowed government to “commend” or give Indians to certain
colonists in return for promise to try to Christianize them.
Really nothing more than slavery.

21. Other Spanish Explorers
Balboa – discovers Pacific, 1513
Ponce de Leon – Florida (“Feast of Flowers”)
Coronado – AZ & NM, Grand Canyon, buffalo
Hernando de Soto – MS River valley
Pizzaro – destroys Incas
Cortes – destroys Aztecs
HOW?
Ponce de Leon thought FL was an island at first – came looking for gold. How did he die? (arrow)
Coronado, – looking for “golden cities” but got pueblos.
De Soto had been great abuser of Indians (dogs, iron collars). Died of fever & wounds & troops secretly disposed of body in MS River so Indians couldn’t exhume & abuse his corpse as he had done to them.
Pizzaro – 1532 destroyed Incas. Gave Spanish huge areas of silver.
Cortes able to defeat Aztecs because he picked up interpreters who could understand the language, had better firepower, Montezuma’s belief that he was a “god” , allies with Indian enemies of the Aztecs, and a smallpox epidemic. At first, Montezuma welcomed him – but Spanish lust for gold wore out their welcome & Aztecs attacked. Cortes then attacked & that same year smallpox raged through.

22. Ferdinand Magellan – first to circumnavigate the globe
Started with 5 ships in Magellan himself didn’t make it – slain by Filipinos. Only 1 of 4 ships actually mae it – 1522.
By end of the 16th century, Spain ready to colonize.

23. Spanish Empire Grew Swiftly
Out of need to protect against French, English encroachment
Also to convert more Indian souls to Christianity
Established St. Augustine, 1565
Oldest European settlement
in U.S.
A move to block French
ambitions in N. America and
protect sea lanes to the Caribbean.

24. The Spanish in the Southwest
NEW MEXICO
Brutal abuse of Indians
Roman Catholic missions
Missionaries suppressed Indian cultural practices
Pueblo Revolt, 1680
Pope, leader
Rebels destroyed all Catholic churches in NM, killed hundreds of priests & Spanish settlers; drove out rest
Took more than 50 yrs. for SP to reclaim NM
Pueblos drove out more than 2000 Spanish
Most important cause was likely the attempt of Spanish to destroy Pueblo’s religion -- banning traditional dances and religious icons such as kachina dolls

25. In TX by 1716 and establishing missions San Antonio
CA not focused on until 1760s – why not?
Missions from San Diego to north of
San Francisco
Father Junipera Serra
“Mission Indians”
Texas settlements to protect against French encroachment – LaSalle coming down the MS River
No early focus on CA since no other Europeans were trying to take it/settle there
Father Junipero Serra – missions from San Diego to Sonoma. Taught Indians horticulture and crafts and Christianity. Many died due to disease

26. THE BLACK LEGEND Spanish conquerors tortured and butchered Indians
Stole Gold
Infected Indians with smallpox
Left behind misery
On the other hand….
Were empire builders
Cultural innovators
Merged their culture with the Indians
THE BLACK LEGEND

27. How do their patterns of colonization differ?
The French, English and Dutch are soon on their way to the New World to compete with Spain.
How do their patterns of colonization differ?
Location?
Time period?
Motives?
Religion?
Land ownership?
Differences in patterns of colonization:
Locations – see map
Time period –
Spanish first in Central/South America; N. America (Santa Fe) by 1610
English & French early 1600s – same as SP in N. America
Dutch – 1620s-1650s
Motives-
SP – God, Gold, Glory - conquistadores
BR – mixed – gold/better life – families
FR – single men as fur traders, missionaries
Religion – BR are Protestants; SP & FR are Catholic
Land Ownership-
SP & Dutch – wealthy
FR – not much….lived among Indians
BR – major importance….not just to wealthy