The Age of Exploration
A meeting of Different Worlds: 1100-1700
Vocabulary needed:
- Crusades: Christians that joined the religious wars to get back the Holy Land
Conquistadors: Spanish Explorers
Magnetic Compass: An object with a needle that always points north. Helped captains of ships travel
Astrolabe: A tool that helped the position of the stars and latitude at sea
Caravel: A ship with triangular sails and steering Rudder
Colony: A group of people who settled in a distant land and are ruled by the government of their native land
Presido: Forts where soldiers lived
Mercantilism: Exporting more than you import - ** Improved maps: With the creation of longitude and Latitude system, maps were more accurate **
Causes of the Age of Exploration
Gold:
- Opportunity for wealth
- In the form of new resources and colonies
God:
- Chance to convert new people to their religion
- Used missionary mission to complete this
Glory:
- Need to find new trading routes to Asia (This would make them famous)
- Asia had spices that were highly desirable, specially for the preservation of food (Salt)
- Europeans wanted to stop the Muslim and Italian control of Asian trade
Possible Risks:
- Very little food (Starvation)
- Diseases (On the boats)
- Attacks (From other countries with the same route)
- Death (There is always death)
Influential Explorers:
Portuguese explorers:
Bartolomeu Dias:
- In 1488: Became the first to travel around the southern tip of Africa
- Dias dies at sea and never made it to India
Vasco de Gama:
- In 1497: Sailed around Africa all the way to India
- He brought back with him many valuable spices, however on his return he lost half his crew (Death!)
Spanish Explorers:
Christopher Columbus:
- In 1492: Italian but sailed for Spain searching for a faster route to India
- Landed in the caribbean sea instead.
- Credited with discovering the Americas
Ferdinand Magellan:
- In 1519: Set sail with five ships and 250 men to circumnavigate (To circle) the globe
- Magellan died during the journey and only 18 men survived to complete the task
Hernan Cortes:
- In 1519: traveled to Mexico to explore
- They came up against the mighty Aztec empire
- Cortes took their emperor Montezuma captive and took over the Aztec empire
Francisco Pizarro:
- In 1520: Traveled for South America in order to conquer the Incas
- Used their emperor to take over the Inca Empire
Effects of the Age of Exploration:
R.A.C.E.D
R: Rigid class system in Latin America
A: African Slave trade
- The conquistadors helped set this up, This greatly controls the lives of the people
A: African Slave trade
- African salves were brought on the "Middle Passage"
- The global exchange of food, plants and animals is known as the Colombian Exchange.
- Mercantilism: Export more than you import
- To do this European countries need resources
- This leads to --> European getting rich and the New World getting conquered, controlled, and "robbed"
- Europeans brought new disease that created epidemics