Chapter 1

v     THE GREAT BIOLOGICAL EXCHANGE

• “more than a difference of cultures: it was a difference of distinctive biological systems”

-      Exchange of Animals:

§         American: Iguanas, flying squirrels, catfish, rattlesnakes, bison…

§         European: Horses, cattle, pigs, sheep, goats, chickens

-      Exchange of plant life (“a revolution of the diets of both hemispheres):

§         American: maize, potatoes, beans

§         European: rice, wheat, barley, oats, wine grapes, melons, coffee, olives, bananas, Kentucky bluegrass, daisies, dandelions

§         The food from the new world helped nourish a worldwide population explosion

-      Exchange of devices:

§         American: canoes, snowshoes, hammocks, kayaks, ponchos, lacrosse

-      Exchange of language:

§         American: tobacco, moose, warpath, warpaint, Miami, tomahawk, pecan, raccoon…

-      Exchange of drugs:

§         American: tobacco, coca, curare

-      Exchange of disease:

§         Europeans exposed the Americans to exotic illnesses (smallpox + typhus) that killed huge percentages of their populations

 

v     PROFESSIONAL EXPLORERS

·        Following Columbus’s example, many new professional explorers began hiring themselves out to find a western passage to Asia

-      1497, JOHN CABOT

§         first to sight the North American Continent

-      1513, VASCO NUNEZ de BALBOA

§         first European to sight the Pacific Ocean after crossing the Isthmus of Panama on foot

-      1519-22, FERDINAND MAGELLAN

§         Portuguese man under the employ of Spain, set out to find a passage through /around South America

§         Died in a battle w/ natives in the Phillippines BUT his crew returned to Spain

§         First circumnavigation of the earth

 

v     THE SPANISH EMPIRE

·        During the 1500s the New World was dominated by Spain.

 

·        A Clash of Cultures

-      Americans stood far inferior to Spanish technology. Conquistadors had: “heavily armed, oceangoing vessels”, steel swords, firearms, explosives, armor, gun-powder

-      The use of horses and guard dogs (greyhounds) also provided a huge Spanish boost in battle

 

·         Cortes’s Conquest

-      1519, HERNANDO CORTES lands at Vera Cruz

-      aimed at conquering the AZTEC EMPIRE

-      “by a combination of threats and deceptions, Cortes entered TENOCHTITLAN and made the emperor MONTEZUMA his puppet”

-      he took all the Aztec’s gold and forced them to mine for more

-      1520, Aztecs revolt and kill Montezuma and attack Cortes driving him out

-      1521, Cortes retakes Tenochtitlan for good

-      1531, FRANCISCO PIZARRO

§         Leads conquistadors South toward Peru and they attack and subdue the INCA empire

 

·         Spanish America       

-      ENCOMIENDA = Spanish system whereby favored officers became privileged landowners who controlled Indian villages/groups of villages

-      ENCOMENDEROS = the favored officer; they were called upon to:

§         protect and care for the villages

§         support missionaries

§         levy tributes

-      By mid-1500s, Indians were nearly extinct in the West Indies (died mostly by disease) SO Europeans began to import slaves from Africa

-      BARTOLOME de las CASAS

§         a priest from Hispanola and author of A Brief Relation of the Destruction of the Indies in 1552

§         he defended the Indian peoples

-      Encomiendas were eventually replaced by HACIENDAS (a large farm/ranch) as land became > than the claim to labor

 

·        Spanish Explorations

-      Under Charles V, Spain dominated Europe AND the New World

§         The treasures from the Aztecs and the Incas added to Spain’s power BUT they also undermined the balance of the economy

-      For most of the colonial period, the US belonged to Spain, and Spanish culture has left a lasting impression

-      In many Indian cultures, Spanish traditions existed side-by-side with their own

-      1513, JUAN PONCE de LEON

§         made the earliest exploration of Florida

-      1528, PANFILO de NARVAEZ

§         explored Florida and marched Northward to Alabama

§         his crew made crude boats in hopes of sailing back to Mexico but they wrecked

-      the survivors, under NUNEZ CABEZA de VACA continued back to Mexico

-      1539, HERNANDO de SOTO

§         landed in Florida and explored all the way to the Mississippi River

-      1540, FRANCISCO VASQUEZ de CORONADO

§         travels up to the American Southwest looking for gold which he never found

-      “the primary reason why England and France surpassed Spain in the development of a presence in America was that Spain assumed that developing a thriving trade in goods with the Natives was less important than converting the heathens and searching for gold and silver”

-      1565, Spaniards establish ST. AUGUSTINE becoming the first European town in the present day US

 

·        The Spanish Southwest

-      Spaniards used religion as an effective instrument of colonial control

-      PRESIDIOS = houses/forts used to house soldiers sent to protect missionaries

-      FRANCISCANS = an order of celibate males sent with colonial expeditions to help “transform their cultures”

-      1598, JUAN de ONATE

§         took possession of New Mexico

§         natives became fed up with him and fought back, but Onate ended up killing 500men and 300womenandchildern

§         when gold and silver failed to materialize (1608) the Spanish gov’t made New Mexico into a royal province

-      POPE = an Indian leader who became fed up with the missionaries, Christianity, etc.

§         1680, he organizes a massive rebellion and drove the Spanish from NM and kills 25% of the Spaniards in America

§         it took 14 yrs to reestablish the Spanish control of NM

 

v     THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION

·        1517, MARTIN LUTHER

-      German monk and theologian,  who disagreed with the Catholic church

-      Posted his Ninety-five Theses on the problems with the church. (esp. the sale of forgivness)

-      Banished from the church in 1520

·        The German states fell into conflict as a result of the religious differences that spawned off him.

 

·        Calvinism

-      JOHN CALVIN = a French scholar who published The Institutes of the Christian Religion (1536)

-      He preached predetermination

-      Inspired the Puritans and Huguenots

 

·        The Reformation in England

-      King HENRY VIII(dubbed The Defender of the Faith for resisting Martin Luther) was married to KATHERINE OF ARAGON but could produce no children. The pope refused to annul his marriage so Henry severed the connection to Rome. He named a new archbishop of Canterbury who granted the annulment. Henry married ANNE BOLEYN and produced (not a son) a daughter ELIZABETH I.

§         Elizabeth could not be Catholic (for by Catholic views she wasa illegitimate) so during her reign The Church of England (aka Anglican church) became Protestant

-      Those who broke away from the Church of England were called SEPARATISTS.

-      “The religious controversies surrounding the English Reformation so dominated the political life of the nation that interest in colonizing the New World was forced to the periphery of concern.”

 

v     CHALLENGES TO SPANISH EMPIRE

·        1524, GIOVANNI da VERRAZANO

-      sent by the French king to search for a passage to Asia

-      he sailed up along the coast N. America

·        ~1534, JACQUES CARTIER

-      led the first French effort at colonization

-      explored the St. Lawrence River and got as far as present day Quebec where he settled a short lived French colony

·        1600, SAMUEL de CHAMPLAIN, “Father of New France”

·        mid-1500s, the Dutch and the English begin to threaten the Spanish power

-      Dutch

§         The “Sea Beggars” were privateers working out of both English and Dutch ports that plundered Spanish ships in the Atlantic and carried out illegal trade w/ Spanish colonies

-      English

§         The “Sea Dogges” engaged in similar smuggling and piracy

§         Even though Elizabeth strove to avoid war with Spain, she encouraged the Sea Dogges

§         1577, (SIR) FRANCIS DRAKE = English sea dogge who made a voyage around South America to raid Spanish towns

 

·        The Armada’s Defeat

-      Elizabeth I’s cousin MARY “Queen of Scots” was ousted by Scottish Presbyterians in favor of her son

-      She fled to England and was supported by Spanish-Catholic folks who wanted her to take the English throne

-      After a plot to kill Elizabeth was foiled, Mary was beheaded in 1587

-      In revenge Spanish king PHILIP II, decided to crush “once and for all, the Protestant power” so he began to gather his SPANISH ARMADA

-      Francis Drake destroyed a good part of the Spanish fleet before it was ready to sail and another section was battered in an ocean storm

-      1588, the Armada is defeated by the English  marking the start of their naval supremacy and clearing the way for English colonization of America

 

·        English Explorations 

-      RICHARD HAKLUYT = a significant Oxford clergyman who promoted colonization. He wrote A Discourse of Western Planting pointing out the benefits of colonies

1.      to extend the reformed religion

2.      the expand trade

3.      to supply England’s needs for her own dominions

4.      to provide bases in case of war with Spain

5.      to enlarge the queen’s revenues and navy

6.      to discover the NW passage to the Orient

7.      to employ the large number of idle people in the population

-      1583, SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT

§         secured a “royal patent” to go create a New England in America

§         he landed in Newfoundland and took possession for Elizabeth

§         in transit back he vanished and never returned

-      1584, SIR WALTER RALEIGH

§          SHG’s half brother, convinced Elizabeth to try again

§         in 1587, he landed in NC’s outer banks and founded Roanoke Island. After a month there he left Gov John White in charge and returned to England to re-supply. When he returned to find the city abandoned and pillaged.

§         No trace of the “Lost Colonists” were ever found.