Mr. Dostert's Domain
Connecting Hemispheres
The Pre-Columbian Americas
While civilizations were developing in Africa, Asia, and Europe, they were also emerging in the Americas. Human settlement in the Americas is relatively recent compared to that in other parts of the world. However, it followed a similar pattern. At first the ancient people of the Americas survived mainly by hunting. Over time, they developed farming methods that ensured a more reliable supply of food. This in turn led to the growth of the first civilizations in the Americas. The first Americans arrived sometime toward the end of the last Ice Age. Most experts believe they crossed a land bridge or arrived by boat in present day Alaska and moved southwards as they followed herds migrating south and settled the continent. However, unlike the peoples of Afroeurasia who regularly interacted with one another, the people of the Americas remained isolated for centuries unaware of the advances in technology happening a world away.
In some ways , the early North American cultures were less developed than those of South America and Mesoamerica. The North American groups created no great empires. They left few ruins as spectacular as those of ancient Mexico or Peru. Nevertheless, the first peoples of North America did create complex societies. These societies were able to conduct long distace trade and construct magnificent buildings.
Throughout the continent a variety of tribes created different and distinct cultures. In the Pacific Northwest they were reliant on the sea and hunted whales in canoes. In the Southwest American tribes successfully developed irriation systems to produce harvests of corn, beans, and squash. Their use of pottery rather than baskets, as well certain religious rituals, showed contact with Mesoamerican peoples to the south. Some even developed complex building techniques to create pueblos which were built into walls of deep canyons. On the Great Plains, other ancient peoples began mound building. These huge earthen mounds were used to bury their dead or for religious ceremonies. In the northeast, along the Atlantic coast, woodland tribes developed a variety of cultures. In some areas, tribes formed political alliances to ensure protection of tribal lands. The best example of this was the Iroquois in the Great Lakes region. North America was a land of diversity.
The Iroquois alliance was a notable example of a political link. For the most part, however, the connections between native North Americans were economic and cultural. They traded, had similar religious beliefs, and shared social patterns. This can be seen in regards to their social organization. Family was the basis for social organization. Generally, the family unit was the extended family, including parents, children, grandparents, and other close relatives. Some tribes further organized families into groups of families descended from a common ancestor. In some tribes, clan members lived together in large houses or groups of houses.
Common among Native American tribes was the use of totems. The term refers to a natural object with which an individual, clan, or group identifies itself. The totem was used as a symbol of the unity of the group or clan. It also helped define certain behaviors and the social relationships of the group. For example, the Northwestern peoples displayed totem symbols on masks, boats, and huge poles set in front of their houses. Others used totem symbols in rituals or dances associated with important group events such as marriages, the naming of children, or planting or harvesting crops.
The Maya
Further south, the peoples of Mexico and Central America were entering into the full flower of civilization. A prime example of this cultural flowering were the Maya, who built an extraordinary civilization in the heart of Mesoamerica which stretched from southern Mexico into northern Central America. This culture centered around the dry scrub forest of the Yucatan Penninsula and the dense, steamy jungles of southeastern Mexico and northern Guatamala. By A.D. 250, the Maya culture had burst forth a flourishing civilization.
The Maya developed as independent city-states, ruled by a god-king and serving as a center for religious ceremonies and trade. Maya cities featured giant pyramids, temples, palaces, and elaborate stone carvings dedicated to the gods and to important rulers. Tens of thousands of people lived in residential areas surrounding the city center, which bustled with activity. Archaeologists have identified at least 50 major Maya sites, all with monumental architecture. Each Maya city also featured a ball court. In this stone-sided playing field, the Maya believe the playing of this game would maintiain the cycles of the sun and mooon and bring life-giving rains.
Although the Maya city-states were independent of each other, they were linked through alliances and trade. Cities exchanged their local products such as salt, flint, feathers, shells, and honey. They also traded craft goods like cotton textiles and jade ornaments. While the Maya did not have a uniform currency, cacao (chocolate) beans sometimes served as one. As in the rest of Mesoamerica, agriculture-particularly the growing of maize, beans, and squash- provided the basis of Maya life.
Religion influenced most aspects of Maya life. The Maya were polytheist and believed in many gods. There were gods of corn, of death, of rain, and of war. Gods could be good or evil, and sometimes both. Gods were associated with the four directions and with different colors: white for north, black for west, yellow for south, red for east, and green in the center. The Maya believed that each day was a living god whose behavior could be predicted with the help of a system of calendars.
The Maya worshiped their gods in various ways. They prayed and made offerings of food, flowers, and incense. They also pierced and cut their bodies and offerend their blood, believing that this would nourish the gods. Sometimes the Maya even carried out human sacrifice, usually of captured enemies. At Chichen Itza, they threw captives into a deep sinkhole lake, called a cenote, along with gold, jade, and other offerings. The Maya believed that human sacrifice pleased the gods and kept the world in balance. Nevertheless, the Maya's use of sacrifice never reached the extremes of some other Mesoamerican peoples.
Maya religious beliefs also led to the development of a calendar, mathematics, and astronomy. The Maya believed that time was a burden carried on the back of a god. At the end of a day, month, or year, one god would lay the burden down and another would pick it up. A day would be lucky or unlucky, depending on the nature of the god. So, it was very important to have an accurate calendar to know which god was in charge of the day. The Maya developed a 260-day religious calendar with thirteen 20-day months. A second 365-day solar calendar consisted of eighteen 20-day months, with a separate period of 5 days at the end. The two calendars were linked together like meshed gears so that any given day could be identified in both cycles. The calendar helped identify the best times to plant crops, attack enemies, and crown new rulers.
The Maya also developed the most advanced writing system in the ancient Americas. Maya writing consisted of about 800 hieroglyphic symbols, or glyphs. Some of these represented whole words while others represented syllables. The Maya used their writing system to record important historical events by carving them in stone or recording them on a bark-paper book known as a codex. Only 3 of these books have survived.
The Maya decline remains a mystery for historians. In the late 800s, the Maya suddenly abandoned many of their cities. Invaders from the north, the Toltec, moved into the lands occupied by the Maya. These warlike peoples from central Mexico changed the culture. The high civilization of Maya cities disappeared. Some believe that warfare caused the decline of the Maya, others believe that over-farming damaged the environment leading to food shortages, famine and disease. By the time the Spanish arrived in the early 1500s, the Maya were divided into small, weak city-states that gave little hint of their former glory.
The Aztec
In central Mexico, where modern Mexico City is located, the greatest empire of Mesoamerica developed; the Aztec. The Aztecs built built a great monumental city called Teotihuacan which at its peak had a population of between 150,000-200,000 people, making it one of the largest cities in the world at that time. The heart of the city was a central avenue lined with more than 20 pyramids dedicated to vaious gods. The largest of these was the giant Pyramid of the Sun. The imposing building stood more than 200 feet tall and measured close to 3,000 feet around its base. The people of Teotihuacan lived in apartment-block buildings in the area around the central avenue.
Over the years, the Aztecs gradually increased in strength and number. In 1428, they joined with two other city-states to form the Triple Alliance. This alliance allowed the Aztec to gain control over neighboring regions. By the early 1500s, the alliance controlled a vast empire that covered some 80,000 square miles with a population between 5 and 15 million people.
Like the Maya, religion played a major role in Aztec society. Tenochtitlan contained hundreds of temples and religious structures dedicated to the approximately 1,000 gods that the Aztecs worshiped. Aztec religious practices centered on elaborate public ceremonies designed to communicate with the gods and win their favor. At these ceremonies, priests made offerings to the gods and presented ritual dramas, songs, and dances featuring masked performers. The most important rituals involved the sun god Huitzilopochtli. According to Aztec belief, Huitzilopochtli made the sun rise every day. When the sun set, he had to battle the forces of evil to get to the next day. To make sure that he was strong enough for this ordeal, he needed the nourishment of human blood, without it he would be too weak to fight. For this reason, Aztec priests practiced human sacrifice on a massive scale. Each year, thousands of victims were led to the altar atop the Great Temple, where priests carved out the hearts while they were still beating. To supply priests with sacrifices, the Aztecs often went to war and adapted battle tactics to ensure they took their opponents alive.
In 1502, a new ruler, Montezuma II, was crowned emperor. Under Montezuma, the Aztec empire began to weaken. A number of provinces rose up against Aztec oppression. This began a period of unrest and rebellion, which the military struggled to put down. Many Aztecs began to predict that terrible things were about to happen. They saw bad omens in every unusual occurrence- lightning striking the temple in Tenochtitlan, or a partial eclipse of the sun for example. The most worrying event was the arrival of the Spanish. For many Aztecs, these fair-skinned, bearded strangers from across the sea brought to mind the legend of the return of Quetzalcoatl. Although initially welcomed by the Aztec, the Spanish would bring with them the destruction of the Aztecs Empire from which the Spanish would create their own American Empire upon the ruins of the Aztecs.
The Inca Empire
In South America, another people- the Inca- created their own powerful state in South America. From Cuzco, their capital in southrn Peru, the Inca spread outward in all directions. They brought the various Andean peoples under their control and built an empire that stretched from Ecuador in the north to Chile in the south. It was the largest empire ever seen in the Americas.
To exercise control over their empire the Inca built many cities and an intricate road system to tie them together. The architecture of government buildings was the same all over the empire, making the presence of government apparent. As in Rome, all roads led to their capital city, Cuzco. Cuzco was a splendid city of temples, plazas, and palaces. Though they had no iron tools and did not use the wheel, Incan builders carved and transported huge blocks of stone, fitting them together perfectly without mortar. Many Incan walls still stand today, undisturbed by the region's frequent earthquakes.
The Incan state exercised almost total control over economic and social life. It controlled most economic activity, regulating the production and distribution of goods. Unlike the May and Aztecs, the Inca allowed little private commerce or trade. The main demand the Incan state placed on its subjects was for tribute, usually in the form of labor. The labor tribute was known as mita. It required all able-bodied citizens to work for the state a certain number of days every year. Mita workers might labor on state farmlands, produce craft goods for state warehouses, or help with public works projects. Historians have compared the Incan system to a type of socialism or a modern welfare state. Citizens were expected to work for the state and were cared for in return. For example, the elderly and disabled were often supported by the state. The state also made sure that people did not go hungry when there were bad harvests. Freeze-dried potatoes called chuno, were stored in huge government warehouses for distribution in times of food shortages.
As with the Aztecs, religion was important to the Inca and helped reinforce the power of the state. The Inca worshiped fewer gods than the Aztecs. The Inca focused on key nature spirits such as the moon, the stars, and thunder. In the balance of nature, the Inca saw patterns for the way humans should relate to each other and to the earth. Chief of the Incan gods was a creator god called Viracocha. Next in importance was the sun god, Inti. Because the Incan ruler was considered a descendant of Inti, sun worship amounted to woship of the king.
The Temple of the Sun in Cuzco was the most sacred of all Incan shrines. It was heavily decorated in gold, a metal the Inca referred to as "sweat of the sun." In fact, gold was a common sight throughout Cuzco. The walls of several buildings had a covering of thin gold sheeting.
While Cuzco was the religious capital of the Incan empire, other Incan cities also served ceremonial purposes. For example, Machu Picchu, excavated by Hiram Bingham in 1912, was isolated and mysterious. Like Cuzco, Machu Picchu also had a sun temple, public buildings, and a central plaza. Some sources suggest it was a religious center. Others think it was an estate of the emperor Pachacuti. Still other believe it was a retreat for Incan rulers or the nobility. To this day it remains unknown.
The Inca Empire reached the height of its glory in the early 1500s during the reign of Huayna Capac. In the 1520s he undertook a tour of Ecuador, a newly conqered area of the empire. In the city of Quito, he received a gift box. When he opened it, out flew butterflies and moths, considered an evil omen. A few weeks later, while still in Quito, Huayna Capac died of disease- probably smallpox. After his death the empire was split between his two sons and a bitter civil war followed. The war tore apart the empire just in time for the arrival of the Spanish. Taking advantage of Incan weakness, they easily conquered the empire.
The Age of Exploration
By the 1400s Europeans were expanding their world. The Renaissance encouraged a new spirit of adventure and curiosity, leading many to venture beyond their borders. These expeditions out into the world began a long process that would bring together the peoples of the world, creating the first global era in history. This new interconnected world enabled the sharing of goods, ideas, and cultures. It also brought with it destruction, war, and disease on a scale not seen before as Europeans embarked on a quest for empire.
For "God, Glory, and Gold"
Europeans had not been completely isolated from the rest of the world before the 1400s. Beginning around 1100, European crusaders battled Muslims for control of the Holy Lands in the Levant. In 1275, the Italian trader Marco Polo reached the court of Kublai Khan in China. For the most part however, Europeans had neither the interest nor the ability to explore foreign lands. That changed by the fifteenth century. The desire for wealth and to spread Christianity, coupled with advances in sailing technology spurred an age of European exploration.
The quest for wealth was the main reason for Euroean exploration. Following the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Europeans had hoped to find a direct overseas route to the luxury goods brought on the Silk Road from China. The price of these goods was steadily increasing due to Italian and Muslim merchants and many looked to bypass them and keep the profit for themselves.
The desire to spread Christianity also motivated Europeans to explore. The Crusades had left Europeans with a taste for spices, but more significantly with feelings of hostility between Christians and Muslims. European countries believed that they had a sacred duty not only to continue fighting Muslims, but also to convert non-Christians throughout the world. Bartolomeu Dias, a Portuguese explorer summarized this sentiment with, "To serve God and His Majesty, to give light to those who were in darkness and to grow rich as all men desire to do."
While "God, glory, and gold" were the motives for exploration, advances in technology is what made these voyages possible. During the 1200s, it would have been nearly impossible for a European sea captain to cross 3,000 miles of ocean and return again. The main problem was that ships could not sail against the wind. In the 1400s, ship builders designed a new vessel, the caravel. The ship was sturdier than earlier vessels and because of triangular sails adopted from Arabs, it could sail effectively against the wind. Europeans also improved navigation techniques. The use of the astrolabe and magnetic compass allowed captains to effectively determine their position and direction so that ships would not get lost in the vast expanses of the ocean. This improved technology allowed European captains to become masters of the seas.
Portugal and Spain Lead the Way
Portugal was the first European country to apply these sailing innovations and used this technology to establish trading outposts along the west coast of Africa. The Portuguese traded with Africans for such profitable items as gold, ivory, and slaves. Slowly, Portuguese captains explored further down the African coast until in 1488 Dias rounded the southern tip of Africa. In 1498, Portuguese sailor Vasco da Gama reached Calicut on the southwestern coast of India. Da Gama and his crew were amazed by the spices, rare silks, and precious gems that filled Calicut's shops. The Portuguese sailors filled their ships and returned home. Their cargo was worth 60 times the cost of the voyage. This direct sea route to India instantly made Portugal rich.
As the Portuguese were establishing lucrative trading posts along the west coast of Africa, Spain watched with increasing envy. The Spanish monarchs also desired a direct sea route to Asia. In 1492, an Italian sea captain, Christopher Columbus convinced Spain to finance a bold plan: finding a route to Asia by sailing west across the Atlantic Ocean. Instead of finding a route to Asia, Columbus reached an island in the Caribbean. He mistakenly thought that he had reached the East Indies, but more importantly, it opened the door for European colonization of the Americas- a process that would forever change the world. This discovery created a conflict with the Portuguese who believed that they had a claim to the lands discovered by the Spanish. To settle this dispute, the pope proposed a line of demarcation which divided the Americas called the Treaty of Toresillas. It gave Brazil to the Portuguese and the remaining lands in the Americas to Spain.
Other Nations Explore
Beginning around 1600, the English and Dutch began to challenge Spain and Portugals dominance of the oceans. The Dutch Republic, also known as the Netherlands, had been a Spanish territory until 1581 when they had won their independence. In a short time the Dutch became a leading sea power and began encroaching on Portuguese and Spanish claims. Both the Dutch and English had formed an East India Company to establish and direct trade throughout Asia. These companies had the power to mint money, make treaties, and even raise their own armies. The Dutch established their trading headquarters at Batavia on the island of Java and expanded west to conquer the surrounding islands. Throughout the 1600s, the Netherlands increased its control of the Indian Ocean trade. They also took control of the Cape of Good Hope on the southern tip of Africa which was used as a resupply stop. By 1700, the Netherlands had replaced the Portuguese as the leading power in the Indian Ocean.
By 1700 the British and French had also gained a foothold in the region. Having failed to win control of the larger area, the English East India Company focused much of its energy on establishing outposts in India. There, the English developed a successful business trading Indian cloth in Europe. In 1664, France also entered the Asia trade with its own East India Company. It struggled at first as it faced continual attacks by the Dutch, however it was never able to match the profits of its competitors.
Europeans Build American Empires
Following the voyage of 1492 by Christopher Columbus the race for conquest was on for the newly disovered lands of the Americas. In fact the following year Columbus returned with 17 ships and over 1,000 soldiers to claim and conquer the land for Spain. With dreams of glory and gold other Europeans followed in search of their own empires to claim. Needless to say, the fate of Native Americans was ignored by Europeans as their cultures were destroyed and their populations decimated within a generation. In the shadow of Europes road to glory and riches was the story of history's greatest genocide, the destruction of the Native American people.
Spain Conquers an Empire
In 1519 a Spaniard named Hernando Cortes landed on the shores of Mexico. After colonizing several Caribbean islands, the Spanish had turned their attention to the American mainland. Cortes and his conquistadors marched into Mexico lured by rumors of vast lands filled with gold and silver. After marching through difficult mountain passes, Cortes and his force of 600 men reached the magnificent capital of Tenochititlan. The Aztec emperor, Montezuma II, was convinced at first that Cortes was a god wearing armor. He agreed to give the Spanish explorer a share of the empire's existing gold supply. The conquistador was not satisfied.
In late spring of 1520, some of Cortes's men killed many Aztec warriors and chiefs while they were celebrating a religious festival. The Aztecs rebelled and drove Cortes out of the city. The Spaniards, however struck back. Despite being greatly outnumbered, Cortes and his men conquered the Aztec in 1521 with the help of many natives who resented their harsh treatment under the Aztecs, including human sacrifice. With their help, and Spanish muskets and cannons the Aztecs were defeated easily.
Despite these great advantages, the greatest ally the Spanish had in their conquest of the Aztec Empire was neither man nor weapon, but disease. Measles, mumps, smallpox, and typhus were just some of the diseases Europeans brought with them to the Americas. Native Americans had never been exposed to these diseases. Thus, they had developed no natural immunity to them. As a result, they died by the hundreds of thousands. By the time Cortes launched his counterattack, the Aztec population had been greatly reduced by smallpox and measles. In time, European disease would devistate the natives of central Mexico, killing millions of them. These diseases would continue to aid the Spanish in their next target, the Inca Empire.
In 1532, another conquistador, Francisco Pizarro, marched a small force into South America to conquer the Inca Empire. Pizarro met the Incan ruler and ambushed him, crushing his soldiers and kidnapping him. The emperor offered to fill a room once with gold and twice with silver in exchange for his release. However, after receiving the ransom, the Spanish strangled the Incan king. Demoralized by their leader's death, the remaining Incan forces retreated and Pizarro then marched on the Incan Capital, Cuzco. He captured it without a struggle.
In building their new American empire, the Spaniards drew from techniques used during the reconquista of Spain. When conquering the Muslims, the Spanish lived among them and imposed their Spanish culture upon them. The Spanish settlers to the Americas, known as peninsulares, were mostly men. As a result, relationships between Spanish settlers and native women were common. These relationships created a large mestizo- or mixed Spanish and NativeAmerican- population. The native people were forced to work on farms, ranches, or mines in a system called encomienda. Although the landlords had promised to act fairly and respect native workers, many abused them and worked them to death; especially inside dangerous mines.
Spain's American colonies helped make it the richest, most powerful nation in the world during much of the sixteenth century. Ships filled with treasure from the Americas continually sailed into Spanish harbors. Conquistadors pushed north and conquered much of what is today the American southwest. The Spanish also converted the natives to Christianity and burned their sacred objects and prohibited native rituals. By the 1700s the native cultures in Spanish America had largely been erased as they assimilated to Spanish culture.
The Portuguese in Brazil
One area of South America that remained out of control was Brazil. The Portuguese who ruled there found little gold or silver, so the settlers began growing sugar. Clearing out huge swaths of forest land, the Portuguese build giant sugar plantations. The demand for sugar in Europe was great, and the colony enriched Portugal. These plantations were labor intensive and forced the Portuguese to import more and more slaves as the Portuguese cleared land to grow more sugar, making Brazil the highest importer of slaves during the slave trade. Conditions in the tropical climate were horrific and many slaves died performing the labor.
Explorers Establish New France
France was comparatively late to exploration compared to many of its neighbors. Most early French explorers set out in an attempt to find a Northwest Passage to the Pacific Ocean. They explored much of North America, sailing up the St. Lawrence River and into the Great Lakes. Others explored the Mississippi River and the present Midwest region of the United States. Unable to locate a route to the Pacific they established New France and set up trading posts and forts along these rivers. These settlements eventually developed into the cities Montreal, Quebec, Detroit, Marquette, St. Louis, and New Orleans amongst others. France's North American empire was immense, but it was sparsely populated because most of the French who came to the Americas had no desire to build towns or raise families. Instead, most who came were young, single men who came to get rich in the fur trade with Native Americans. Unlike the English, the French were less interested in occupying the territories than they were in making money off the land.
The English and Dutch Arrive in North America
The explorations of the Spanish and French inspired the English. In 1606, a company of London investors received a charter from King James to found a colony in North America. With three ships and more than 100 settlers they built Jamestown in modern Virginia. The colony's start was disastrous. The settlers were more interested in finding gold than in planting crops. During the first few years, seven out of every ten people died of hunger, disease, or battles with Native Americans. Despite their nightmarish start, the colonists eventually gained a foothold and began growing tobacco as a profitable cash crop which they traded with Europe.
In 1620, a group known as Pilgrims or Puritans founded a second English colony, Plymouth, in Massachusettes. Persecuted for their Calvinist beliefs in England, these colonists sought religious freedom. The Puritans wanted to build a model community which would set an example for other Christians to follow. Although the colony experienced early difficulties, it gradually took hold. This was due in large part to the numerous families in the colony, unlike the mostly single, male population of early Jamestown.
Following the English and French into North America were the Dutch. The Dutch, like the French, established fur trade with Native Americans. They built trading posts along the Hudson River at Fort Orange and on Manhattan Island. To the English, the Dutch colonies separated the English colonies and they therefore drove out Dutch from the region, renaming it New York.
The English soon set their eyes upon France's American holdings. In 1754 a dispute over land claims in the Ohio Valley led to a war between the British and the French that became known as the French and Indian War. The British colonists, with the help of the British Army defeated the French in 1763 and took over New France. This war left the Spanish and English in control of massive American Empires.
The Columbian Exchange
The colonization of the Americas dramatically changed the world . It prompted both voluntary and forced migration of millions of people as well as the exchange of foods, plants, animals, and diseases. This has become known as the Columbian Exchange.
Ships from the Americas brought back a wide variety of items that Europeans, Asians, and Africans had never seen before. They included such plants as tomatoes, squash, pineapples, tobacco, and cacao beans. More importantly, Europeans returned with corn and potatoes which were inexpensive to grow and very nutritious. These plants became a steady part of diets which allowed people to live longer and ultimately boosted the world's population. Explorers also returned to Europe with animals such as the turkey which became a part of the diets of people throughout Africa, Asia, and Europe. Traffic did not flow in just one direction. Europeans introduced various animals such as horses, cattle, sheep, and pigs which flourished in the Americas. Foods from Africa migrated west such as bananas, black-eyed peas, and coffee. Grains introduced to the Americas such as wheat, rice, barley, and oats thrived and reshaped the landscape.
The most devistating and tragic impact of the Columbian Exchange was the effects of disease. Europeans brought diseases such as smallpox and measles which led to the death of millions of Native Americans in the years following Columbus's arrival in the new world. Simple diseases such as influenza had the potential of wiping out entire tribes who had no immunity nor medicine to protect themselves. It is estimated that diseases brought by Europeans may have killed as much as 90% of Native peoples. By the time conquistadors landed to invade, there were few able-bodied men able to fight back. Within a generation the great societies and cultures of the Americas were decimated, with the survivors forced to assimilate to Europeans laws and culture.
Capitalism & Mercantilism
One aspect of colonization is the growth of capitalism. Capitalism is an economic system based on private ownership and the investment of resources, such as money, for profit. No longer were governments the sole owners of great wealth. Due to overseas colonization and trade, numerous merchants had created companies which became incredibly rich. Profits from these investments enabled merchants and traders to reinvest even more money in other enterprises to make even more money. As a result, business across Europe grew and flourished. The increase in economic activity led to an increase in the nations' money supply which brought inflation. The cost of goods across Europe rose leading to the need for higher profits and further investment.
During this time, the nations of Europea adopted a new economic policy known as mercantilism. The theory of mercantilism held that a country's power depended mainly on its wealth. As a result, the goal of every country was to accrue as much wealth as possible. According to this theory, a nation could increase its wealth in two ways. First, it could obtain as much gold and silver as possible. Second, it could establish a favorable balance of trade, in which it sold more goods than it bought. Mercantilism went hand in hand with colonization, for colonies played a vital role in producing raw materials that could not be found in the home country. By doing this, European states were able to keep wealth within its borders and not have to spend gold or silver on purchasing the materials needed for production within their own borders.
These new economic changes led to many changes in Europe. Individualism developed and a new middle class emerged. More than anything else, the economic revolution increased the wealth of European nations and their monarchs. The states of Europe quickly had become some of the most powerful on earth, surpassing the great states of the medieval Turkish and Chinese powers who once dwarfed them.
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The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Sugar plantations and tobacco farms required a large supply of workers to make them profitable for their owners. Initially, Europeans used Native Americans as a source of cheap labor. But millions of Native Americans died from the diseases brought through the Columbian Exchange. Therefore, Europeans turned to Africa for workers. This demand for cheap labor resulted in one of human history's greatest injustices: the slave trade.
Early African Slavery
Slavery had existed in Africa for centuries. In most regions, it was a relatively minor institution. The spread of Islam into Africa ushered in an increase in slavery and the slave trade. Muslim rulers in Africa justified enslavement with the Muslim belief that non-Muslim prisoners of war could be bought and sold as slaves. As a result, between 650 and 1600, Muslims transported about 17 million Africans to the Muslim lands of North Africa and Southwest Asia. In most African and Muslim societies these slaves had some legal rights and an opportunity for social mobility. In African societies, slaves could escape their bondage in numerous ways, including marrying into the family they served.
The Demand for Africans
The first Europeans to explore Africa were the Portuguese during the 1400s. Initially, Portuguese traders were more interested in trading for gold than for captured Africans. That changed with the colonization of the Americas, as natives began dying by the millions.
Europeans saw advantages in using Africans in the Americas. First, many Africans had been exposed to European diseases and had developed som immunity. Second, many Africans had experience in farming and could be taught plantation work. Third, Africans were less likely to escape because they did not know their way around the new land. Fourth, their skin color made it easier to catch them if they escaped and tried to live amongst the natives.
In time, the buying and selling of Africans, known as the Atlantic Slave Trade, became a massive enterprise. Between 1500 and 1600, nearly 300,000 Africans were transported to the Americas. During the next century, that number climbed to almost 1.3 million. By the time the slave trade ended around 1870, Europeans had imported about 10 million Africans to the Americas.
Triangular Trade
Africans transported to the Americas were part of a transatlantic trading network known as the Triangular Trade. Over one trade route, Europeans transported manufactured goods to the west coast of Africa. There, traders exchanged these goods for captured Africans. The Africans were then transported across the Atlantic and sold in the West Indies. Merchants bought sugar, coffee, and tobacco in the West Indies and British colonies and sailed to Europe with these products.
This trans-Atlantic trade network became a major component of the developing capitalist economies of Europe, ultimately leading to the development of the global economy based on manufacturing and trade. It also led to the cross-cultural dependence for raw materials and open markets to sell goods which is a central concern of the modern economy of the world today.
The Middle Passage
The voyage that brought captured Africans to the West Indies and later to North and South America was known as the middle passage. Because of the system of triangular trade, it was considered the middle leg. Sickening cruelty characterized this journey which treated slaves without mercy, stripping them of their humanity and treating them instead as cargo. In African ports, European traders packed Africans into the dark holds of large ships. On board, Africans endured whippings and beatings from merchants, as well as diseases that swept through the vessel. Countless Africans died from disease or physical abuse aboard the slave ships. Many others committed suicide by jumping overboard. Scholars estemate that roughly 20 percent of the Africans aboard each slave ship perished during the trip.
Consequences of the Slave Trade
The Atlantic slave trade had a profound impact on both Africa and the Americas. In Africa,numerous cultures lost generations of their fittest members- their young and able- to European traders and plantation owners. In addition, countless African families were torn apart. Many of them were never reunited. The slave trade devastated African societies in another way: by introducing guns into the continent. The economies of Africa became based on this trade which left the continent dependent on others and producers of very little. Following the establishment of the slave trade Africa no longer developed the great kingdoms as it had before, and have at the mercy of Europe ever since.
