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When Old Worlds Collide:

Contact, Conquest, CatastropheSept. 7, 2011

History 103

Web

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Reminders: class etiquette

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Reminders for week 2

y Lecture outline posted before class on BB underDocuments section

y Look in SAME BB section Documents for

Reading packet no. 2, which has readings andreview questions due for this weeks section.

y Do section reading and fill in reading reviewquestions BEFORE coming to your section.

y Bring two copies of your answers: give one toyour TA, keep the other for reference duringsection discussion.

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a provocative statement

y By 1600, Europeans had created the first globaleconomy in history and had inflicted upon thenative peoples of the Americas, for the most partunintentionally, the greatest known catastrophethat human societies have ever suffered.

y todays lecture: why many historians would agree

with this statement

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Demographic disaster:

y Native Americans isolated from contact with Eurasianpeoples since @ 15,000 BC

y No immunities to diseases exchanged along Eurasian traderoutes in 11-14th centuries

y virgin soil epidemics: high death rates at first exposure tonew diseases

y Chief killers: smallpox but also measles, chicken pox

y Disease burden compounded by disruption of native

American economiesy Estimates that as much as 95% of native population died in

two centuries after 1492

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Virgin soil epidemics among first peoples

All of Americas North America

Pop. Estimates

1492 72+ million 5 million1800 4-4.5 million* 600,000

1900 250,000**

1980 1 million

* 6% of 1492 total ** 5% of 1492 total

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Resilience of native peoples

y Survivors regrouped, formed new tribal units

y Sought to coexist with dangerous new Europeanneighbors

y

Tried to trade to their own advantage: their goods(food, furs and skins) for European goods they wanted(metal goods, cloth, guns, alcohol)

y Not the dumb consumers of white peoples

imaginationy But new trade patterns had some unfortunate

consequences: guns and alcohol in particular

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European advantages

y Virgin soil epidemics decimated native Americancommunities often before Europeans even arrived

y small bands of Europeans able to subdue survivors due to:

y The heavy metal advantagey Theyd learned how to make many metals, esp. steel

y The domesticated animal advantage: Europeans had horses,pigs, cows; natives had dogs & in some areas, llamas andguinea pigs

y

Metal weapons plus horses: a great military advantage

Web

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European expansion in context

y Why Europe and not China? Who was Cheong Ho(also spelled Zheng He) and why didnt HE discoverAmerica?

y

European expansion in context of emergent globaleconomy

y On edges of trade routes linking Asia, Middle East,and Europe

y

Fierce competition among Islamic and Christiannations

y Post- bubonic plague concentration of wealth andpower

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secret ofEuropean immunityCrusades +trade = plague

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Looking for new trade routesy fierce competition among European nation states to

find and hold trade routes

y Established overland routes already locked up by

other powersy Incentive to bypass them via the ocean to reach

Asia and Asia and their valuable goals

y First to do so: the Portuguese

y Technological innovations: astrolabe and caravely Began search for water route to Asia in the 1480s

y Bartolomeu Dias and Vasco de Gama

y Established chain of naval bases extending to Asia

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The Atlantic slave trade

y Portuguese founded key newtrade: in African slaves

y Exploitation local rivalriesamong states of West and

Central Africa

y Rise of slave factories

y Enabled rise of plantationsystem

y Model later used in Americas

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Spain, Columbus, and the Americas

y Spanish support for Christopher Columbusy Sought water route to Asia across AtlanticyMade four voyages to the New World after 1492

y Amerigo Vespucci and Ferdinand Magellan:evidence that discoveries were in fact of previouslyunknown (to Europeans) continent

y Discoveries unleashed a horde of imitators

y Spanish dominated early explorations

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The Conquest of Mexico and Peru: the

magnet cultures

y Hernn Corts invaded Aztec capital of Tenochititln in 1519y Capture of Emperor Moctezuma, replacement of Aztec religious

images with Christian ones

y Initial invasion not successful

y

Returned later with Tlaxcalans, enemies of the Aztecsy Looted the city and established Mexico City on its ruins

y Aztec gold and other treasures became European sensation

y Francisco Pizarro located Incas in 1531y Capitalized on internal turmoil within the Incan empire

y Defeated much larger Incan force and destroyed Cuzcoy Established new capital at Lima on the coast of Peru

y Incan silver mines: also a fabulous prize

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North American Conquistadores and Missionaries:

looking for gold and theelixir of youth

y NA: disappointment toSpanish explorers

y Jesuits establishedmission in Virginia in

1570, departed afterIndian revolt

y Some missionary successin northern Florida and

New Mexicoy Far more interest in

Caribbean islands

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earliest N.A. settlements

y Spain in Florida andsouthwest

y French/ New France

(now Canada andupper midWest)

y Dutch/NewAmsterdam (now New

York)y English/ Chesapeake

Bay (Virginia) and NewEngland

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Theswarming of theEnglish

Least likely to succeed?

y Came relatively late tocolonizing game

y Tudor royals began colonizingat time of national unrest, dueto:

impact of ProtestantReformation: Henry VIII and

his divorceefforts of his heirs to

consolidate their shaky holdon political power

Ireland and Roanake

Elizabeth I, 1533-1603

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The first Chesapeake Colonyy Jamestown represented

effort by her successor JamesI to succeed where she hadpreviously failed and plant

a successful colony in NorthAmerica

y King granted charters toprivate companies

yLondon Company launchedexpedition in 1607

y Settled on James River andfounded Jamestown

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Jamestown settlement

y Colonists came to find preciousminerals

y Survived only because of Indiansassistance

y

By chance, English ended up interritory of one of more developedIndian empires of this era

y Headed by Wahunsonacock, alsoknown as Chief Powhatan

y

Relations of intense distrustbetween English and natives

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Powhatans confederacy

y Confederation of Algonquian speakingtribes of Eastern Woodland Indians

y Mixed economy of agriculture overseenby women, hunting overseen by men

y Artisans produced baskets, cooking andstorage vessels, clothing

y Trade in rare items for both personal andsacred use

y Some goods imbued with ritualsignificance: example of tobacco

y Goods distributed in ways that

supported tribal governance system:tribal head had the most stuff

y But in general, many fewer things thanEnglish contemporaries

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Chief Powhatans court; his cloak

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John Smith and Pocahontas both end

up in England

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Jamestowns later development

yColony almost abandoned in 1610yRole of tobacco in colonys early survival: this

turns out to be the real goldyColonists began to govern themselves through

House of BurgessesyConflict with Indians decimated colony in

1622yCrown assumed control of the colony in 1624,

making Virginia a royal colony