American History: Unit 1 Lecture 1

The Earliest Americans and European Contact

Arrival of Human Population

• ~ 15,000 – 12,000 years ago – Stone Age Hunters

• Ice Age reveals land bridge connecting Asia and North America

• Known as BERINGIA• ~ 8000 BCE people

dispersed throughout the Americas

HOW DO WE KNOW?

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Native American Societies

• Over time, various complex cultures form in America

• Culture – Beliefs, norms, traditions, and values of a group of people. • No private land

ownership, close dependence on environment

Early European Exploration: Why Now?

• Growth of centralized nations after the Middle Ages

• Crusades create a thirst for Eastern Goods (spices, rice, coffee, lemons, mirrors, cotton clothes, writing paper, etc., etc.)

• Renaissance ideas/discoveries lead to inventions that make long distance sailing possible (Astrolabe, Caravel, cartography improvements, etc.)

Early European Exploration

Motives for Exploration

“The Three G’s”• Gold• God• Glory

Early Explorers• Vasco de Gama – sails

around Horn of Africa to India

• Columbus – looking for a shorter route sails WEST – stumbles onto the Americas - 1492

Early European Exploration

Columbus:• Claims new lands for

Spain• Enslaves native

population of San Salvador

• Opens the door for Columbian

Exchange

Columbian Exchange:The exchange of people, ideas, plants, animals, and diseases between the Old World and the New World.

• Disease devastated Native Populations

Effects of Disease

Columbus remains a controversial figure today…click here to see why.

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The Columbian ExchangeThe Columbian Exchange had not only a great effect on history, but still effects our lives today.

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Colonization

Spain becomes the first European nation to COLONIZE in the Americas.

COLONIZE – Take control of the people and resources of another land

TREATY OF TORDESILLAS – Divides Latin American between Spain and Portugal

Spanish holdings as of 1615

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Colonization

• Britain and France are eager to establish colonies in the New World as well.

• These nations soon begin establishing colonies of their own in North America!

Non-Wiki Images1. From http://www.learnnc.org2. From regentsprep.org3. From http://northspringsapwh.blogspot.com4. From http://mapas.owje.com