It all dates back to 225 million years ago, when the supercontinent disassembled and the ice age would soon begin. These times, although long before our time, effected the American society greatly. In fact, they began it. It was during this period where the first humans or natives would migrate to America by the northeast corner of Asia to what is present day Alaska. The ice made the travel possible. It also formed our geological features like mountains and lakes etc. It was up until the Europeans touched the American soil that peace would be a part of the new world. It all started with the desire for Asian goods.
The desire for an easier route to Asia was sought out to lessen cost of goods and mostly to use a route to compete with Portugal. Portugal, at the time, led the exploration era with command of the South African route. Spain would be the one to send Christopher Columbus west to reach Asia. He ended up bumping into a new continent America since then the new world would meet the old world and forever be intertwined throughout history. The problem that was among the new and old was the growing conflict between the two because of ideas set on by their different society. At first hand, they traded and shared knowledge but the Europeans would soon use their superiority to take advantage of the natives as zinn told us so knowingly. Potatoes, maize (corn), and sugar were among the important new world exports to the old world. Livestock and horses were very important supplies for the new world, as some native tribes took quickly to them.
However, like I mentioned before, the Spanish conquistadors came in and reeked havoc among the natives while tearing down longstanding societies of natives like the Aztecs and Incas.
Important things to note:
1295 Marco Polo returns to Europe from Asia.(or so he thought)
1492 Columbus land in the Bahamas.
1494 Treaty of Tordesillas between Spain and Portuga
1522 Magellans crew completes circumnavigation of the world.
sorry guys i went thorough this quick ... let me know if i forget anything!!!
FUN FACT: the reason we called native americans 'indiands' today, is because columbus was so convinced, and contiuned to be for the rest of his life, that he had landed in india, that he called the natives of the bahamas indians. the term which now despised by native americans (including myself) has stuck, and even in offical documents did and still refer to native american as indians.
I remember doing the dbq on this topic, I think it was the first one we did...I remember one of the pictures was the Native Americans being attacked by the new settlers with guns, which they were able to get from Europe...and the Natives only had what supplies they were able to produce themselves...okay hopefully this information fits in with this chapter, if not, sorry
Wikipedia (the class's favorite site =] ) said that Christopher Columbus actually destroyed an entire race of people from the bahamas. Kind of what the Zinn stated. Not everything is all good and peachy!!
All of the Countries were competeing for land in the New World. Spain and Portugual created the Treaty of Tordesillas, drawing a line down the atlantic in which spain took land in the west and Portugual took land in the east. This shows how competative the countries were after Columbus discovered the New World in search for the Indies.
the Treaty of Tordesillas doesn't seem to be getting much love... hey! isn't anyone else upset that Portugal got cheated out of massive land? I mean brazil is great, but Spain got the rest of the continent. I guess it's ok considering no one really knew what the rest of the world looked like yet.
the Treaty of Tordesillas doesn't seem to be getting much love... hey! isn't anyone else upset that Portugal got cheated out of massive land? I mean Brazil is great, but Spain got the rest of the continent. I guess it's ok considering no one really knew what the rest of the world looked like yet.
Who were actually the first people to come to America? Why was the Treaty of Tordessillas fair or do you think Portugal was cheated out by this treaty?
Who were actually the first people to come to America? Why was the Treaty of Tordessillas fair or do you think Portugal was cheated out by this treaty?
I did a little bit of research on the Treaty of Tordesillas and it seemed pretty fair. The end agreement of the Treaty was that any land that was west of the 46"37' (whatever that means) was given to Spain and anything east of 46"37' was given to Portugal. That may be just me.... but that sounds pretty good!! But even though Portugal was given a good amount of land, as I continued to read more into it, Spain ended up with most of the land.So in a way Portugal was kinda cheated out because even though it sounded like a good deal right off the bat, it ended up being that Spain was still being more benefited by the whole thing. Maybe I'm way off on this answer but that's what i got out of it!! Please tell me if I'm wrong so that i don't take in the wrong information!!!
Who were actually the first people to come to America? Why was the Treaty of Tordessillas fair or do you think Portugal was cheated out by this treaty?
Not including the Native Americans, the Vikings were the first Europeans to come to the Americas. Some historians actually believe that some Pacific Islanders came first in canoes but they are having a really hard time proving it.
Also do you know that no one believed Marco Polo after he returned to Italy. For the rest of his life everyone thought he was nuts and even on his deathbed he was asked if everything was just made up and his reply was, 'I didn't tell you half of it.'
"1494 Treaty of Tordesillas between Spain and Portuga"
what was the treaty about? what did it do?
The Treaty of Tordesillas divided the world outside of Europe between the Spanish and Portuguese along a north-south meridian.The lands east would belong to Portugal and west went to Spain.It was actually made to resolve the dispute that had been created after the return of Christopher Columbus.
