Hernn Corts

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The Age of Exploration

15001800

Key EventsAs you read this chapter, look for the key events of the Age of Exploration.

Europeans risked dangerous ocean voyages to discover new sea routes. Early European explorers sought gold in Africa then began to trade slaves.

Trade increased in Southeast Asia, and the Dutch built a trade empire based on spices in the Indonesian Archipelago.

The Impact TodayThe events that occurred during this time period still impact our lives today.

European trade was a factor in producing a new age of commercial capitalism that was one of the first steps toward todays world economy.

The consequences of slavery continue to impact our lives today. The Age of Exploration led to a transfer of ideas and products, many of which are still

important in our lives today.

World History Video The Chapter 13 video, Magellans Voyage,chronicles European exploration of the world.

1480 1510 1540 1570 1600

1497John Cabot andAmerigo Vespucciexplore theAmericas

1519Spanish beginconquest ofMexico

1492ChristopherColumbusreaches theAmericas

1518First boatloadof slavesbrought directlyfrom Africa tothe Americas

1520Magellan sailsinto PacificOcean

Amerigo Vespucci

1595First Dutch fleetarrives in India

Shackled African slaves

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HISTORY

Chapter OverviewVisit the Glencoe WorldHistory Web site at

and click on Chapter 13ChapterOverview to preview chapter information.

wh.glencoe.com1630 1660 1690 1720 1750

1767Burmese sackThai capital

1630English foundMassachusettsBay Colony

World map, 1630

Ships of the Dutch East India Company

c. 1650Dutch occupyPortuguese fortsin Indian Oceantrading areas

c. 1700English establishcolonial empire inNorth America

http://wh.glencoe.com

Strait of Magellan

ATLANTICOCEAN

PACIFICSEA

SOUTHAMERICA

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onvinced that he could find a sea passage to Asia throughthe Western Hemisphere, the Portuguese explorer Ferdi-

nand Magellan persuaded the king of Spain to finance his voy-age. On September 20, 1519, Magellan set sail on the AtlanticOcean with five ships and a Spanish crew of about 250 men.

After reaching South America, Magellans fleet moveddown the coast in search of a strait, or sea passage, thatwould take them through America. His Spanish ship captainsthought he was crazy: The fool is obsessed with his searchfor a strait, one remarked.

At last, in November 1520, Magellan passed through a nar-row waterway (later named the Strait of Magellan) andemerged in the Pacific Ocean,which he called the Pacific Sea.Magellan reckoned that itwould be a short distance from there to the Spice Islandsof the East.

Week after week he and hiscrew sailed on across the Pacificas their food supplies dwindled. At last they reached thePhilippines (named after the future King Philip II of Spain).There, Magellan was killed by the native peoples. Only one ofhis original fleet of five ships returned to Spain, but Magellanis still remembered as the first person to sail around the world.

CMagellan Sails Around the World

FerdinandMagellan

Discovery of Magellan Strait by an unknown artist

Why It MattersAt the beginning of the sixteenthcentury, European adventurerslaunched their small fleets into thevast reaches of the Atlantic Ocean.They were hardly aware that theywere beginning a new era, not onlyfor Europe but also for the peoplesof Asia, Africa, and the Americas.These European voyages markedthe beginning of a process that ledto radical changes in the political,economic, and cultural life of theentire non-Western world.

History and You Create a mapto scale that shows Spain, SouthAmerica, and the Philippines. Drawthe route Magellan took from Spainto the Philippines. If the voyage tookabout 20 months, how many mileseach day, on average, did Magellantravel? How long would a similarsea voyage take today?

1494The Treaty of Tordesillasdivides the Americas

1500Pedro Cabral lands in South America

Guide to Reading

Exploration and Expansion

Preview of Events

1550Spanish gain controlof northern Mexico

1480 1495 1510 1525 1540 1555

In a letter to the treasurer of the king and queen of Spain, Christopher Columbusreported on his first journey:

Believing that you will rejoice at the glorious success that our Lord has granted mein my voyage, I write this to tell you how in thirty-three days I reached the Indies withthe first fleet which the most illustrious King and Queen, our Sovereigns, gave me,where I discovered a great many thickly-populated islands. Without meeting resistance,I have taken possession of them all for their Highnesses. . . . When I reached [Cuba], Ifollowed its coast to the westward, and found it so large that I thought it must be themainlandthe province of [China], but I found neither towns nor villages on the sea-coast, save for a few hamlets.

Letters from the First Voyage, edited 1847

To the end of his life, despite the evidence, Columbus believed he had found a newroute to Asia.

Motives and MeansThe dynamic energy of Western civilization between 1500 and 1800 was most

apparent when Europeans began to expand into the rest of the world. First Portu-gal and Spain, then later the Dutch Republic, England, and France, all rose to neweconomic heights through their worldwide trading activity.

Voices from the Past

Main Ideas In the fifteenth century, Europeans

began to explore the world. Portugal, Spain, the Dutch Republic, and

England reached new economic heightsthrough worldwide trade.

Key Termsconquistador, colony, mercantilism,balance of trade

People to IdentifyVasco da Gama, Christopher Columbus,John Cabot, Amerigo Vespucci, FranciscoPizarro, Ferdinand Magellan

Places to LocatePortugal, Africa, Melaka, Cuba

Preview Questions1. Why did Europeans travel to Asia?2. What impact did European expansion

have on the conquerors and theconquered?

Reading StrategySummarizing Information Use a chartlike the one below to list reasons whyMelaka, a port on the Malay Peninsula,was important to the Portuguese.

CHAPTER 13 The Age of Exploration 407

Importance of Melaka

1488Bartholomeu Dias roundsthe Cape of Good Hope

Christopher Columbus

Lambert Azimuthal Equal-Area projection2,000 kilometers0

2,000 miles0

N

S

EW

Death ofMagellanApril 1521

30E60W 60E 90E 120E 150E 180120W 90W150W 030W

0

30S

30N

60N

60S

EQUATOR

TROPIC OFCAPRICORN

TROPIC OF CANCER

Dias 14

87 Elcano (for

Magellan) 1

522

Elcano

Mag

ellan

1519-

1520

Magellan 1521

Cortes 1519 Columbus 149

2

Verrazano

1524

da Gam

aCa

bral

150

0Cab

ral

daG

am

a 1497

Cartier 1534

Cabot

1497

Hudson 1610

Hudson 1609

Magellan

Pizarro

1531-1532 AtlanticOcean

INDIanOcean

pacificOcean

HudsonBay

CaribbeanSea

pacificOcean

Strait of Magellan

Strait ofMalacca

A S I A

AFRICA

EUROPE

AUSTRALIASOUTHAMERICA

NORTHAMERICA

Philippines

Greenland

HispaniolaBahamasCuba

Spice Islands(Moluccas)

SPAINPORTUGAL

NETHERLANDSFRANCE

PERU

CHINAINDIA

JAPAN

HONDURAS

MEXICO

ENGLAND

Lima

Tenochtitlan(Mexico City)

MelakaCalicut

Goa

For almost a thousand years, Europeans hadmostly remained in one area of the world. At the endof the fifteenth century, however, they set out on aremarkable series of overseas journeys. What causedthem to undertake such dangerous voyages to theends of the earth?

Europeans had long been attracted to Asia. In thelate thirteenth century, Marco Polo had traveled withhis father and uncle to the Chinese court of the greatMongol ruler Kublai Khan. He had written anaccount of his experiences, known as The Travels. Thebook was read by many, including Columbus, whowere fascinated by the exotic East. In the fourteenthcentury, conquests by the Ottoman Turks reduced theability of westerners to travel by land to the East.People then spoke of gaining access to Asia by sea.

Economic motives loom large in European expan-sion. Merchants, adventurers, and state officials hadhigh hopes of expanding trade, especially for thespices of the East. The spices, which were needed topreserve and flavor food, were very expensive afterbeing shipped to Europe by Arab middlemen. Euro-peans also had hopes of finding precious metals. OneSpanish adventurer wrote that he went to the Amer-icas to give light to those who were in darkness, andto grow rich, as all men desire to do.

This statement suggests another reason for theoverseas voyages: religious zeal. Many people sharedthe belief of Hernn Corts, the Spanish conqueror ofMexico, that they must ensure that the natives areintroduced into the holy Catholic faith.

There was a third motive as well. Spiritual andsecular affairs were connected in the sixteenth cen-tury. Adventurers such as Corts wanted to convertthe natives to Christianity, but grandeur, glory, and aspirit of adventure also played a major role in Euro-pean expansion.

God, glory, and gold, then, were the chiefmotives for European expansion, but what made thevoyages possible? By the second half of the fifteenthcentury, European monarchies had increased their

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DutchEnglishFrenchPortugueseSpanish

European Voyages of Discovery

For more than a hundred years European explorers sailedthe globe sea