Native American societies before European contact
European exploration in the New World
The Columbian Exchange
Labor, slavery, and caste in the Spanish colonial system
Cultural interactions between Europeans, Native Americans, and Africans
1492 Columbus/Reconquista of Spain
1519 Cortez Conquers Aztecs
⭐ 1607 Jamestown
Maize Cultivation
⭐ Columbian Exchange
🔵 Encomienda System
🟢 Caste System
Tenochtitlan
Aztec
Caravel
🔵 Mestizos
🔵 Creoles
Black Legend
Columbus/Reconquista of Spain: Many European nations like Spain and Portugal wanted to expand and find new trade routes but settled in the New World.
Cortez Conquers Aztecs: Cortez destroyed Tenochtitlan and proclaimed the Aztec Empire to be New Spain.
Jamestown: Was the first permanent English colony in which they settled in to find gold and seek a water route to the Pacific in North America.
Definition: The growing of Indian corn, a staple of many Indian diets, leading many nomadic tribes to settle and develop great civilizations such as the Aztec Incas and Mayans.
Significance: Supported economic development, settlement, advanced irrigation, and social diversification among societies.
Definition: The exchange of plants, animals, diseases, and technologies between the Americas and the rest of the world following Columbus' voyages.
Significance: Transformed European and Native American ways of life.
Definition: System in Spanish America that gave settlers the right to tax local Indians or to demand their labor in exchange for protecting them and teaching them skills.
Significance: Allowed for a vast accumulation of wealth by the conquistadors and the Spanish crown.
Definition: A set of rigid social categories that determined not only a person's occupation and economic potential, but also his or her position in society. In Spanish America colonies it was determined by birth and degrees of racial mixing.
Significance: Define the status of these populations under the Spanish empire based on race and ethnicity.
Definition: Capital of the Aztec Empire, located on the island in Lake Texcoco. Its population was about 150,000 on the eve of Spanish conquest. Mexico City was constructed on it's ruins.
Significance: Conquistadors described it as the greatest city they had ever seen.
Definition: (1200-1521) 1300, they settled in the valley of Mexico. Grew corn. Engaged in frequent warfare to conquer others of the region. Worshipped many gods (polytheistic). Believed the sun god needed human blood to continue his journeys across the sky. Practiced human sacrifices and those sacrificed were captured warriors from other tribes and those who volunteered for the honor.
Significance: The Aztecs made advances in art, architecture, and astronomy.
Definition: A small, highly maneuverable three-massed ship used by the Portuguese and Spanish in the exploration of the Atlantic.
Significance: Allowed European sailors to explore the Western shore of Africa.
Definition: A person of mixed Native American and European ancestry.
Significance: They made up a significant portion of Spanish America's population.
Definition: Descendants of Spanish-born but born in Latin America; resented inferior social, political, and economic status.
Significance: As one of few examples of successful slave rebellion, it inspired slaves and abolitionists alike to continue fighting for the antislavery cause.
Definition: Concept that Spanish conquerors merely tortured and murdered Indians, stole gold and infected them with smallpox, leaving nothing of benefit.
Significance: Depicted Spanish and Portuguese colonizers as cruel, brutal, and greedy, and portrayed their treatment of indigenous peoples as barbaric and inhumane.
Explored and first found the Americas.
Destroyed Aztecs and built New Spain.
First colony.
Corn that Indians grew and it allowed for greater populations.
Exchanging everything between the Americas and everywhere else.
Settlers had the right to tax Indians or ask for anything in return they protected them and taught them things.
Social structure that set certain classes based on race.
Capital of the Aztec Empire.
Believed in many gods and human sacrifice.
A new ship used by the Portuguese and Spanish.
Mixed Native American and European.
Parents are Spanish-born but born in Latin America.
Concept that the Spanish took everything from the Indians and left them with nothing.