THE
EUROPEAN DISCOVERY OF THE NEW WORLD
Interpreting
Primary Source Documents
Columbus
reports on his voyage to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain.
These people
in the Caribbean have no creed and they are not idolaters, but they are very
gentle and do not know what it is to be wicked, or to kill others, or to
steal...and they are sure that we come from Heaven....So your Highnesses should
resolve to make them Christians, for I believe that if you begin, in a little
while you will achieve the conversion of a great number of peoples to our holy
faith, with the acquisition of great lordships and riches and all their
inhabitants for Spain. For without doubt there is a very great amount of gold
in these lands….
The people
of this island [Hispaniola], and of all the others that I have found and seen,
or not seen, all go naked, men and women, just as their mothers bring them
forth; although some women cover a single place with the leaf of a plant, or a
cotton something which they make for that purpose. They have no iron or steel, nor any weapons....They have no other
weapons than the stems of reeds...on the end of which they fix little sharpened
stakes. Even these they dare not
use....they are incurably timid....
I have not
found, nor had any information of monsters, except of an island which is here the second in the approach of
the Indies, which is inhabited by a people whom, in all the islands, they
regard as very ferocious, who eat human flesh….
They brought
us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which they
exchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells. They willingly traded everything they owned. They do not bear arms, and do not know them,
for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out of
ignorance. With fifty men we could
subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want.
Questions
to think about:
1. How accurate do you consider Columbus's
description of the New World?
2. How does Columbus describe the Indians?
3. Why, according to Columbus, should Spain be
interested in colonizing
the New
World?
INTERPRETING
STATISTICS: THE FIRST AMERICANS
Depopulation
of Native Americans in Florida, 1519-1617
Year Disease Percent Estimated
Decline Population
1517 722,000
1520 Smallpox -50 361,000
1528 Measles -50 180,500
1545 Bubonic
plague -12.5 158,000
1559 Influenza -5 150,000
1564-70 Influenza -10 135,000
1585 Unidentified -10 121,500
1586 Cape
Verde
Island
fever -20 97,200
1596 Measles -25 72,900
1613-17 Bubonic
plague -50 36,450
Questions
to think about:
1. How many people were living in the New World
when Columbus arrived?
2. Why did the Native American population
rapidly decline after the arrival of Europeans?
3. What factors may have contributed to the
Indians lack of immHANDOUTy to disease?
CHRONOLOGY:
SPANISH EXPLORATION AND CONQUEST
Date Explorer Accomplishment
1492-1504 Christopher
Columbus Discovered West Indies
1513, 1521 Juan
Ponce de Leon First European to explore land in
present-day
United
States
1513 Vasco
Nunez de Balboa First European to see the Pacific
Ocean
1519-1522 Ferdinand
Magellan Led first voyage around the world
1519-1521 Hernando
Cortes Conquered Aztec empire in Mexico
1528-1536 Alva
Nunez Cabeza First
European to explore American
de Vaca Southwest
1531-1533 Francisco
Pizarro Conquered Inca empire
1539-1542 Hernando
de Soto Explored Alabama, Florida, Georgia,
Mississippi,
and Oklahoma
1540-1542
Francisco Vasquez Explored
American Southwest as far
de Coronado northward
as Kansas