quiz 1 study guide.
How did the encomienda system function?
A grant by the Spanish Crown to a colonist in America bestowing the right to enslave the indigenous populations of that land.
What did the Treaty of Tordesillas accomplish?
Agreement between Spain & Portugal over colonial lands - Portugal got the east, Spain got the west.
How did justifications for slavery change from the fifteenth to eighteenth century?
Arguments supporting slavery began shift from religion to supposed white biological + scientific supremacy, as well as sociological stereotypes.
After losing access to slave trading from the Black Sea, what slaves did the Genoese obtain as an alternative?
Black Africans.
What was a major motivation for European exploration?
Economy, religion, and glory.
What are the characteristics of the role of Europe in the system of world trade prior to the voyage of Columbus?
Europe was a comparatively primitive, minor outpost for trade due to producing few products desired by other civilizations.
What are the characteristics of the immigration patterns (forced and unforced) of Europeans and Africans to the Americas between 1500 and 1800?
Europeans were motivated to the Western Americas by wealth & power, while Africans were forced to work as slaves to provide European wealth.
"[E]veryone gives the title of barbarism to everything that is not according to his usage." How did Michel de Montaigne offer a counterpoint, expressed in the quote above, to Europe's growing imperial activities?
He disagreed with a majority of colonialist rhetoric & rejected the supposed superiority of the West over indigenous populations.
How did Portuguese merchants obtain most of their slaves in Africa?
Human trafficking.
How did the Turks' expansion of the Ottoman Empire and their conquest of the Byzantine Empire and its capital Constantinople in 1453 influence European exploration?
It compelled Europeans to search for alternate Chinese trade routes to bypass the Ottoman-controlled areas.
What did Columbus believe he had found when he arrived in the Caribbean?
Japanese islands.
Who resisted the Portuguese efforts to gain control over Indian Ocean trade?
Muslim-controlled port stations.
The European voyages of the fifteenth century were derived from a desire to share in the wealth of which region?
The Indian Ocean trade market.
What group dominated the Aztec state?
The Mexicana people.
In the fifteenth century, which were the two rival Islamic empires dominated the Middle East?
The Persian Savafids and the Turkish Ottomans.
How did Europeans initially justify the enslavement of Africans?
The conversion the Native populace to Christianity, which was later disputed by Vatican spies.
What motivations for exploration by Europeans are expressed in the following two quotes? Bartholomew Diaz: "[T]o serve God and his Majesty, to give light to those who were in darkness, and to grow rich as all men desire to do." Hernán Cortés: "I have come to win gold, not to plow the fields like a peasant."
The first is the command of the Crown, conversion to Christianity, and to gain personal wealth, while the second is to enslave others to gain wealth for themselves.
What was the primary cause of the emergence of inflation in Spain in the sixteenth century?
The inability of Spanish industry to produce enough goods to meet demand. Also increase in population and surplus of production.
What is the only acceptable way to contact the instructor in this course? (Read the syllabus)
Via SMC email.
