1/20Do Now What is your favorite food? What are the ingredients (meats/fruits/vegetable/etc.) and where do they come from?

The Columbian Exchange

Who benefited from the Columbian Exchange the most, the New World or the Old World?

Columbian Exchange  Columbus brought new plants and animals to the New World (Americas).  The New World also had plants & animals that Europe did not.  The spread of plants, animals, diseases, people, and ideas between Europe and America became known as the Columbian Exchange.

From the Americas  Tomatoes  Potatoes  Chocolate  Peppers  Pumpkins  Corn  Peanuts  Beans From Europe/Africa/Asia  Wheat  Sugar  Grapes  Cattle  Horses  Pigs  Coffee  Bananas  Chicken

From Europe/Africa/Asia  Wheat  Sugar  Grapes  Cattle  Horses  Pigs  Coffee  Bananas  Chicken

New Ways of Life  Corn and potatoes swept through Europe  Easy to grow and store  These crops helped feed a rapidly growing European population, beginning several centuries of European world domination.  Potatoes provided poor Irish peasants with nutritious food – but it backfired (Irish Potato Famine)  Horses and donkeys brought to the Americas made life easier by improving transportation and hunting.

Spread of Disease  Diseases brought from Europe killed 90% of the Native Americans (anywhere from 1,000, ,000,000 people)  Native Americans had no resistance to the disease – Europeans had built up immunities over the centuries through close contact with various animals and bacteria.  People living at this time did not know about germs or the causes of diseases

What did the Native Americans think was happening? Why were they all dying?

Disease  When European moved inland, they encountered ghost towns of dying Native Americans  How did this affect the European colonists and their expanding settlements

Divine Intervention  “The good hand of God favored our beginnings,” William Bradford said, “by sweeping away great multitudes of the natives … that he might make room for us.”  They believed that by wiping out the native populations, God was clearing room for the Europeans to settle.

How would life today be different without the Columbian Exchange?  Corn and peanuts became staples in African cuisine – they grow well there, enriched Africans’ diets.  Italian food without tomatoes?  Irish food without Potatoes?  No chocolate in Belgium?