An Age of Explorations and Isolation

Europeans Explore the East  Renaissance encouraged adventure and curiosity  Exploration greatly changes the world  Marco Polo reaches China in 1275  Exploration increases:  Grow rich  Spread Christianity  Advances n sailing technology

Europeans Explore the East  Desire for money from spices and Asian goods motivates exploration  Nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon and pepper added to bland European food  Spices introduced from crusades ( )  Muslims and Italians controlled over land trade  European merchants and monarchs wanted to bypass Italians with a sea route

Europeans Explore the East  Europeans believed they had a sacred duty to convert non-Christians  Caravel ships (pg. 531) of 1400s allow ships to sail against the wind with triangular sails adopted from the Asians  Astrolabe and compass allow for better navigation

Europeans Explore the East

 Portugal lead the way in exploration  Prince Henry supports exploration of African coast for spices, gold, jewels, and eventually slaves  Henry founded a navigation school:  Mapmakers  Instrument makers  Shipbuilders  Scientists  Sea Captains

Europeans Explore the East

 Dias reaches the tip of Africa in 1488 before storms and food shortages turned him back  Da Gama reaches India in 1497  Profit 60 times the cost of trip  Trip was 27,000 miles

Europeans Explore the East  1492 Spain Columbus as he tries to go west to reach Asia  He lands in Caribbean believing he made it  Tensions grow between Spain and Portugal  Line of Demarcation by Pope divides Spanish and Portuguese territories (Treaty of Tordesillas)  Spain gets most of Americas except for Brazil

Europeans Explore the East  Traders dealt with violent inhabitants as well as each other  Portugal beats Muslims at Hormuz and wins Spice Islands  Price of goods becomes 1/5 of original prices  Many other countries begin exploring  Magellan (Spain)

Europeans Explore the East  Map page 534  English and Dutch challenge Portuguese in 1600s  Dutch had over 20,000 vessels  Portuguese dominance fades as English and Dutch battle  Dutch East India Company becomes very powerful  By 1700 Amsterdam becomes trading center and Dutch control South Pacific and Cape of Good Hope for resupply

Europeans Explore the East  English East Company focuses on India  Port cities are controlled by Europeans  France begins trading in India  Traders to China and Japan had less success

China Limits European Contacts  European countries look to China and Japan in East Asia for additional trade  Ming Dynasty ( ) get tributes from other areas and does not want outsiders threatening their power  Mongols were chased out in 1368 and Hongwu stabilized China with reforms:  Agriculture, government, and morals,

China Limits European Contacts  Zheng Hue has 7 large voyages starting in 1405  Up 27,000 on an expedition with ships  After 7 th voyage in 1433 China withdrew to focus on fighting northern barbarians  Only government could conduct trade through certain ports  Ceramics and silk traded  Smuggling occurred

China Limits European Contacts  Economy favoring agriculture hurt trade  Missionaries brought Christianity  Poor leadership, famine, rebellion, corruption led to end of Ming Dynasty  1644 Manchus invade and Qing Dynasty begins  Would last for 260 years and add Taiwan, Mongolia and Tibet to China

China Limits European Contacts

 Dutch paid tributes and respected Chinese trade policies  China did not get along well with Britain  In 1800s the empire finally cracked  China felt it was the center of the universe for over 2,000 years

China Limits European Contacts  1600s and 1700s there was general peace in China and lives improved  Most Chinese were farmers and technology improvements led to a food surplus that led to a population boom  Sons valued for religious reasons and many daughters were killed

China Limits European Contacts  Chinese were artists and made intricate pottery and porcelain  Dramas were popular as many were illiterate. Plays created strong nationalsm.

Japan Returns to Isolation

 Japan had centuries of unrest and strife beginning in the 1300s as shoguns were politically weak and the economy was poor.  1467 civil war sent the feudal system and Japan into chaos.  Hundreds of separate domains develop  warring states period had warlords (daimyo) taking land and providing peasants protection

Japan Returns to Isolation  Castles and samurai on horses with gun supplied infantries fought each other for land  Seppuku – samurai suicide  Toyotomi Hideyoshi unites much of Japan and tries to conquer China before dying in 1592  Tokugawa Ieyasu unifies Japan in 1600 and moves capital to present day Tokyo  Local rulers had to spend every other year in the capital. This unites government eventually  Future shoguns were to – “Take care of the people, be virtuous, and protect the country”

Japan Returns to Isolation  Life in Japan  1616 to 1867 stable, prosperous and isolated  Merchants and wealthy prospered while peasants suffered with taxes  Society very structured  emperor (figurehead)  shogun (supreme military commander)  daimyo(landholding samurai)  samurai warriors  peasants and artisans  merchants

Japan Returns to Isolation  Confucius – ideal society depended on agriculture not commerce  Many farmers moved to growing towns and cities  Mid 1700s Tokyo had over 1M people  Women sheltered and restricted lives and obeyed husband without question  Drama and art grow  Haiku syllable poetry

Japan Returns to Isolation  16 th century traders and missionaries welcomed  By 17 century wore out their welcome due to aggressiveness  Muskets, cannons, eyeglasses, tobacco and clocks to Japan  300,000 Christian converts before being outlawed as a threat to the state  Christians and missionaries persecuted and killed while Buddhism was championed

Japan Returns to Isolation  Leaders did not want European ideas and ways so borders were sealed in 1639  200 years of limited foreign contact, no one could leave Japan either