1. Spanish North America
The Spanish left an impact on the cultures of North and South America that helped to shape the present-day United States

2. Myths of Columbus
Believed the world was round when everyone else thought it was flat
“Discovered” The “New World”
Looking for a new route to Asia because the Muslim Turks closed the “silk road”
Exploration and Trade were his primary motivations

3. Realities of Columbus
Primary motivations were conquest and exploitation
Scholars had understood the world was round for centuries
Many other Europeans had traveled to and even settled North America as early as 400 years earlier
“Silk Road” closed by other Christian countries to limit economic competition

4. Why does the Myth Persist?
Catholic Church
Italian Americans
Ethno-centrism (Thinking your culture is superior)
America’s obsession with Columbus

5. Three Worlds Collide Americas, Europe, Africa Columbian Exchange
Exchange of Flora and Fauna
Drastic economic, social, and political changes in all three areas
Columbian Exchange
Most important import from America to Europe: potato
Most important import from Europe to America: Disease

6. -What is the most important thing to come from the Old World to the New World?
-What is the most important thing to come from the New World to the Old World?

7. Spanish Pattern of Conquest
Plantation system:
Use native labor to grow large amount of crops cheaply
Used superior European weapon technology to dominate native peoples
Devastating to native populations
Spanish men intermarry with native women creating a mestizo population
Natives die in large numbers from European diseases
95% of the Native Americans die within 1 generation of European arrival

8. Effect of Spanish Conquest
Spain enters a “golden age”
So much silver is plundered from the Incan empire that the value of silver in Europe drops dramatically
Spain becomes the richest most powerful country in Europe
Death of Native populations influences Spanish “planters” to search for a new labor source---from West Africa