Age of Exploration and the Columbian Exchange

Vocabulary flashcards covering the Columbian Exchange, the Age of Exploration, and the impacts on Europe, Native Americans, and Africans based on the provided lecture notes.

Columbian Exchange

A network of trade products and biological transfers passing from the Americas, to Europe, to Africa.

Columbus in 1492

European explorer whose arrival created linkages between continents, leading to agricultural sharing, natural environment changes, introduction of diseases to the Americas, and the African slave trade.

Effects of the Age of Exploration

Major developments resulting from exploration, including Spanish and Portuguese empires established in the New World, beginnings of slavery in the Americas, European competition for land, growth of capitalism, and native population decrease.

Causes of Native Population Decrease

The three primary factors responsible for the decline of native populations during European exploration: guns, germs, and steel.

Growth of Capitalism

An economic result during the Age of Exploration that developed due to the Columbian Exchange.

Positive Impacts of Exploration on Europe

Favorable outcomes for Europe including trade, gold, economic expansion, expansion of land ownership, spreading of religions, and social order and justice.

Negative Impacts of Exploration on Europe

Unfavorable consequences for Europeans, specifically indentured servitude and death from wars and disease.

Negative Impacts on Native Americans and Africans

Severe adverse effects of European exploration, including disease, exploitation, loss of property, and loss of cultural identity.

Potential Positive Impact on Native Americans and Africans

A possible beneficial outcome where affected groups unite against a common enemy.

New World Products (Americas)

Items native to the Americas in the Columbian Exchange, including squash, turkey, cocoa, peanut, avocado, pumpkin, pineapple, tomato, peppers, tobacco, cassava, vanilla, sugar cane, sweet potatoes, quinine, potato, and maize.

Old World Products and Diseases (Introduced to Americas)

Items and pathogens brought to the Americas, including olive, onion, grape, citrus fruits, cattle, flu, diphtheria, coffee bean, turnip, peach, pear, sheep, typhus, whooping cough, banana, honeybee, syphilis, wheat, pigs, measles, rice, barley, oats, horse, smallpox, and malaria.

European Trade Items (Europe to Africa/Americas)

Goods traded out of Europe across the network, including trinkets, liquor, and guns.

Foner Book, Pages 6-8 Unit 1: A New World

Assigned reading outlining European exploration, Columbus's arrival in 1492, and the good and bad influences of exploration on Europe, Native Americans, and Africans.