The European Advantage

By the beginning of the eighteenth century, European powers had laid claim to most of the Western Hemisphere. Their wars and rivalries during that century led to an expansion of Spanish and English claims, at the expense of the French.

Distinctiveness of Early Modern European Empires

• Geographical Advantage:

  • European empires were distinctive because they conquered territories across the Atlantic Ocean rather than adjacent to the imperial heartland.

  • Atlantic rim countries like Portugal, Spain, Britain, and France were closer to the Americas, giving them a strategic advantage over potential Asian and Eastern European competitors.

• Maritime Environment and Navigation:

  • Challenges like the Atlantic's complex currents and prevailing winds forced Europeans mariners to innovate, fostering the creation of highly maneuverable European ships.

    • Advanced mapmaking, navigation techniques, and ship designs, built upon earlier models, facilitated Atlantic exploration, enabling Europeans to traverse vast distances with greater efficiency.

• Motivations for Expansion:

  • Economic: European elites sought access to lucrative Eurasian commerce, feeling marginalized in the Indian Ocean trading network dominated by China, India, and Muslim states.

    • The discovery of the Americas promised vast resources, including precious metals and agricultural wealth, so all of the competing states sought to gain access to those resources, that would be inaccessible to their Asian neighbors.

    • The merchant class aimed to establish direct trade links with Asia to maximize profits and reduce dependence on middlemen, incentivizing exploration and colonization.

  • Political: Rivalries among European states and a desire to bypass the Ottoman Empire motivated expansion efforts motivated aggressive expansion efforts.

    • European states and trading companies effectively mobilized state resources and private enterprise to finance and support colonial ventures.

  • Religious and Cultural:

    • Missionaries saw colonization as an opportunity to spread Christianity to indigenous populations, driven by religious zeal and the desire for converts.

    • Persecuted minorities sought refuge and opportunities for social mobility in the colonies, contributing to frontier expansion and settlement.

Advantages of European Empires

• Effective Mobilization of Resources:

  • European states and trading companies effectively mobilized human and material resources for empire-building efforts.

• Technological Superiority:

  • European innovations in mapmaking, navigation, sailing techniques, ship design, ironworking, gunpowder weapons, and horses gave them advantages over indigenous peoples in the Americas.

  • Divisions within and between local societies provided opportunities for European invaders to gain allies.

• Impact of Diseases:

  • European germs and diseases, to which Native Americans had no immunity, decimated indigenous populations.

  • Diseases often spread in advance of European arrival, contributing to the rapid decline of native societies and allowing Europeans to outnumber local populations within a few decades in certain regions.

Role of Alliances and Disease in Conquest

• Alliances with Indigenous Peoples:

  • European conquests were facilitated by alliances with local peoples who resented indigenous domination or saw benefits in collaborating with European invaders.

  • Subject peoples of the Aztec Empire, such as the Tlaxcalans, deeply resented their Mexica overlords, creating internal divisions ripe for exploitation by the Spanish invaders.

    • Spanish conquistadors, led by Hernan Cortes, allied with various subject peoples of the Aztec Empire and Inca elite during the attack on Tenochtitlan, welcomed as liberators.

• Impact of Disease on Indigenous Societies:

  • European diseases, unfamiliar to Native Americans, devastated indigenous societies and contributed significantly to the success of European conquests.

    • Diseases introduced by Europeans, such as smallpox, measles, and influenza, caused widespread devastation among Native American populations. These epidemics, often occurring before direct contact with Europeans, led to staggering losses and weakened indigenous resistance to European conquest.

  • Diseases often spread rapidly, causing demographic collapse among native populations and altering the balance of power in favor of European colonizers.

    • The combination of warfare, displacement, and disease led to a sharp decline in native populations, allowing European settlers to establish dominance in certain regions.

AP Questions:

• What historical developments enabled Europeans to carve out huge empires an ocean away from their homelands?

  • Maritime Innovation: European advancements in shipbuilding, navigation, and sailing techniques allowed for longer and more efficient voyages across the open ocean. Innovations such as the caravel, compass, astrolabe, and improvements in mapmaking made transatlantic travel feasible.

  • Motivations for Exploration: European states were driven by various motivations to explore and expand overseas. These included the desire for new trade routes to Asia to bypass the Ottoman Empire, competition with other European powers for wealth and territory, the spread of Christianity, and the quest for glory and adventure.

  • State-Sponsored Ventures: European monarchs and governments sponsored overseas exploration and colonization through charters, grants, and investment in trading companies. Entities like the Spanish Crown, Portuguese Crown, Dutch East India Company, and British East India Company financed expeditions and established colonies to expand their influence and increase their wealth.

  • Technological Superiority: European military technology, including firearms, cannons, and iron weaponry, gave them an advantage over indigenous populations. Additionally, the introduction of diseases like smallpox, measles, and influenza, for which Native Americans had no immunity, devastated indigenous societies and facilitated European conquest.

  • Alliances with Indigenous Peoples: European explorers often formed alliances with indigenous groups who were enemies of established empires or who sought to benefit from European trade or military support. These alliances provided European powers with local knowledge, resources, and manpower to aid in their conquests.

The Great Dying and the Little Ice Age

• Impact of European Diseases:

  • Devastation of Native American Societies: Contact with European and African diseases led to catastrophic mortality rates among Native American populations, with some regions losing up to 90 percent of their people within a few decades.

  • Collapse of Caribbean Peoples: The densely settled indigenous populations of Caribbean islands were virtually wiped out within fifty years of Columbus's arrival due to diseases like smallpox.

  • Population Decline in Central Mexico: The population of Central Mexico, estimated at 10 to 20 million before the Spanish conquest, dwindled to about 1 million by 1650, as described in native Nahuatl accounts depicting social breakdown and starvation during the smallpox pandemic.

• Demographic Consequences:

  • Dutch and British Territories in North America: Observations from New Netherland (New York) and Plymouth Colony (Massachusetts) reported drastic declines in indigenous populations, with estimates suggesting up to nine-tenths of Native Americans perishing due to diseases like smallpox.

  • Slow Population Recovery: The catastrophic decline in Native American populations persisted for centuries, with some regions experiencing limited recovery only by the late seventeenth century.

• Impact of the Little Ice Age:

  • Global Climatic Shift: The Little Ice Age, spanning the thirteenth to nineteenth centuries, brought unusually cool temperatures, especially in the Northern Hemisphere, impacting weather patterns and agricultural productivity worldwide.

  • Link to Demographic Collapse: The abandonment of farmland due to disease outbreaks led to a resurgence of plant life, absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and contributing to global cooling.

  • Impact on Food Production: Shorter growing seasons and adverse weather conditions during the Little Ice Age adversely affected food production globally, exacerbating the challenges faced by indigenous populations already devastated by European diseases.

The General Crisis: The near-record cold winters experienced in much of China, Europe, and North America in the mid-seventeenth century, sparked by the Little Ice Age; extreme weather conditions led to famines, uprisings, and wars.

• Peak in the Mid-Seventeenth Century: The impact of the cooler climate reached its peak in the mid-seventeenth century, sparking what scholars term the General Crisis.

• Widespread Effects: Much of China, Europe, and North America experienced record or near-record cold winters during this period, leading to extreme conditions and irregular rainfall. Severe droughts in regions like China and central Mexico resulted in crop failures and food shortages.

• Difficult weather conditions exacerbated existing stresses in societies, leading to widespread famines, epidemics, uprisings, and wars in which millions perished. The collapse of the Ming dynasty in China, constant warfare in Europe, and civil war in Mughal India occurred within this context.

• Impact on the Americas:

  • The Americas, already devastated by the Great Dying, faced further suffering during the Little Ice Age and the General Crisis. Central Mexico experienced severe droughts, leading to skyrocketing maize prices and water shortages.

  • Caribbean Conditions: The Caribbean region experienced torrential rains, accompanied by El Niño weather patterns, which provided ideal conditions for the breeding of disease-carrying mosquitoes.

The Columbian Exchange

• Creation of New Societies in the Americas:

  • Labor Shortage: The Great Dying, coupled with the effects of the Little Ice Age, created a significant labor shortage in the Americas, leading to a new influx of immigrant Europeans and enslaved Africans.

  • Cultural Transformation: Over centuries, the interaction of indigenous, European, and African peoples gave rise to entirely new societies in the Americas, replacing pre-Columbian cultures.

• Biological Exchange:

  • Introduction of European and African Species of Crops: Europeans and Africans brought not only their people but also plants and animals to the Americas, fundamentally altering the landscape and dietary habits.

    • Examples: Wheat, rice, sugarcane, grapes, garden vegetables, fruits, and domesticated animals such as horses, pigs, cattle, goats, and sheep.

  • Impact on Environment and Society:

    • Environmental Transformation: Extensive deforestation occurred, making room for agriculture and ranching, while the proliferation of domesticated animals facilitated the emergence of ranching economies and cowboy cultures.

    • Social Changes: The introduction of horses transformed Native American societies, particularly in the North American West, where bison hunting from horseback became prevalent.

• Spread of American Food Crops:

  • Global Dissemination: American food crops such as corn, potatoes, and cassava spread widely in the Eastern Hemisphere, contributing to population growth and dietary diversity.

    • Examples: Corn and potatoes significantly boosted population numbers in Europe, while corn also became an essential food staple in China and Africa.

  • Consequences: The introduction of American food crops played a crucial role in sustaining population growth worldwide and had profound socio-economic impacts, such as in Ireland's case of population growth followed by the potato famine, which was also due to an American disease.

• Cultural Exchange and Economic Impact:

  • Global Adoption: American stimulants like tobacco and chocolate became widely used around the world, while tea from China and coffee from the Islamic world also spread globally.

  • Economic Benefits and Inequality: The Columbian Exchange had uneven benefits, with Western Europeans reaping the greatest rewards through the acquisition of wealth, resources, and colonial markets, leading to their dominance on the world stage.

  • Intellectual Revolution: The influx of new information from the colonies contributed to the Scientific Revolution in Europe, challenging conventional understandings of the world.

  • Industrial Revolution: The wealth and resources extracted from the colonies served as a foundation for Europe's Industrial Revolution, extending European civilization and power globally.

  • The colonial empires of the Americas greatly facilitated a changing global balance of power, which now thrust the previously marginal Western Europeans into an increasingly central and commanding role on the world stage.