Columbian Exchange Essay

784 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Patterns and trends in columbian exchange

Columbian Exchange Essay
Starting in the 13th century, many countries were running out of room for their growing populations, and out of patience for one another. Many Europeans were getting almost cramped in their countries, and with no room to expand to the East, they decided to try and expand elsewhere. The spirit of adventure fueled their travels, with many explorers wanting to learn more about the world and what the endless possibilities could be if they were to find what was unknown to them at the time. The Columbian Exchange was one exploration that forever changed civilizations in the New World of the Americas and in the Old World in Europe. While some aspects of the exchange may have hurt one side or the other, overall the Columbian Exchange had an overall positive effect for the New World and Europe because it helped improve exploration for the future, shared new crops around the world, and introduced people of the new world to more helpful technologies and animals.
Where some may say that the Columbian Exchange just exchanged objects and ideas, it enabled much more as well. Before the Europeans had actually touched down in the New World, they had obtained a large amount of new experiences from their journeys at sea. “Exploration brought a better understanding of the world, which led to improved navigation and easier future voyages.” (Source One) Before any real exploration, Europeans had not known about Natives in the Americas or that the Americas even existed at all. While they thought they knew everything about the world, it was truly limited compared to its true size. Through this exploration, European explorers were able to obtain more information than they thought there was to know about what else what out in the...

... middle of paper ...

...at disease killed in the tribes, but in reality the diseases helped control the Native American population and enabled better and freer lives for the Natives that lived on. All animals brought across the Atlantic greatly helped the economies and daily lives of the people of the New World.
There were of course a few negative effects of the Columbian Exchange, but there are always negative effects of everything. But the Columbian Exchange greatly improved exploration for Europeans, making it easier for them to expand and explore in the future. It also brought new crops to both the Americas and Europe, helping both economies and populations. And finally, the trade of livestock enhanced the lives of Native Americans and made them much easier. Overall, the Columbian Exchange greatly helped both the New World and the Old World economically, politically, and socially.

Show More
Related

  • Columbian Exchange Research Paper

    747 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Columbian exchange was the exchange of goods and products that occurred when the Europeans came to America. Some of the items exchanged included potatoes and tomatoes, which originated in America, and wheat and rice, which originated in Europe. Because of this exchange, certain dishes are possible to be made. For example, tomatoes are a popular ingredient in Italian dishes, but they originated in America. Because of the Columbian exchange, Italians were able to adapt tomatoes to be included in their dishes. Similarly, there are many dishes which also cannot be possible without the exchange. This will go in-depth into a few dishes and see if they could be made without the Columbian exchange.

    Read More

  • The Columbian Exchange Chapter Summary

    1537 Words  | 4 Pages

    In Alfred J. Crosby’s book, The Columbian Exchange, the author examines the impact of the New World on the Old World, but also the impact the Old World had on the New World. One key distinction Crosby notes is how the discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus challenged the intellectual systems of Christianity and Aristotelianism. Most notably, the discovery of a world that was, in fact, “new” was so contradictory to scholarly work of the past, such as Aristotle or found in the Bible, that assumptions were made on where to fit the New World into a Christian and Aristotelian world. For example, previous findings under Aristotle, which were still utilized into the 15th Century, had “quite logically supposed the equatorial zone of

    Read More

  • Dbq Columbian Exchange

    886 Words  | 2 Pages

    Some consequences of the exchange are the spread of disease to the Native people and settlers, the destruction of the Native population, and the disappearance of the Natives custom’s, beliefs, and way of life. Columbus’s arrival to the Americas, land that had already been established by the Natives, resulted in a spread of fatal diseases. Disagreement between the Europeans and the Natives and the enslavement of Native people helped to wipe out the population. Document 5 illustrates the fighting that occurred between the Natives and Europeans.

    Read More

  • How Did The Columbian Exchange Affect Native Americans

    502 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Columbian Exchange impacted Native Americans, Europeans, and Africans in many ways. Some of the major components of this exchange were plants, animals, and diseases. The Native Americans was impacted because they did not have immune systems capable of handling diseases such as; small pox, the plague, and yellow fever. This resulted in the population of Native Americans being cut by at least 90% over the course of a couple hundred years and making it easier for foreigners to come in and take over. The animal that helped the Native Americans was the horse. It helped them expand and explore places other than agricultural plains like mountains. The Europeans brought back tobacco. Tabaco then lead to many deaths because of its health issues involved with the use. They also got introduced to tomatoes which people thought for a long time was not edible. Africans acquired potatoes and maize, which became a main staple in Africa.

    Read More

  • Columbian Exchange Argumentative Essay

    999 Words  | 2 Pages

    The most important person of the Columbian Exchange should be mentioned is Christopher Columbus (1451-1506), the Italian navigator and explorer. Columbus had sailed across the Atlantic four times which supported by Isabella, the queen of Spain. As a consequence, he found the “New World” which is America,

    Read More

  • Columbian Exchange Thesis

    1121 Words  | 3 Pages

    The author’s thesis is that before the arrival of Columbus and European culture in 1492, advanced society and culture already existed in the Americas that was not of the barbaric nature. This is clear when upon observing the author’s reasons for writing the book: “Balee’s talk was about ‘anthropogenic’ forests-forests created by Indians centuries or millennia in the past-a concept I’ve never heard of before. He also mentioned something that Denevan had discussed: many researchers now believe their predecessors underestimated the number of people in the Americas when Columbus arrived...Gee, someone ought to put all this stuff together, I thought. It would make a fascinating book”(x). Charles C. Mann is stating that upon learning the impressive

    Read More

  • The Columbian Exchange: Hierarchy System

    527 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Columbian exchange was one of the largest transfer of goods, human population, and etc between the New and Old world. These goods and other things changed the course of both world as we know it. In the Old World, new crops such as corn and potatoes were brought. These crops are able to stand harsh environment and able to grow in short amount of time. To the New World goods such as wheat, onions, and rice were brought. Also, ideas and technology were introduced to New World. However, The things coming from the Old World were contaminated with diseases that nearly wiped out the natives of New World. The people in from the Old World took advantage of the defenseless natives and enslaved them. The natives were forced into cheap and unfair labor.

    Read More

  • Cause And Impact Of The Columbian Exchange

    1284 Words  | 3 Pages

    This was the positive effect of the encounter and it was largely responsible for the doubling of the world’s population over the next three hundred years. There were also many negative effects to the “Columbian Exchange”. A major consequence was the spread of disease in the New World. Diseases carried by Europeans and Africans devastated the population of the Americas. As Europeans traveled through the Americas, epidemics came with them.

    Read More

  • Columbian Exchange

    2028 Words  | 5 Pages

    On August 3, 1492, Christopher Columbus departed from Palos, Spain to begin his journey across the Atlantic Ocean. This was the first of many voyages that allowed him to explore a New World where he was able to discover plants, animals, cultures and resources that Europeans had never seen before. The sharing of these resources and combination of the Old and New World has come to be known as the Columbian Exchange. During these explorations, the Europeans brought diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, typhoid and bubonic plague to the New World, wiping out entire Indian populations. There were also many other populations wiped out due to complications that came from this exchange. Were these explorations and the wiping out of entire populations worth the benefits gained by the exchange?

    Read More

  • Age Of Exploration Essay

    809 Words  | 2 Pages

    Many positive outcomes came from exploring. After exploration there was a lot more knowledge of the world, Europeans started producing better more accurate maps of the world which made it easier for sailors to get to the new world and back without getting lost. The discovery of the new world led to more trade and new foods, the new foods were able to feed more people which led to a bigger population for not only Europeans. After exploration Europeans were able to spread ideas and technology much quicker than before. For the Natives, they were able to hunt buffalo much easier with European

    Read More

  • The Columbian Exchange And The Columbian Exchange

    558 Words  | 2 Pages

    Columbian Exchange or the big exchange was a great exchange on a wide range of animals (Horses, Chickens, sheep, swine, Turkey), plants (Wheat, barley, corn, beans, tomatoes), people and culture, infectious diseases, and ideas, technology (Wheeled vehicles, iron tools, metallurgy) all these things happened between Native Americans and from Europe after the voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492. Resulting in communication between the two cultures to initiate a number of crops that have led to the increase in population in both hemispheres, where the explorers returned to Europe loaded with corn, tomatoes, potatoes, which has become one of the main crops in Eurasia with the solutions of the eighteenth century. At the same time, the Europeans crops, cassava and peanuts to Southeast Asia with a tropical climate.

    Read More

  • European Imperialism And The Columbian Exchange

    475 Words  | 1 Pages

    Christopher Columbus’ discovery of the New World in 1492 sparked an era known as the Columbian Exchange, in which the exchange of plants, animals, technology, ideas, and diseases occurred. It also marked the migration of many European settlers into the Americas, where they implemented their Eurocentric ideology on the First Nations who were residing there. A large amount of Latin Native Americans were taken as slaves back to Europe, or forced to commit rigorous labour and chores on sugar and coffee plantations in the Caribbean or South America. European monarchs utilized such resources through a mercantilist policy, giving Europe an economic boost. Based on the profits they were making through colonialism, they decided to set out and go imperialize more territory around the world. These events reinforce the idea that Europe could only flourish through the marginalization of Aboriginal

    Read More

  • Columbian Exchange Dbq

    331 Words  | 1 Pages

    The Columbian Exchange was the trading of goods between the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Asia. The Columbian Exchange could be argued as to whether it had a good or bad affect on the Americas. But in my opinion, it had a bad effect on the Americas. In document one, two, and three it says that the Americas weren’t custom to the diseases that the Explorers brought over so therefore they didn’t know how to treat it causing a majority of the Native Americans to die out. Also, in document three it shows that that the decline

    Read More

  • The Columbian Exchange

    1121 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Columbian Exchange allowed the world to share its resources and discover new ways of living. It opened the doors for new discoveries, trade, and raised the economy of many countries. People throughout Europe were given the opportunity to travel to the newly discovered lands of the Americas and begin new lives.

    Read More

  • The Columbian Exchange

    1084 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Colombian Exchange was an extensive exchange between the eastern and western hemispheres as knows as the Old World and New World. The Colombian exchange greatly affects almost every society. It prompted both voluntary and forced migration of millions of human beings. There are both positive and negative effects that you can see from the Colombian Exchange. The Colombian Exchange explorers created contact between Europe and the Americas. The interaction with Native Americans began the exchange of animals, plants, disease, and weapons. The most significant effects that the Colombian Exchange had on the Old World and New World were its changes in agriculture, disease, culture, and its effects on ecology.

    Read More

More about Columbian Exchange Essay

Open Document