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The Europeans colonized most of America because they saw the land they had available where they could expand their influence on the world. Also, they were able to establish colonies that sent raw materials home which would make them money. Through the analysis of Jared Diamonds video Guns, Germs, and Steel, this essay will show that the Europeans were able to conquer the Native American’s so easily because of their geography, weapons, and diseases. The advantages from the geography that the Europeans had allowed them to have agriculture and domesticated animals causing complex societies to be developed which lead to the conquering of the Native Americans (Guns, Germs, and Steel Video). The germs and diseases that were exposed to the America’s made the settlement of the land a lot easier. Since the Europeans settlers did not understand the causes of Malaria, they settled by river and water sources where they were exposed to Malaria even more. Also, they all lived close by each other so the epidemics were occurring often and were very deadly to the other settlers (Guns, Germs, and Steel Video). The Europeans had great agriculture. Since there was rich soil, they were able to harvest a lot. For example, cereal crops like wheat and barley. These were easy to store and also very easy to produce. All you had to do was scatter the seeds around in order to get the plant to start growing. Also, they were very high in calories so it filled you up quickly (Guns, Germs, and Steel Video). There were a lot of different plants to gather. Gathering was a lot easier and effecting than hunting. Most of the gathering was done by women. Domesticated animals were a way of life to the Europeans. As well as meat, animals could be used for their milk, ... ... middle of paper ... ... to. Since they had been exposed to these diseases, their bodies were immune. When the people of the America’s and the South African cape came in contact with these germs, they were automatically killed in large numbers. The African’s knew how to avoid Malaria by living in dry areas since mosquitoes were responsible for spreading the diseases to begin with. However, Malaria was the number one killer for children under the age of five (Guns, Germs, and Steel Video). As you can see, the Europeans were able to conquer the Native American’s easily. They were able to do this because of their geography, weapons, and diseases. Their soil was very rich and they had domesticated animals. Also, the guns they had allowed them to shoot from long distances. Their horses allowed the Europeans to travel faster. Also, the diseases like Malaria and Smallpox let them settle easier.
The European influences to the Native Americans were Europeans carried the new diseases to the Indians. “Europeans were used to these diseases, but Indian people had no resistance to them. Sometimes the illnesses spread through direct contact with colonists. Other times, they were transmitted as Indians traded with one another. The result of this contact with European germs was horrible. Sometimes whole villages perished in a short time” (Kincheloe). Slave trade was another influence to American Indians. Europeans soon realized that they could provide commercial goods such as tools and weapons to some American Indian tribes that would bring them other Indians captured in tribal wars, and these captured Indians were bought and sold as slaves. Therefore, “slavery led to warfare among tribes and too much hardship. Many tribes had to move to escape the slave trade, which destroyed some tribes completely. In time, the practice of enslaving Native peoples ended. However, it had greatly affected American Indians of the South and the Southwest” (Kinchloe). Lastly, Europeans change Native America and African’ roots. Native Americans
Another example Diamond uses to support his claim is the Spanish defeat of the Incas. Pizarro, the leader of these Spaniards that invaded the Americas, had access to greater and more advanced guns, germs, and steel. Their advanced maritime technology allowed them to sail to the Americas in the first place, writing and well-developed means of communication allowed them to have more information about these Incas before they got there, diseases that Native Americans had no immunities to could wipe out much of the population, advanced weaponry like guns that Americans had never seen before, and Spanish centralized political organization also gave them great advantages. Diamond argues that Pizarro’s advanced technology came from ...
Jared Diamond the author of The Collision at Cajamarca believes that Spaniard Pizarro’s conquest of Atahuallpa was an important historical event when a conqueror from Europe defeated a New World Native American Group. This event was one of other confrontations that will happen in history. Explaining that the diseases the Europeans brought to the new World contributed to the conquering of the native tribes. Killing many of the inhabitants created competition between the tribes instead of united them against European invaders. The well-equipped Europeans were superior with their technology and easily defeated the native tribes. The foundations the author uses are credible because they are first person accounts of witnesses that were present at the conflict. There is speculation why the Indians did not try to conquer Europe, though I do not feel Diamond offers a balanced viewpoint from the perspective of the Indians. The author includes citations for the piece yet does not use in text citations other that the companions’ descriptions of the conquerors of Atahuallpa’s people, land and wealth.
According to Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel, there are many types of agricultural areas that impacted the amount of food being grown, which is shown through the four original domestic animals. The author wrote in his book, “In contrast, four species of big mammals- the goat, sheep, pig, and cow- were domesticated very early in the Fertile Crescent, possibly earlier than any other animal except the dog anywhere else in the world. Those species remain today four of the world’s five most important domesticated mammals. But their wild ancestors were commonest in slightly different parts of the Fertile Crescent, with the result that the four species were domesticated in different places: sheep possibly in the central part, goats either
The European conquest of the new world was most commonly attributed to the superiority of the Europeans in all the facets of their confrontation. They had the superior weaponry, and were thought to have a superior intellect. After all, they were just bringing "civilization" to the new world, right? It sounds nice when you are learning about Columbus in grade school, but the traditional story is pretty far from the truth. The truth is that the Europeans, when they discovered this was a brand new world and not the spice islands, sought to rape the land for its gold and natural resources and enslave the Amerindians (native Americans), who were regarded to be less than human. One has to wonder why it was so easy for the Europeans to impose their will on the Amerindians. Was it solely because the Europeans were superior technologically and intellectually? Unfortunately the answer is not that simple. The Europeans were superior in those areas, but the bulk of the disaster they imposed was not what they knew, but what they brought with them, disease. Disease, on the epidemic level, is thought to be the major factor in the decline of the Amerindians during the age of discovery.
...mon domesticated animals such as cattle, pigs, horses, and sheep were introduced into the unsuspecting environment. Although these animals totally altered the diet and lifestyle of many people indigenous to the region, not all change was positive. The settlers allowed their animals to run wild, eating the land in which the native people were growing crops and thus leading to a mass famine and starvation in several places newly settled. The animals, with no natural predators in the areas, would multiply their populations rapidly and continue to take over the fragile ecological situation. In addition to this unfortunate occurrence, domesticated animals are credited with the spread of the epidemics that struck down a huge majority of the Native Americans. The Europeans over time had grown immune or at least less susceptible to the germs and diseases that came with the
All through history, there is a ubiquitous theme. In life’s perpetual cycle, the Europeans always manage to overshadow the other civilizations. Why is it that the Europeans dominated the other races? Throughout Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond desperately attempts to answer Yali’s question asking “Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own” (Diamond, p. 14)? In the Epilogue, Diamond summarizes his answer to Yali’s question essentially attributing the environment for the success of the Europeans and discredits racial superiority of any sort (Diamond, p.405). Although other factors contributed to the rise of the European civilization, the environment was the main factor. Some specific factors falling under environment that affected the European civilization are geography, food production, and diffusion and population.
The europeans also brought not only disease but warfare and sacrifice along with them. They sacrificed helpless victims and killed off the population in battle. After they had killed the Aztecs and their leader they took control of the city and implemented their own rules. “The many other warnings we had received to beware of entering the city of Mexico, since they would kill us as soon as they had us inside.” This shows how the Spanish denied their rude ruling habits causing the Aztecs to revolt. The Spanish were ruthless during the battles and their advanced weaponry is how they took over the Aztec
"Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond started off asking us one question. "Why did history unfold differently on different continents? Why has one culture—namely that of Western Europe—dominated the development of the modern world?" Diamond proceeded by telling us that the answer to that question was geography. We watched a portion of this small movie and at the end of class we were asked to compare the movie to chapter 3: Invisible Warriors: The Myth of the White Conquistador. I had to sit down and really think about it. The movie was based on agriculture while chapter 3 was focused on war- so I decided to make my main focal point to be: What is the link between agriculture and war?
The Europeans were very controlling and showed lots of narcissistic traits. This was shown greatly when Christopher Columbus and his men enslaved the peaceful tribe as they saw themselves superior to the Taino. The Spaniards treated the Taino very poorly, they tortured them, and killed them mercilessly as if they were barbaric beasts with no civil traits whatsoever and were dangerous. After enslaving the Taino Christopher Columbus had his men take over the land which the Taino controlled and claimed the land for Spain. He left the soldiers that had accompanied him on the voyage there on the island to watch over the remaining Taino as he sailed back to Spain to inform the Spanish crown of his “discovery”. This led to many other European nations to sending groups of their own over to the New World. The Portuguese, the French, the English, and others sent settlers along with more settlers from Spain. As more Europeans landed in different parts of the Americas, the population ration of Europeans to Native Americans were becoming more balanced, especially when the Native Americans started contracting diseases from the Europeans such as Typhoid, Influenza, and smallpox, measles, scarlet fever, typhus, pertussis (whooping Cough), tuberculosis, cholera, and diphtheria. These diseases decimated the Native American population because the Native Americans had not developed the
The Indians thoughts about war varied. They would fight to gain land, to prove themselves, and for other various types of feuds. When the Europeans migrated to the New World they did not just bring themselves. They brought in a new arsenal and diseases. The primitive weapons of the Indians were no match against the sophisticated weapons of the Europeans. Although the Indians won a few battles against the Europeans with their bows, arrows, and spears the Indians could not hold their ground with the Europeans. Various battles regarding land ended with the Europeans conquering the Indians. By the 1670s, the Europeans in New England out numbered the Indians. The English population had multiplied while the Indian population had lessened. The diseases carried from the Europeans such as smallpox, influenza, measles, and yellow fever was a major factor in the Indians’ population downfall. As the Indian population decreased the European population increased rapidly expanding the New Worlds population as a
During voyages across the oceans in route to discover the Americas, Europeans came across some people that we now call natives. The Natives were easily conquered by the European explorers because they were very vulnerable. The natives were vulnerable because they lacked knowledge, most of their people were dying due to disease, and they had an effect on the slave trade. The natives were introduced to the Europeans weapons such as knives, mirrors, copper kettles, and other novelties they brought along with them. “The Native Americans possessed the necessary skills to work with copper but failed to develop those needed to smelt iron thus they lacked sufficient
When the European arrived to the Americas, they brought diseases such as smallpox, influenza, and measles. Because the Native Americans did not have immunity to these diseases, masses lost their lives.
The Indians were markedly impacted by the new arrival of the Europeans in various ways. For one, the Europeans brought about great sickness and disease, wiping out entire tribes in some situations. When Fernando Cortez faced the resistant Aztecs, he managed to triumph in their conquest due to the epidemic of small pox they brought to and spread among the Natives. This encounter was just one of many where the Europeans caused millions of Indian fatalities through illness such as typhus, mumps, influenza, and chicken pox on the indigenous people who lacked an immunity to these diseases.
When I think back to high school about the first europeans arrived to America, all my teacher taught me was that the about 90 percent of native american population die from the disease the pilgrim brought with them. I never thought of the reverse and now I have to research a question why the native american didn’t wipe out europeans with disease and I found it very hard to research my paper. I asked my history professor about my question and the response I got was that the native tribes are normans who migrate from place to place and they are very clean with the connection with earth. On the research I found out that europeans are more farming while native american are hunters and gatherers, european living area is different from native american