The European nation that came into the American territory was the Spanish. The first contact between Europeans and the Maya was in 1502” (Source 3), this expedition was headed b y Christopher Columbus, who was trying to find a new trade route to the far East but inadvertently landed in what came to be known to the Europeans as the “New World” (Source11). The Spanish had claimed the New World territory, and when they found out that the Mayans were a divided group, had no political authority; they were also able to exploit this division by taking advantage of the rivalries within the group.
Even when Montejo travelled to Mexico, he soon later left Yucatan in 1534 because “no gold had been discovered, nor is there anything [else] from which
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advantage can be gained,” (Source 7) meaning that the Spanish where there for one reason; and that was to exploit the land for their own benefit, which they later on did b going back to peninsula and getting slaves from there instead. Many Spaniards who went to America were searching for riches (such as silver and gold); others where there to receive glory when they returned home (to make a name of themselves, they conquered new land for their king and sent back wealth to the old country); the kings were financing colonization so needed money to finance their expenses. And some went there to build homes and make new lives for themselves as a form of European emigration. The income for Spain from gold and silver mined in the Americas made a rapid increase from (the years 1500) 250 000 pesos to 22 500 000 pesos (in 1800s) (Source 14). The overall purpose of the settlement of the New Worlds by the Spanish conquistadores was to acquire new wealth, “The Mayas were to...receive their conquerors’ religion or to add to his wealth and ease” (Source 8). The Mesoamerican empires were known to have provided wealth in the form of gold, silver and other riches. The Spaniards were also in America to show their “virtue” (Source 10), by imposing their religion (Christianity) on the Mayans. “Educate theses (inferior) people to a more humane and virtuous life.” (Source 11). And in the 1540, the Spanish returned to Yucatan Peninsula, “mainly to enslave the inhabitants, as native labour,” (Source 7) because the Mayan were considered most valuable marketable commodity, as the Mayan were sustained by their use of the land for agriculture. They went to America to plunder the New World of its treasures was acceptable because it was populated by pagans. To Christianize the pagans was necessary because it was part of God’s plan; to kill them was right because they were Satan’s or Antichrist’s warriors. As European powers conquered the territories of the New World, they justified wars against Native Americans and the destruction of their cultures as a fulfillment of the European secular and religious vision of the New World. In 1511, another recorded contact between the Spanish and the Maya. A ship under the command of Valdivia sank, but Valdivia and 18 of his men managed to survive and landed up on the east coast of Yucatan; there they were captured and sacrificed by the Mayan. Eventually only two of the men had survived and that was “Geronimo de Aguilar and Gonzalo Guerrero” (Source 3). In 1519, Hernando Cortes landed on the Gulf of Mexico whilst Aguilar and Guerrero were serving under the Maya lord (Source 3). In 1519, Cortez reached the Gulf of Mexico with a few of his men (600 men). There he got the Aztec enemies as his allies and then destroyed the population, which he then later on turned on his allies; thus the Spanish being able to own all of Mexico. Then in a period of two years (1519-1521), the Aztec Empire was destroyed by him. “The years between 1515 and 1524 witnessed several more encounters between Maya and Spaniard.” (Source 3) The Spanish colonization of the Maya officially began in 1521. In 1523, Cortes sent his trusted captain, Pedro de Alvarado to attack the “Cakhiquel (chieftan) and Quiche Maya in Guatamala” (Source 3); after successfully winning the battle, Alvarado establish the first Spanish capital of Guatamala at Iximche. This was the Spanish invasion and she conquered the Mayan of Yucatan Peninsula, highlands of Chiapas and lowlands in Guatamala Peten. “The conquest of the Yucatan was unndoutably the most prolonged and difficult campaign attempted by the Spanish.” (Source 3). Francisco Montejo the elder and his crew, abandoned Yucatan in 1534, he reported to the crown stating that they had not discovered any gold or anything else which “advantaage can be gained” (Source 7) Although the Spanish officially controlled the Yucatan by 1546, various Maya nations united in the ides that they could launch a coordinated attack on Valladolid in peninsula. On November, 1546 was the “Great Maya Revolt” (Source 7). The Mayan slaughtered numerous Spainards, sacked the town and had developed the “hit-and-run tactics of guerrilla war” (Source 7). After 13 years of failure of conquering the land, Francisco Montejo the elder intrusted his son in 1540 to do the job instead. In 1546, the Spanish took control over Mexico. “The city of Merida was founded (ruins of the Maya city of Tiho” Source 7). In 1542 Merida served as the capital of the region and the base for further Spanish incursions to the south, “(Source 3). Then in January 14th 1697, Ursua led an expedition from Campeche to Lake Peten to where he conquered “the last independent Maya city” (Source 3). The last Mayan stronghold city was finally destroyed on “13th day of March in 1697” (Source 3). The interaction between the Europeans and the Native Americans resulted in an array of positive and negative consequences. The exchange of ideas and goods was beneficial to both sides, but the exchange of disease was massively devastating for the Americans. An eyewitness account by Franciscan friar Lorenzo de Beinvendia explained the “...murders, mutilations and other atrocities inflicted by the Spanish in their suppression of rebellion” Source 7). Friar de Landa’s experience amongst the Maya stated that several of the Indians were including leading men were put into stocks in a building and were set on fire and burnt alive, other, such as women and infant children were hung; according to Diego, this was considered the “greatest inhumanity in the world,” (Source 8). Alvarado’s conquest of Guatemala was a gruesome affair. The Spanish would toss the Native Americans who resisted into the pits with sharpened stakes (Source 15). During that time, slaves were considered one of the most valuable marketable commodity (Source 7). In 1540 the Spanish returned to peninsula after five years of not being there; they mainly went there to enslave the inhabitants and the indigenous people as native labour. The Spanish colonization entailed forced labour through a system called encomienda (Source13). This system gave the Spanish the right to force the Mayan to provide labour on Spanish-owned farms, mines, ranches, tobacco plantations and silver mines. Consequently, which led to bad working conditions in the mines that it was considered “death traps” (Source 13). If one was to resist to work under encomienda, then they were killed. The Spanish administrators along the course establish two centres of authority in the Americas “Mexico (which they called New Spain) and Peru (known as New Castile)” (Source12) There was also mandatory conversion to Christianity. There was a stage when Provincial Landa found that the Mayans had ongoing idolatry, which led to the arrest of thousands of natives who were suspected on idolatry and Landa supervised the torture of “...more than 4,500 people over the course of three months; many were tortured to death” (Source 8); idols where torched and “convicted idolaters were put to the lash, “ (Source8). They forced the Maya to become Christians. The Maya were called pagans and mistreated if they did not adhere to the Christian doctrine that Spanish friars required them to follow. “Huge piles of idols were set to the torch and many convicted idolaters were put to the lash,” Source 7). By Landa destroying “...his writings in all aspects of Maya culture would serve as an invaluable resource for Maya scholars” (Source7). To show the superior moral and political power of the Christian Church, de Landa oversaw a huge “auto-da-fé”. An auto-da-fe, is defined as an “act of faith”. This was a ritual of public reparation of condemned heretics and apostates; the Spanish Inquisition (in this case Landa) had decided on extreme punishment imposed on those convicted was execution by burning (burning at the stake). By the mid-1500, a Spanish friar, Bishop Diego de Landa, and nine more friars arrived; de Landa ordered that all Mayan books be burned and many. By doing so he was burning the so-called idols but in fact they were sacred Maya books. This led to the taking away the ‘existence of the Maya kingdom and disregarding their religion, culture and tradition as well as their knowledge. Many scholars considered the destruction of the Mayan sacred books as “the most tragic losses of accumulated human knowledge in world history” (Source 7). Amongst the interation between the Spanish and Maya, many of the Mayan were killed and mistreated but “a few high-ranking members of the community retained some official control,” (Source 1).
So although they were under Spanish control they still managed to keep hold of some official control because it is stated that some provinces were regarded independent i.e. the Maya, long after the fall of the other Mesoamerican groups.
The Mayan population decreased between 1515 and 1516 there was a rapid wildly spread epidemic among the Mayan people in eastern Yucatan know as the “mayacimil (or “easy death”)”. This epidemic was caused by smallpox which was transmitted by a soldier arriving in Mexico (probably a Spanish soldier), who was carrying the epidemic. This plague spread through the native population of the Americans, modern estimation of the death rate varied from “75% to 90% mortality” among the natives.
The Mayan had no immunity, medicine or technology so the epidemic spread among them. Small pox was rapidly transmited and other Old World diseases, which were the most deadly were, “aforementioned smallpox, influenza, measles…pulmonary diseases, including tuberculosis; the latter disease was attributed to the arrival of the Spanish by the Maya inhabitants of Yucatán.” (Source
4) Later on there was friction between the landowners, so the Franciscans implemented the “congregating (or “reducing”) the scattered Indian hamlets into larger nucleated areas. The Spanish came to a conclusion of “...concentrating native population in newly founded colonial towns, or reducciones (also known as congregaciones)” (Source 5). “The Mayas were to live through 400 years of seizures from sale abroad, resettlements and forced removals from their towns, to receive their conqueror’s religion, or to add to his wealth and ease” (Source 8). the Native Americans are positioned on reservations that account for some of the poorest areas in the country. There was even a social hierarchy in the Spanish America. First it was the “peninsulares” (people born in Spain in advantage of colonial government and Catholic Churches); secondly was the “creoles” (who owned most of the plantations); the “mestizos (people of Native American and European descent); the “mulattos” (people of African and European descent, -mostly from the slave trade). The Native Americans and people of African descent were considered as the lowest social class (Source 13). The people who had lived in the land for many years were considered inferior and part of a lower class in their own land and were disrespected by this act. There was emphasised superiority of the Europeans over the Native Americans traditions (Source 12) The indigenous American societies were changed by the arrival of European on American shores because Bibliography Anon., 2008. Image. [Online] Available at: http://histclo.com/imagef/date/2008/06/it01s.jpg [Accessed 20 March 2015]. Anon., 2012. Conquest of Yucatan. [Online] Available at: http://epicworldhistory.blogspot.com/2012/04/conquest-of-yucatan.html [Accessed 6 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. Explorations. [Online] Available at: https://www.classzone.com/net_exploration/U4/U4_article.cfm [Accessed 24 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. Landa. [Online] Available at: http://ambergriscaye.com/landa/ybac19.htm [Accessed 6 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. Maya Graphics. [Online] Available at: http://anthropology.si.edu/maya/graphics/mayaclose30.jpg [Accessed 6 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. Spanish conquest of Guatemala. [Online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_conquest_of_Guatemala [Accessed 4 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. Spanish conquest of Yucatan. [Online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_conquest_of_Yucat%C3%A1n [Accessed 4 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. Spanish conquest of Yucatan. [Online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_conquest_of_Yucat%C3%A1n [Accessed 4 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. The Spanish conquest and its aftermath. [Online] Available at: http://www.nichbelize.org/ia-archaeology/the-spanish-conquest-and-its-aftermath.html [Accessed 24 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. The Spanish conquest of Yucatan. [Online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_conquest_of_Yucat%C3%A1n [Accessed 4 March 2015]. Anon., n.d. World History Connections of Today. s.l.:Pretice Hall. Dugmore, et al., 2005. Making History 10. In: Making History 10. s.l.:s.n. Janari, Proctor, Spuy, v. & Weldon, 2005. New Africa Education. In: New Africa History 10. s.l.:s.n. Juta, 2005. Moments in History 10. s.l.:Juta. others, G. A. C. a., n.d. The Inca and Aztec States 1400 to 1800, s.l.: s.n.
From a proud Conquistador, to a castaway, a slave and trader, and then medicine man, Cabeza de Vaca was the first European to explore much of the southern coast of Texas. Cabeza was a 37 year old military veteran in 1527 when he left on the Narvaez Expedition to find gold and colonize the Gulf Coast. He was the expedition’s treasurer. Cabeza de Vaca was enslaved by Indians in 1528 when one of the rafts the crew made crashed on present day Galveston island, he then escaped in 1530 and joined/was enslaved by another tribe called the Charrucos until his escape with 3 other survivors in 1534. He then walked to Mexico City. Cabeza survived this ordeal because of the incredible patience he had, his skills of diplomacy and goodwill, and his amazing wilderness survival skills.
... The plague was brought over by the Spanish who where immune to the disease, but the Aztecs weren't so lucky. Many where killed over the course of seventy days, including the new King Cuitlahucs (92). Obviously this had a dramatic impact because they lost their leader. Those that remained where very weak with a milder form of the disease (93). Obviously this affected their strength to fight.
After the discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492, the powerful Old World scrambled to colonize it. The three major nations involved in this were Spain, France, and England. Spain took more to the south in the Central American and Mexico areas while France went north in the Canada region. The English came to America and settled in both the New England and Chesapeake area. Although the people in these regions originated from the same area, the regions as a whole evolved into different societies because of the settlers’ purpose for coming to America and the obstacles faced in both nature and with the natives.
Christopher Columbus discovered the America’s for Spain in 1492. The explorers and settlers that settled in Central and South America were mostly Spanish and Portuguese. The English took notice of the Spanish success in the America’s, so they decided to explore the upper part of the America’s, North America, in the late 1500’s.
From the moment Hernan Cortes landed in Mexico and began his campaign against the Aztec empire, the people of the new world were doomed to be conquered by both technological and biological means. Smallpox, a disease that had never been experienced in America before the arrival of the Europeans devastated large scale native populations. The abandonment of the famous lost city of Machu Picchu stands as a famous example of the devastation of native populations.
The outnumbered Spanish conquistadors were able to so easily defeat the natives of South and Central America for many reasons. These reasons include the spread of disease, the fear the Spanish spread, civil war, and the thought that Cortez was a God. The Natives were not immune to the European disease such as smallpox, influenza measles, typhus, plague, malaria, and yellow fever. This wiped out 85-90% of the Native population in 50 years. This was the largest demographic catastrophe in human history. (Document 4: The American Holocaust)
Cultures had been flourishing thousands of years before the Europeans arrived to the New World. Great empires such as the Aztecs, Mayans, and Incas inhabited the vast lands of Central and South America. These three major powers controlled the land before Columbus or Cortez were even born. Although the Pre-Columbian civilizations and the Europeans shared some similar ideas, life was very different in the New World compared with that of Middle Age Europe.
Beginning in 1492, Spain had been the first European nation to sail westward across the Atlantic Ocean and colonize the Amerindian nations of the Western Hemisphere. The empire that came from this exploration extended from Virginia on the
Pizarro, being the decisive, military leader that he was, would take advantage of the terrible plague and use it against the Inca. As he traveled from village to village, he would leave a person infected with smallpox in the village so that the whole village would become infected and die. When his men were in Cuzco while it was under siege from Manco Inca, he ordered dead bodies infected with small pox to be thrown into the Inca camps at night. Huge number of Inca soldiers died because of attacks like these. Pizarro and his men were from Europe, so they had some resistance to the diseases they brought with them, so they were not affected by them.
Europeans, Spanish and the French. American Indians had thrived on American soil for thousands of
The Spaniards arrived at the Americas prior to the English. The Spanish mainly wanted to explore in the first place because after the Black Death, the population increased, and thus, so did the frequency of commerce. There was a sudden new interest in new products and the new strong monarchs who sponsored the journeys wanted to be more affluent. Therefore, explorers such as Christopher Columbus attempted to go west to target Asia. However, he ended up on Cuba and called the natives Indians. The Spanish soon started to consider the Americas less of a blockage and could now see it as a source of resources. In 1518, Cortes arrived into Mexico with his group of conquistadors, or conquerors, which is a proper name because the men after gold exterminated native areas using their military skills, brutality and greed to turn the Southern America into a vast Spanish empire. The smallpox the Spanish unknowingly carried also helped wipe many people out. When they saw the religious ceremonies of the Aztecs that produced many skulls, they thought of these people as savages and not entirely human. This of coarse was quite hypocritical because the Spanish have killed before during the Inquisition for their faith. It was this contempt that made them think it was all right to slaughter the natives. Spanish colonies were established when conquistadors had gotten a license to finance the expedition from the crown to fixture encomiendas. These encomiendas were basically Indian villages that became a source of labor. The Spanish dreamed of becoming wealthier from South America, but they also wanted a profitable agricultural economy and to spread their Catholic religion (the Pueblo Indians converted to Christianity), which became very important in the 1540s.
European exploration in the Americas started in approximately the year 1000, in which Norse people fled their homeland of Norway and Greenland and settled around modern day
The Mayans are American Indian people who lived in southern Mexico (Miller "Maya" Grolier). The Yucatan was the center of the Mayan civilization from about the 1st century B.C. ("Yucantan" Grolier). They flourished in Mexico and central America from 250 to 1600 A.D. ("History of Agriculture" Grolier). Their ancestors had crossed the Bering land Bridge from Asia (Miller "Maya" Grolier). Honduras was once a part of the Mayan Empire. It had flourished between 250 and 950 A.D. (Seligson "Honduras" Grolier). The Mayans also had lived in Mexican states: Yucantan and Chiapas, British Honduras, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador (Burland 1770)
Upon the arrival of the Spanish, and in addition to the “Columbian Exchange” of plants and animals, a plethora of diseases were introduced in Latin America. As a result, bacteria and viruses such as influenza, measles, smallpox, and typhus were credited as the most effective Spanish allies. Unlike the Spanish who had been exposed to these illnesses long before, the Indians’ millennia of isolation had prevented them from developing immunities against a series of diseases imported from Europe. In truth, the high death toll was not exclusive to the inhabitants of Mexico and Peru as the pattern of destruction in Brazil was similar. For example, it is noted that smallpox and measles killed thousands in northeastern Brazil in the
The colonialism by Europeans of the Caribbean resulted in devastating and severe impacts on the indigenous people. They were dispossessed of their land, exposed to European diseases that were new to them and had to be involved in violent conflicts, which resulted in the death of so many indigenous people. Their lives and those of their future generations were changed forever. As the settlers arrived in the Caribbean, they came in with epidemic diseases from Europe, among them smallpox, chickenpox, influenza and measles (Lang 273). The indigenous populations of the Caribbean had not acquired immunity to the unfamiliar diseases, and just within weeks, the