New Trade Routes and Exploration

The Search for New Trade Routes

• Spices were essential for food preparation and were among the most important products brought to Europe from the Orient.
• Luxury goods like silk gave status to the nobility.
• These products were transported by sea and land and were mainly controlled by Genoese and Venetians who had strong control over the Mediterranean Sea.
• This control was not favorable for Spain and Portugal, which were far from main commercial ports.
• When the Turks of the Ottoman Empire restricted European commerce with Asia, these kingdoms decided to find new routes to the East.

Portuguese Exploration

• By the mid-15th century, the Portuguese had an expansionist commercial policy.
• They explored the west coast of Africa and gradually rounded the continent, eventually reaching India.

Christopher Columbus's Proposal

• Christopher Columbus proposed a voyage west to reach the East to the King of Portugal, but he did not show interest in the plan.
• Columbus decided to take his proposal to the Catholic Monarchs of Spain.

Columbus's Idea

• Columbus's idea to sail the Atlantic Ocean was logical.
• Some maps from the geographer Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli showed it was possible to reach the East by sailing west.
• The map Columbus used to plan his first voyage had errors, so instead of reaching the far east of Asia, he reached unknown lands that are now part of the American continent.

Columbus's Voyage and Discovery

• Columbus, with financial support from the Catholic Monarchs, got three caravels and started his trip from the port of Palos on August 3, 1492.
• The voyage ended on October 12, 1492, on the island of Guanahani in the Bahamas after two difficult months.
• Columbus thought he was on an island near India, referring to its inhabitants as "Indians", a derogatory term still used to refer to the descendants of Native American people.

Consequences of Columbus's Voyages

• Significant economic gains were not obtained in the voyage, but it was considered a triumph because it showed the possibility of new routes to the prosperous Asian lands.
• Later, Columbus made three more voyages, paving the way for exploration, invasion, conquest, and colonization of those territories.
• In 1507, the cartographer Martin Waldseemüller published a map showing how the vast territory discovered was actually a continent, naming it America in honor of the explorer Amerigo Vespucci.

Justification for Colonization

• The Spanish monarchs believed it was God's will that these new lands inhabited by "pagan" peoples should be known, justifying the imposition of Christianity.
• European society interpreted the social and natural reality of America from their own perspective.

Views of the World

• Europeans applied their values and beliefs, and new hierarchies and the idea of different races with different values were used to legitimize the relations of rule.
• The historical perspective names these events as the "discovery of America", a phrase loaded with Eurocentrism since it expresses how the historical event was interpreted from Europe and not how the societies in the American continent experienced it.

Expansionism and Colonization

• The search for other trade routes expanded the world by giving way to new routes in the Atlantic Ocean.
• This facilitated the expansion of commercial traffic but led to the invasion and colonization of what was called America.
• In this context, the conquerors created the idea of "race" to justify colonization, which has had political, economic, social, and cultural repercussions in world history.

Transformation of the Iberian Peninsula

• Transformations in the Iberian Peninsula were relevant to the start of the colonization process.
• The exploration and subsequent invasion of the territory known as America is the continuation of the expansionist project of the kingdom of Castile and of Christianity.
• This process involved the dispossession of territory and natural resources from the conquered peoples, as well as their conversion to forced labor.