1.2

• Indigenous groups = very different
• Inca, Aztec, Maya
  • Aztec: Tenochtitlan
• N America:
  • SW = sedentary, irrigation systems, villages
  • GP, GB = nomadic in small groups
  • NW/Pacific = fishing, elk, villages, longhouses
  • NE = Iroquois, three sisters crops
  • MRV = fertile → easily support a lot of people
    • Cahokia

1.3

• pop. rebound after Black Plague + political unification (centralized gov) + upper class desire for luxury items from Asia → European exploration
  • Crusades → at odds w/ Muslims who controlled trading routes → wanted water-based route
• Portugal = first to explore
  • trading post empire along African coast
  • maritime tech
• SP wanted profit too
  • Columbus landed in Caribbean (thought it was India), knew there was gold there
  • set off Columbian Exchange

1.4

• Columbian Exchange = transfer of food, animals, minerals, people, diseases between Europe, Americas, Africa
  • fundamentally changed all three continents
• disease → Europeans able to conquer great empires (ex: Tenochtitlan Aztecs)
  • devastated pops
• Americas → Europe: maize, tomatoes, potatoes, cacao, tobacco
• Europe/Africa → Americas: rice, wheat, soybeans, rye, oats, lemons, oranges, horses, pigs, cattle, chickens
  • grain crops transformed American pops
  • diet transformed, horses revolutionized farming + warfare
• Indigenous peoples plundered for gold + silver → Spain = incredibly wealthy
• Gold → economic growth → change from feudalism to capitalism
• Native Americans enslaved, taken to SP (relatively small #)
• lots of enslaved Africans sent to Americas
  • Middle Passage
• SP = first to colonize Americas
• SP exploration financed by state + mercantilist policies
  • mercantilism = depended on heavy gov direction + intervention

1.5