C H A P T E R 1

APUSH

THE SHAPING OF NORTH AMERICA

• Recorded history began 6,000 years ago. It was 500 years ago that Europeans set foot on the Americas to begin colonization

• The theory of “Pangaea” exists suggesting that the continents were once nestled together into one mega-continent. They then spread out as drifting islands.

• Geologic forces of continental plates created the Appalachian and Rocky Mountains.

• The Great Ice Age thrust down over North America & scoured the present day American Midwest.

PEOPLING THE AMERICAS

• “Land Bridge”• As the Great Ice Age diminished, so did the glaciers over North America.• The theory holds that a “Land Bridge” emerged linking Asia & North

America across what’s today the Bering Sea. People were said to have walked across the “bridge” before the sea level rose and sealed it off and thus populated the Americas.

• The Land Bridge is suggested as occurring an estimated 35,000 years ago.

• Many peoples• Those groups that traversed the bridge spread across North,

Central, and South America.• Countless tribes emerged with an estimated 2,000 languages.

Notably…• Incas – Peru, with elaborate network of roads and bridges linking their

empire.• Mayas – Yucatan Peninsula, with their step pyramids.• Aztecs – Mexico, with step pyramids and huge sacrifices of conquered

peoples.

THE EARLIEST AMERICANS

• Development of corn or “maize” around 5,000 B.C. in Mexico was revolutionary in that…• People didn’t have to be hunter-gatherers, they could

settle down and be farmers.• Gave rise to towns and then cities.• Corn arrived in the present day U.S. around 1,200 B.C.

• Pueblo Indians• The Pueblos were the 1st American corn growers.• They lived in adobe houses (dried mud) and pueblos

(“villages” in Spanish). Pueblos are villages of cubicle shaped adobe houses, stacked one on top the other and often beneath cliffs.

• They had elaborate irrigation systems to draw water away from rivers to grown corn.

EARLIEST AMERICANS

• Adena-Hopewell• Existed from 1000-200, thought to be ancestors of Mound

Builders. • Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, New York

• Mound Builders• These people built huge ceremonial and burial mounds

and were located in the Ohio Valley.• Cahokia, near East St. Louis today, held 25-40,000

people.

EARLIEST AMERICANS

• Eastern Indians grew corn, beans, and squash in “three sister” farming…• Corn grew in a stalk providing a

trellis for beans, beans grew up the stalk, squash’s broad leaves kept the sun off the ground and thus kept the moisture in the soil.

• This group likely had the best (most diverse) diet of all North American Indians and is typified by the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw (South) and Iroquois (North).

EARLIEST AMERICANS

Iroquois Confederation• Hiawatha was the leader.• IC was a group of 5 tribes

in New York state & was closest civilization to Incas & Mayans

• Authority was matrilineal.• Unusual-Each tribe kept

their independence, but met occasionally to discuss matters of common interest, like war/defense.

INDIRECT DISCOVERERS OF THE NEW WORLD

• The 1st Europeans to come to America were the Norse.

• Approx. 1000 AD, the Vikings landed, led by Erik the Red and Leif Erikson.

• They landed in “Newfoundland” or “Vinland”.• No written record and therefore didn’t get the credit.• The only record is found in Viking sagas or songs.• The Christian Crusaders of Middle Ages fought in

Palestine to regain the Holy Land from Muslims. This mixing of East and West created a sweet-tooth where Europeans wanted the spices of the exotic East.

EUROPEANS ENTER AFRICA

• Marco Polo traveled to China and stirred up a storm of European interest.

• A desire for spices, an East to West trade flourished but had to be overland, at least in part. This initiated new exploration down around Africa in hopes of a water route.

• Henry the Navigator was responsible for the early development of Portuguese exploration and maritime trade and started a sailing school to find better ways to get to the “Spice Islands,” eventually rounding Africa’s southern Cape of Good Hope.

• New developments…1. caravel – a ship with triangular sail that

could better tack (zig-zag) ahead into the wind and thus return to Europe from Africa coast.

2. compass – to determine direction.3. astrolabe – a sextant gizmo that could tell

a ship’s latitude.

SLAVE TRADE BEGINS

• The 1st slave trade was across the Sahara Desert.• Later, it was along the West African coast. Slave

traders purposely busted up tribes and families in order to squelch any possible uprising.• Slaves wound up on sugar plantations the

Portuguese had set up on the tropical islands off Africa’s coast.• Spain watched Portugal’s success with

exploration and slaving and wanted a piece of the pie.

COLUMBUS COMES UPON A NEW WORLD

• Columbus convinced Isabella and Ferdinand to fund his expedition.

• His goal was to reach the East Indies by sailing west & bypassing the around-Africa route that Portugal monopolized.

• He misjudged the size of the Earth though, thinking it 1/3 the size of what it was.

• After 30 days or so at sea, when he struck land, he assumed he’d made it to the East Indies and therefore mistook the people as “Indians.”

• This spawned the following system…• Europe would provide the market, capital,

technology.• Africa would provide the labor.• The New World would provide the raw

materials (gold, soil, lumber).

WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE

• Of huge importance was the biological flip-flop of Old and New Worlds. Simply put, we traded life such as plants, foods, animals, germs.

From the New World (America) to the Old• corn, potatoes, tobacco, beans, peppers, manioc, pumpkin,

squash, tomato, wild rice, etc.• also, syphilis

From Old World to the New• cows, pigs, horses, wheat, sugar cane, apples, cabbage, citrus,

carrots, Kentucky bluegrass, • devastating diseases – smallpox, yellow fever, malaria as

Indians had no immunities.• The Indians had no immunities in their systems built up over

generations.• An estimated 90% of all pre-Columbus Indians died, mostly due to

disease.

COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE

THE SPANISH

• Treaty of Tordesillas 1494 – Portugal and Spain feuded over who got what land. The Pope drew this line as he was respected by both.

• The line ran North-South, and chopped off the Brazilian coast of South America

• Portugal – got everything east of the line

• Spain – got everything west of the line.

THE SPANISH

Spanish Conquistadores = “conquerors”

• Vasco Balboa – “discovered” the Pacific Ocean across isthmus of Panama• Ferdinand Magellan – 1st to circumnavigates the globe • Ponce de Leon – touches and names Florida looking for legendary “Fountain of Youth”• Hernando Cortes – enters Florida, travels up into present day Southeastern U.S., dies and is

“buried” in Mississippi River• Francisco Pizarro – conquers Incan Empire of Peru and begins shipping tons of gold/silver

back to Spain. This huge influx of precious metals made European prices skyrocket (inflation).• Francisco Coronado – ventured into current Southwest U.S. looking for legendary El Dorado,

city of gold. He found the Pueblo Indians.• Hernando de Soto- Spanish explorer that discovered the Mississippi

THE SPANISH

Encomienda system established• Indians were “commended” or given to Spanish

landlords• The idea of the encomienda was that Indians

would work and be converted to Christianity, but it was basically just slavery on a sugar plantation guised as missionary work.

Bartolomé de las Casas• 16th-century Spanish historian, social reformer

and Dominican friar who spoke out against the atrocities against the Native Americans.

THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO

• Hernando Cortez conquered the Aztecs at Tenochtitlan.• Cortez went from Cuba to present day Vera Cruz, then marched over mountains

to the Aztec capital.• Aztec King, Montezuma, thought Cortez might be the god Quetzalcoatl and

welcomed Cortez into Tenochtitlan.• The Spanish lust for gold led Montezuma to attack on the noche triste, sad night.

Cortez and men fought their way out, but it was smallpox that eventually beat the Indians.

• The Spanish then destroyed Tenochtitlan, building the Spanish capital (Mexico City) exactly on top of the Aztec city.

• A new race of people emerged, mestizos, a mix of Spanish and Indian blood.

THE SPREAD OF SPANISH AMERICA

Spanish society quickly spread through Peru and Mexico• A threat came from neighbors…1. English – John Cabot (an Italian who

sailed for England) touched the coast of the current day U.S. in 1497.

2. Italy – Giovanni de Verrazano also touched on the North American seaboard.

3. France – Jacques Cartier went into mouth of St. Lawrence River (Canada).

4. France- Samuel de Champlain was a navigator, cartographer, draughtsman, soldier

• To oppose this, Spain set up forts all over the California coast and in cities like St. Augustine in Florida.

• New Laws of 1542• Issued by King Charles I of Spain

regarding the Spanish colonization of the Americas.

SPREAD OF SPANISH AMERICA

• Don Juan de Onate followed Coronado’s old path into present day New Mexico. He conquered the Indians ruthlessly, maiming them by cutting off one foot of survivors just so they’d remember.

• Despite mission efforts, the Pueblo Indians revolted in Pope’s Rebellion.

• Robert de LaSalle sailed down the Mississippi River for France claiming the whole region for their King Louis and naming the area “Louisiana” after his king. This started a slew of place names for that area, from LaSalle, Illinois to “Louisville” and then on down to New Orleans.

• “Black Legend” – The Black Legend was the notion that Spaniards only brought bad things; though true, they also brought good things.

IMPRESSIONS OF EXPLORERS

An Aztec View of the Conquest, 1531

Conquistadores, ca. 1534

BARTOLOMÉ DE LAS CASASA SHORT ACCOUNT OF THE DESTRUCTION OF THE INDIES

WRITTEN 1542, PUBLISHED 1552* [EXCERPTS

de las Casas or Casaus, to the most high and potent lord Prince of all the Spains don Felipe, our lord_________Most high and potent lord:Because divine providence has ordered in this world that for the direction and common utility of the human lineage the world be constituted by Kingdoms and peoples, with their kings like fathers and shepherds (as Homer has called them) and therefore the most noble and generous members of the republics, for that reason no doubt of the rectitude of the royal spirits of those kings may be held, or with right reason might be held. And if any wrongs, failings, defects, or evils should be suffered in those kingdoms, the only reason for that is that the kings have no notice of them. For these wrongs &, if they be present and reported, it is the duty of the king, with greatest study and vigilant industry, to root them out. . . .Considering, then, most potent lord, the evils and harm, the perditions and ruin the equals or likes of which, never were men imagined capable of doing considering, as I say, those evils which as a man of fifty years’ and more experience, being in those lands present, I have seen committed upon those so many and such great kingdoms, or better said, that entire vast and new world of the Indies lands conceded and given in trust by God and His Church to the king and queen of Castile, to rule and govern them, convert them to belief in Christ and the Holy Catholic Church, and give them to prosper temporally and spiritually, this subject was not able to contain himself from supplicating with Your Majesty, most importunely, that Your Majesty not concede such license nor allow those terrible things that the tyrants did invent, pursue, and have committed against those peaceable, humble, and meek Indian peoples, who offend no person. . . .

. Into and among these gentle sheep, endowed by their Maker and Creator with all the qualities aforesaid, did creep the Spaniards, who no sooner had knowledge of these people than they became like fierce wolves and tigers and lions who have gone many days without food or nourishment. And no other thing have they done for forty years until this day,1 and still today see fit to do, but dismember, slay, perturb, afflict, torment, and destroy the Indians by all manner of cruelty new and divers and most singular manners such as never before seen or read of heard of some few of which shall be recounted below, and they do this to such a degree that on the Island of Hispaniola, of the above three millions souls that we once saw, today there be no more than two hundred of those native people remaining.The island of Cuba is almost as long as from Valladolid to Rome; today it is almost devoid of population. The island of San Juan [Puerto Rico] and that of Jamaica, large and well favoured and lovely islands both, have been laid waste. On the Isles of the Lucayos [Bahamas] . . . where there were once above five hundred thousand souls, today there is not a living creature. All were killed while being brought, and because of being brought, to the Island of Hispaniola where the Spaniards saw that their stock of the natives of that latter island had come to an end. . . .Two principal and general customs have been employed by those, calling themselves Christians, who have passed this way, in extirpating and striking from the face of the earth those suffering nations. The first being unjust, cruel, bloody, and tyrannical warfare. The other after having slain all those who might yearn toward or suspire after or think of freedom, or consider escaping from the torments that they are made to suffer, by which I mean all the native-born lords and adult males, for it is the Spaniards’ custom in their wars to allow only young boys and females to live being to oppress them with the hardest, harshest, and most heinous bondage to which men or beasts might ever be bound into. . . .violence, and vexation. . . .

The cause for which the Christians have slain and destroyed so many and such infinite numbers of souls, has been simply to get, as their ultimate end, the Indians’ gold of them, and to stuff themselves with riches in a very few days, and to raise themselves to high estates without proportion to their birth or breeding, it should be noted owing to the insatiable greed and ambition that they have had, which has been greater than any the world has ever seen before. . [A]ll the Indians of all the Indies never once did aught hurt or wrong to Christians, but rather held them to be descended from heaven, from the sky, until many times hey or their neighbours received from the Christians many acts of wrongful harm, theft, murder,

TESTAMENTI, Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, or Casaus, friar of the order of Saint Dominic, who by the mercy of God am here today in this court of Spain, was persuaded by the same notable persons resident in this Court . . . To set down an accounting of the hell that is the Indies, so that those infinite masses of souls redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ may not die for all eternity without any help for it, but rather know their Creator and be saved. And by the compassion that I have for my native land, which is Castile, I pray that God not destroy it for the great sins committed against its faith and honour. . . . I have great hope that the emperor and king of Spain, our lord Don Carlos, the fifth of that name, may come to understand (for until now the truth has always been most industriously covered over) the acts of malice and treachery which have been and still are being done upon those nations and lands, against the will of God and his own, and that he may bring an end to so many evils and bring relief to that New World which God has given him, as the lover and cultivator, as he is of justice.