The Age of Exploration

Why People Explore

• Gold – Nations were always looking for new sources of wealth.

• Glory – Individual explorers competed for fame and honor for both themselves and their countries.

• God – Europeans believed it was their duty to bring Christianity to the non-believers of the world.

European Powerhouses

•France

•England

•Spain

•Portugal

Europe

Portugal

Spain

France

England

Who were the rulers of the nations of Europe?

Kings and Queens (a Monarchy) ~ a form of government in which supreme power is

in an individual.

What was one way kings of the 15th century could expand their

power?

By adding overseas

colonies to their empire.

Early World Map: Includes just Europe, Africa, and part of Asia.

Many believed the earth was

flat.

Bishop Pierre d’ Ailly’s book change the way people viewed the earth.

•He said the earth was round, not flat.

Explorers of North AmericaThe Age of Exploration

Leif Ericson

The Vikings reached North America five hundred years

before Columbus

Discovering North America

• 982 Erik the Red founded Greenland.

• Leif Erikson later landed on North America.

Claudius Ptolemy 87-150AD

One of the first to believe that the Earth was round (sphere), not flat.

Ptolemy’s map omitted the Western Hemisphere

One of the classical errors concerning the earth ----miscalculated the size of the earth.

Motives for Exploration

• To search for new routes to the Far East.

• To expand the empires of Spain, Portugal, England, and France.

• To gain riches through trade.

• To spread religious ideas

Marco Polo

• European whose descriptions of the riches of China made traders wants to go to Asia.

• He did not discover unknown lands and seas

• Served as a special ambassador to Kublai Khan

• Stayed in China for almost 25 years

• Had books written about his travels

Prince Henry, the Navigator

  • Never actually sailed on any of the voyages of discovery he sponsored.

• Established a school for the study of the arts of navigation, mapmaking, and shipbuilding.

Bartolomeu Dias

• Led the first European expedition to sail around Africa's Cape of Good Hope

• Opened up money making trading routes from Europe to Asia.

Vasco Da Gama• Portuguese explorer who discovered an ocean route from Portugal to the East.

Amerigo Vespucci

•An Italian explorer

•First person to realize that the Americas were separate from the continent of Asia.

•America was named for him in 1507

Vasco Nunez de Balboa (1475-1519)

• Spanish conquistador and explorer.

• First European to see the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean (in 1513)

Magellan

• Searched for passage to Pacific Ocean

• Sailed through “straits of Magellan”

• Crew first to circumnavigate the world

Cabot

• Sailed for England

• Landed on coast of New-foundland

• Gave England claim to North America

Christopher Columbus Reason for Exploring

• Thought that Japan and the Indies were much closer than they are.

• Explore a new route to the East Indies (Spice Islands).

• Would become Governor of any lands discovered.

• Keep 10% of wealth discovered.

Christopher Columbus

•Set sail on Aug 3, 1492 from port of Palos, Spain.

•Voyage into uncharted waters.

•Landed in the Bahamas on October 12, 1492

Hernando de Soto Explores the Southeast• In 1539, Hernando de Soto landed

near modern Tampa with an army of 700 to explore the Southeast and locate the fabled cities of gold.

• Three years of exploration were marked by nearly constant conflict with the Native tribes and disease that reduced his army by half.

• In 1542, de Soto himself died of disease in modern Alabama forcing the survivors of his party to escape to the Gulf of Mexico on rafts.

• Despite the failure to secure riches for Spain, de Soto’s expedition was the most significant exploration of the American mainland to date.

• Contact with the European explorers introduced the devastating disease smallpox to Native populations that had no natural immunity.

De Soto’s exploration of the De Soto’s exploration of the SoutheastSoutheast

Giovanni da Verrazzano

• First white man to sail into the New York Harbor and see the Hudson River

Juan Ponce De Leon1460? - 1521

• a Spanish explorer and soldier

• First European to set foot in Florida.

• Established the oldest European settlement in Puerto Rico

• Discovered the Gulf Stream (a current in the Atlantic Ocean).

• Was searching for the legendary Fountain of Youth and other riches.

Hernando Cortes

• a Spanish adventurer and conquistador

• Overthrew the Aztec empire and claimed Mexico for Spain(1519-21).

Francisco Pizzaro1478-1541

• A Spanish conquistador

• Traveled through much of the Pacific coast of America along Peru. Discovered" the Incan empire and conquered it brutally and quickly, stealing immense hoards of gold, silver, and other treasures.

Francesco de Orellana

•First European to travel the length of the Amazon River

Sir Francis Drake

•Voyages: South America, Strait of Magellan.

•Famous for: In 1577 Drake made his voyage around the world in Golden Hind.

Female Pirates.

•The life of a pirate or merchantman offered:

• a steady income,

• Adventure

• freedom from social expectations.

•Anne Bonny and Mary Read are the most infamous female pirates. They sailed with Calico Jack Rackham.

Blackbeard (Edward Teach)• The most notorious of the

pirates of the Caribbean.

• Captain of Queen Anne’s Revenge, also followed by several small sloops, depending on what he needed for attack.

• In 1718, Blackbeard and his crews sailed into the harbor at Charleston, SC. They blockaded the harbor, plundered any ships which came his way, and held the town to ransom.