Download GLOBAL EXCHANGES Adapted from: Traditions and Encounters

GLOBAL EXCHANGES
Adapted from: Traditions and Encounters – A Brief Global History, Volume II, Bentley,
Ziegler, Street-Salter, McGraw Hill, 2010, pgs. 381-384.
1. PRE – COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE
The process of biological exchange (plants, foods, animals, diseases) was
present in world history well before the age of exploration and Christopher
Columbus. The early expansion of Islam, for example, helped the spread of plants
and food crops, such as rice, sugar cane and cotton throughout much of the eastern
world (Africa, India, China, Middle East, and parts of Europe) between 700 to 1100
C.E. The primary mode of exchange was due to trading routes in the Mediterranean,
Black Sea and throughout Asia.
Also during this time, diseases were spread between world regions. The
most famous, as well as, deadly was the Bubonic Plague (also known as the Black
Death). Historians estimate that this disease originated in China around 1350 C.E.
and was spread throughout Asia, the Middle East and Europe through ships
transporting people and trading goods. In addition, trading ships carried infected
rats and fleas, the primary source of disease, which then infected humans living in
overcrowded cities and towns. It is estimated that over 30% of China’s population
died as a result of the Black Death and Europe experienced close to a 60% decline in
population.
2. COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE – FOOD CROPS / ANIMALS
The Columbian Exchange was responsible for a major spread of food crops
and animals. Wheat, grape vines, horses, cattle, pigs, sheep, goats, and chickens went
from Europe to the Americas, where they sharply increased supplies of food and
animal energy. Food crops native to the Americas also played prominent roles in
the Columbian Exchange. American crops that took root in Africa, Asia and Europe
include maize (corn) potatoes, beans, tomatoes, peppers, peanuts, avocadoes,
tobacco, pineapples and cacao (yes, chocolate!). Residents of Europe, Africa and
Asia only gradually developed a taste for American crops but by the 18th century
corn and potatoes had contributed to a sharply increased number of calories in the
Eurasian diets and lead to longer life expectancy.
3. COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE - DISEASES / POPULATION DECLINE
When infectious and contagious diseases traveled to previously unexposed
populations, they touched off widespread epidemics that sometimes destroyed
entire societies. Beginning in 1519, smallpox ravaged the Aztec empire and within a
hundred years the indigenous population of Mexico declined by as much as 90%,
from 17 million to 1.3 million. As a result, most cultural traditions of the indigenous
peoples disappeared or had been overrun by Spanish rule.
Imported diseases took their worst tolls in very populated areas such as the
Aztec and Inca Empires, as well as, the Taino peoples of the Caribbean. Smallpox
and other diseases such as Influenza and Measles were so easily transmitted so that
by the 1530s European diseases had spread from Mexico north to the Great Lakes
and south to Argentina. All told, disease epidemics started by the Columbian
Exchange probably caused the worst population decline in all of world history.
Between 1500 and 1800 upwards of 100 million people may have died from
Eurasian diseases imported to the Americas and Pacific Islands.
4. COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE - MIGRATION
Alongside of disease pathogens and plant and animal species, the Columbian
Exchange involved the spread of human populations through transoceanic
migration, both forced and voluntary. During the period from 1500 to 1800, the
largest group of migrants consisted of enslaved Africans (10 million) who were
transported against their will to the Americas. A smaller migration involved
Europeans who traveled to the Americas and settled in lands depopulated of
indigenous peoples. Great Britain, France, Spain and Portugal were the main
European countries that voluntarily migrated from Europe to the Americas. The
migration of large amounts of Europeans to the Americas, as well as, to Africa,
Australia and the Pacific Islands greatly impacted modern world history and native
cultures.
5. COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE - POPULATION GROWTH
The Columbian Exchange of plants and animals fueled a surge in world
population. In 1500, as Eurasian peoples were recovering from epidemic bubonic
plague, world population was about 425 million. By 1600 it had increased more
than 25 percent, to 545 million. By 1750, human population stood at 720 million
and by 1800 it had surged to 900 million, having grown by almost 50 percent during
the previous one hundred years. Much of the rise was due to the increased
nutritional value of diets enriched by the global exchange of food crops and animals
a source of high protein. Also, the European discovery of South American quinine
(long used by the indigenous South America peoples) by a Jesuit priest in Lima, Peru
aided the treatment of malaria throughout Europe and Africa and assisted in
improving life expectancy.
6. COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE - ENVIRONMENTAL DECLINE
As the mining of silver and gold increased the wealth of many European
nations and their settlements in North America, animal skins became prized
commodities. Fur bearing animals such as beavers and sables came under great
pressure as hunters sought their pelts for sale and profit. During the 1700s, more
than 16 million North American beaver pelts fed consumer demands for fur hats and
coats. Over hunting of fur bearing animals drove many species into extinction or
permanently altered their living habitats. Early modern hunters also harvested
enormous numbers of deer, codfish, whales, walruses and seals as merchants sought
to supply animal products for global consumers.