Download The Age of Exploration - Setting the stage

The Age of Exploration - Setting the stage
In this unit, you will learn about Europe during the early modern age. This period lasted
from the 1400s to the 1700s. At the same time that Europe was crackling with the creative
energy of artists, writers and thinkers, and dealing with the reformation European explorers
ventured into the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. In the Age of Exploration, a series of voyages
took place during the 1400s, 1500s, and early 1600s that would change Europe and the
world.
A major reason for these voyages was the
desire to find ocean routes to buy spices in
East Asia, which Europeans called the
Indies. The Portuguese traveled south
looking for a route to Asia by going around
the tip of Africa. When the Spanish funded
Christopher Columbus’ journey west across
the Atlantic Ocean, he was also looking for
such a route. He thought he had reached the Indies. Instead, he reached the Americas. In
time, Europeans would realize that Columbus had found what they called the “New World”
which became known as the West Indies. European nations rushed to trade and claim lands
in the Americas and elsewhere.
With today’s global positioning satellites (GPS), internet maps,
cell phones, and superfast travel, it is hard to imagine exactly
how it might have felt to embark on a voyage across unknown
oceans. In the early 1400s in Europe, most sailors still believed
the great unexplored oceans were filled with monsters, and
few were truly convinced that the earth was round and they
would not sail off the edge. What lay across the ocean? How
long would it take to get there? That depended on the wind,
the weather, and the distance. Days would have run together,
with no sounds but the voices of the captain and the crew, the
creaking of the sails, the blowing wind, and the splash of waves
against the ship’s hull.
Would you be willing to undertake such a voyage? Only those most adventurous, most
daring, and most confident in their abilities to sail in any weather, manage any crew, and
meet any circumstance dared do so.
Early explorers often suffered terrible hardships. In 1520, Ferdinand Magellan set out with
three ships to cross the Pacific Ocean from South America. He had guessed, correctly, that
Asia lay west of South America, but Magellan had no idea how vast the Pacific Ocean
was. He thought his crew would sail for a few weeks at most. Instead, the crossing took
three months. While the ships were still at sea, the crew ran out of food, nearly starving to
death. One sailor wrote about the terrible time. “We ate biscuit . . . swarming with
worms. . . . We drank yellow water that had been putrid [rotten] for days . . . and often we
ate sawdust from boards.”
Why did explorers brave such dangers? In this chapter, you will discover some of the
reasons for the Age of Exploration. You will learn about the voyages of explorers from
Portugal, Spain, England, France and Holland. You will also learn how the Age of Exploration
changed the world in dramatic ways. Cultures divided by 3,000 miles or more of water
interacted for the first time in history, but, as European nations competed for territory, and
claimed large parts of the world they discovered Europeans had an enormously negative
impact on people living in distant lands. So too, the exchange of goods and ideas between
Europe and the rest of the world had a huge impact on all involved.