COLUMBUS AND THE EUROPEAN
CONQUEST OF THE NEW WORLD
The man whom we call Columbus was born in Genoa, Italy. His birth name was Cristoforo Colombo. He offered his services to the rulers of Spain, and in Spain his name is Cristobal Colon. Christopher Columbus is the English translation. Columbus, sailing for Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castille, or Spain, sailed west across the Atlantic. And in 1492 the Native Americans, the so-called Indians, "discovered" Columbus. The trans-Atlantic slave trade emerges in the context of European conquest and colonization of the New World. Today I am going to concentrate on the European conquest of the New World, and the spread of slavery with it.
Columbus did not discover the New World. There were already people here when he arrived. But he was the first European to reach the Caribbean and South America. His encounter became a permanent part of the knowledge and consciousness of Europe. For Europeans it was a new realization, but not the first human discovery of the Americas.
1. THE FIRST AMERICANS
In your BULK PACKS there is an article entitled "The First Americans," from Newsweek Magazine. It describes the current theory that in the last Ice Age, tens of thousands of years ago, the level of the sea was much lower than it is today. When the last Ice Age receded, and more of the ice melted into water, the level of the sea rose. Thus areas that are under water today were dry land thousands of years ago. Scientists believe that during the Ice Age Siberia and Alaska were connected by something called the Bering land bridge (or Beringia). During the Ice Age people from Northeast Asia, people somewhat like the Mongolians, migrated across the Bering land bridge to America. They were the ancestors of the American Indians. They discovered America, and were the first people here. They are the indigenous or native people of the New World.
The article describes the scientific debate about this. Traditionally scientists said this occurred 12-18,000 years ago. But as new remains are discovered some archaeologists, the date gets pushed back. Archaeologist Richard MacNeish studied bones with spears points embedded in them, at Orogrande Cave in New Mexico. The spear points are 26,000 years (p. 16) He has found what he believes to be stone tools chipped by human hands (rather than naturally occurring rocks) dated at 38,000 years. MacNeish believes the Paleo-Indians arrived 40,000 years ago. Niede Guidon has studied the Pedra Furada site in Brazil. There she has found red ochre cave paintings of birds, deer, armadillos and stick figure people. The paintings are 17,000 years old.
The most recent research indicates that people like the Australian Aborigines and Polynesians reached South America many thousands of years ago. The ancestors of human beings are believed to have migrated out of Africa 100,000 years ago. By 40,000 years ago they reached Australia and the islands of Melanesia, etc. The Australian Aborigines, the Maoris of New Zealand and the people of Melanesia (south sea islands) are black or brown in color (think of Vai Sikahema).They look like Africans, but are a good 60,000 years removed from Africa. Therefore we hesitate to call them Africans, although they are indeed dark in color. In any event Luiza, the name of the oldest humanoid fossil found in South America, appears to be like the Australian Aborigines and Melanesians and Polynesians. They were seafaring people. The Luiza fossil waas found at Minas Gerais, in Brazil, in 1975. She is thought to date from 11,500 years ago, or 9500 BC. These ancient people probably came by sea.
2. THE LOST WORLDS OF ANCIENT AMERICA
The article entitled "The Lost Worlds of Ancient America" describes the highly advanced civilizations of the New World, including the Olmecs (1500 B.C.) of Central America, the Toltecs of Teotihuacan (500 B.C.) in Mexico, the Aztecs of Mexico (1300 A.D), the Maya (400 A.D.) of the Yucatan Peninsula and Guatemala, and the Inca of Peru (1400 A.D.). The Aztec, Inca and Maya were conquered and subjugated by the Spanish in the decades following Columbus.
3. GREAT FOOD MIGRATION
The article entitled
"The Great Food Migration" describes the exchange of plants, foods and
animals between the Old World and the New World. The illustration on p.
62 reveals that the following items came from the New World and Old World:
NEW WORLD (Americas) OLD WORLD (Europe, Africa, Asia)
corn
horse
potato
cow
tomato
pig
bell and chili peppers
sheep
chocolate
chickens
vanilla
guinea fowl (Africa)
tobacco
wheat
lima and kidney beans
barley
pumpkin
oats
peanut
sugar cane
pineapple
okra (Africa)
banana
4. THE FOUR VOYAGES OF COLUMBUS
Columbus arrived in America in 1492. He landed in the Bahamas, Cuba and Hispaniola. Sailing with Columbus on the first voyage was Pedro Nino Alonzo, who is believed to have been a Moor (mixed race Arab and North African people who had been Moslems). On his second voyage of 1493-1496 he landed in Puerto Rico and Jamaica. The third voyage was 1498-1500, when he explored Trinidad and the coast of Colombia and Venezuela. On the fourth voyage of 1502-1504 he explored Honduras, Panama and the coast of central America. With Columbus on this fourth voyage was a black man named Diego el Negro. Negro is the Spanish word for the color black. There is little doubt as to the color and race of Diego el Negro.
5. ENSLAVEMENT OF THE TAINOS
About 1496, during
the second voyage, the Spanish established a settlement on Hispaniola (today
Haiti and the Dominican Republic). The islands of the Caribbean were inhabited
by a number of Indian tribes or ethnic groups. On Hispaniola and Cuba they
were the Tainos (Arawak in English). They resisted the efforts of
Columbus and his brother to control them. On p. 46 of the article entitled
"Columbus and His Four Fateful Voyages," it mentions that about 1496 Columbus
fought and enslaved the Tainos on Hispaniola. Some 1600 Tainos were
rounded up, and of this number 550 were crammed into 4 ships and sent back
to Spain as slaves. This was the beginning of the enslavement of Indians
by Europeans in the New World. Within 4 years of Columbus's arrival in
the New World, the Spanish had begun enslaving the indigenous people. What
began with the Tainos would soon stretch out to encompass Africans as well.
6. THE NAMING OF THE NEW CONTINENT
In 1499 a man named Amerigo Vespucci explored the coast of South America, and the Amazon River. He was a native of Florence, Italy. He lived however in Seville, in Spain. His first voyage was in the service of Spain. In 1501-12 he made a second voyage, this time on behalf of Portugal. Up until this time Columbus and others thought that the lands Columbus had encountered were islands off the coast of Asia, near Japan or India. That is why the area was called the Indies. Columbus had been trying to reach India. But by 1502 Vespucci disagreed. He asserted that this was not a series of islands off the coast of Asia. Rather, he said, it is a new continent, a new land mass, a "new world," previously unknown to Europe. Europe, Africa and Asia were the continents known to the Europeans. This was the Old World. Now there was a New World.
In 1506 Columbus died. In 1507 a geographer and map-maker produced a new book of maps, an atlas. His name was Martin Waldseemuller. His book was written in Latin, and he called it the Cosmographiae Introductio. In Latin, Amerigo Vespucci is Americus Vespuccius. However by convention the names of continents are female. The female form of Americus is America. Waldseemuller named the new continent America in honor of Amerigo Vespucci. Since his map was the first to show the new continent, the name stuck (Daniel Boorstin, The Discoverers, p. 253 and William Langer, Encyclopedia of World History, p. 391).
In 1513 Vasco Nunez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama and became the first European to see the Pacific Ocean from the coast of America.
II. BLACK PEOPLE TOO ARE A "WORLD-HISTORICAL" PEOPLE
Next I want to digress for a few minutes and say a word about the approach to black history taken in this class. That approach comes from Maulana Karenga and Molefi Asante, who have said that "black people, too, are a world-historical people." Molefi Asante is a professor of communications at Temple University, and he is one of the founders of the Afrocentric movement. That perspective derives from his book entitled Afrocentricity, in 1980. Maulana Karenga, formerly Ron Karenga, is the father of black cultural nationalism, along with Leroi Jones (or Amiri Baraka) of Newark. Karenga, was an activist in Oakland, California in the Sixties. He advocated the study of black history and culture. He felt that black or African-American people should study their own history, and preserve and revitalize their own culture. In the Sixties he created Kwanzaa, which is celebrated at the same time as Christmas.
But Karenga and Asante insist that black people also are a world-historical people. What they mean by this is that the history of black people does NOT begin all of a sudden in 1619 when a Dutch ship arrives in Jamestown, VA and sells 20 black people as slaves to the English. 1619 is NOT the beginning of our history as a people. God did not create black people in 1619. Karenga and Asante mean that our history as black people is a part of world history. Our history connects with and intersects with world history. We have contributed to world history and to world civilization. Our history is more than just 1619 to the present. It is more than just what has happened in the United States. It is more than just slavery and segregation and a civil rights movement. It is more than the last 450 years.
THE AFRICAN DIASPORA
Every society in the New World was touched and affected by slavery. The development of the New World would not have happened without African labor. All the societies of the Caribbean, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, even Canada, had black slavery. African slavery built the New World in the 1500s, 1600s, 1700s.
The dispersion of a group of people is called a DIASPORA. In ancient tijkes there was the dispersion of the Jews, or the Jewish diaspora. After the Great Potato Famine of 1846 there was the Irish dispersion or diaspora. The dispersion of any group of people, in general, is a diaspora. The dispersion of the children of Africa to the New World and elsewhere is called the African diaspora. Any group of people can have a diaspora. If we want to know about all of the black family, we cannot ignore and leave out the black people who went to the Caribbean and South and Latin America. The black people of Haiti, Jamaica, Barbados, Trinidad, Bermuda, the Bahamas, Venezuela, Panama, Brazil, etc, are also part of the transoceanic black family. They are also part of the African diaspora. This is why I insist on your knowing something about those societies too. In other words, world history, not just U.S. history since 1619.
III. EUROPEAN CONQUEST OF THE AMERICAS
1. SPAIN
Thanks to Columbus, the Spanish were the first Europeans to reach the New World. Among the Europeans, they got here first. And therefore they took or grabbed the lion's share of the New World.
DATE CONQUEST OF:
1494 Hispaniola (in 1505 seventeen (17) black slaves brought to the island)
1508-1511 Puerto Rico, Jamaica
1509-1513 Panama (in
1513 Vasco Nunez de Balboa became the first
European to see the
Pacific Ocean from America. Some of the soldiers with Balboa were black)
1511-1515 Cuba
1519-1521 Mexico (by Cortes)
1523-25 Guatemala
1524-26 Honduras
1525 Venezuela
1527-1539 Maya, in Yucatan
1531-32 Pizarro conquers Inca of Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia
1535-36 Buenas Aires founded in Argentina
In 1521 Juan Ponce de Leon explored Florida. From 1526-28 Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon established a Spanish colony in the Carolinas, called San Miguel de Guadeloupe, but it dissolved when he died. In 1541 Hernando De Soto encountered the Mississippi River. In 1565 the Spanish (Pedro Menendez de Aviles) succeeded in establishing a settlement at St. Augustine in Florida. Occupation of Florida from that date.
Let me also mention that in 1527-1528 Panfilo de Narvaez explored Texas and the Gulf coast. With him was a freed black slave from Morocco named Estevanico (Estevan or Steven).He was the first black man recorded or documented to have set foot on North America.
Spain colonized Texas in 1720.
And, for the record, the Spanish colonized California beginning in 1769. They founded San Diego in 1769; Monterey in 1770; Los Angeles in 1781; and San Francisco in 1776. The United States inherited these in the Mexican War of 1848. I mention this because some misinformed persons think California began all of a sudden when the United States conquered it from Mexico in 1848.
2. PORTUGAL
The Portuguese followed the Spanish, exploring the coast of Brazil in 1500. They began the actual conquest and settlement of Brazil in 1530.
3. ENGLAND
a) Roanoke
In 1584 Sir Walter Raleigh established a small English colony on Roanoke Island, off of North Carolina. When the English returned in 1591, everyone had vanished without a trace. There were no bodies, no bones, nothing. The only clue was a name carved into the bark of a tree. It said "Croatoan." This is thought to be the name of an Indian tribe or perhaps the chief of the tribe.
b) Jamestown
The first permanent English settlement in the New World was at Jamestown, in VA, in May 1607. This is the beginning of U.S. history. Please notice that the English are lagging along more than 100 years after the Spanish. In fact the English were latecomers.
The English conquered Bermuda in 1612, and English Puritans landed at Plymouth, in Massachusetts in 1620. Barbados was occupied in 1625. The British occupied Antigua in 1632. In 1655, in a war with Spain, Britain won Jamaica.
4. FRANCE
In 1608 the French conquered Quebec, in Canada. Spain and France competed for the Mississippi River Valley. In 1679-83 Robert de La Salle explored Michigan and Illinois and traveled down the Mississippi. In 1682 he reached the mouth of the Mississippi River, and claimed the entire Valley for France. Between 1683 and 1689 the French established a colony at the mouth of the Mississippi River, but it was wiped out by Indians in 1689. The French re-established their colony in Louisiana in 1699; founded Mobile Bay (St. Louis) in 1702; and founded New Orleans in 1710. France lost Louisiana to Spain in 1763; Napoleon Bonaparte got it back in 1800; and in 1803 France sold the Louisiana Territory to the United States for roughly $15 million.
Martinique and Guadeloupe were colonized in 1635, and became French colonies.
French pirates, and those of other nations as well, operated from the island of Tortuga on the west side of Hispaniola for decades. In 1697, by the Treaty of Ryswick, Spain ceded the western side of the island to France (Langer, p. 536). The French called their colony St. Domingue. The Spanish side was Santo Domingo. When the black slaves revolted in 1791, and finally won independence in 1804, they proclaimed their country by the name of Haiti. Haiti is what the blacks called their country.
5. THE NETHERLANDS (HOLLAND)
Between 1612-1614 the Dutch settled the New York and Hudson River area. In 1614 the Dutch founded Fort Nassau (later Fort Orange) near present-day Albany. Also recall that Peter Minuet "bought" Manhattan from the Indians for $24 in 1626. The Dutch called the town at Manhattan by the name of New Amsterdam. The entire Hudson River colony was called New Netherland. In the 1600s there were three wars between Britain and Holland, called the Anglo-Dutch Wars (1652-54; 1664-1667; and 1672-78). As a result of war between Britain and Holland, the British won New Amsterdam and Fort Nassau-Orange (New Netherland) in 1664 and renamed it New York. They also acquired New Jersey.
In the Caribbean the Dutch conquered Curacao in 1634. In 1625 the Dutch established a town in the region of Surinam, north of Brazil, but were driven out by the French. In 1667 the Dutch won for good.
6. SWEDEN
In 1638 the Swedes established a colony at Ft. Christina (now called Wilmington) in Delaware. The Swedes called their colony New Sweden. The Swedish colony also included territory on the New Jersey side of the Delaware, including Varkenskill and Salem. New Sweden was seized by the Dutch in 1655, and then by the British in 1664. .
7. DENMARK
Even little Denmark had a piece of the New World. In 1671 Denmark took over islands called St. Thomas, St. Croix and some adjacent islands. They generally called this colony St. Thomas, or the Danish West Indies. In 1917 Denmark sold the islands to the United States, and today they are called the U.S. Virgin Islands.
IV. INDIAN SLAVERY
When Cortes overthrew and conquered the Aztecs and the Indians of Mexico in 1521, he and the Spanish essentially enslaved the population. Large tracts of desirable land were confiscated in the name of the king of Spain, who in turn assigned some of this land to his nobles and favorites and soldiers as encomiendas. An encomienda is a royal land grant. With it, however, comes the right to rule over and tax and use the labor of the Indians resident on the land. Under the Aztecs there had already been a system called mayeques. They were like serfs. They were bound or tied to the land. They could not leave the land or estate without the permission of their landlord. They were required to work for him and obey his commands. Landlords might come and go as the emperor assigned a new favorite to the estate. But the people in a sense "belonged" to the estate permanently.
The Spanish simply confiscated the land from the Aztecs and other Indians and installed themselves as the new landlords. The Indians now became serfs on the encomiendas. Likewise Spaniards seized lands, without benefit of a royal charter, and these became plantations or estates called haciendas. Depending on the environment, they might be used for agricultural production or for ranching. From even before the Spanish conquest, however, the masses of the people are in the position of serfs who own no land of their own, but are working on the estate of a landlord, paying him taxes, and owing him labor and obedience. They must grow crops for the landlord, and for themselves as well. Some more fortunate people will become renteros, which is to say they are tenants renting land from the great landlords. The Indians were also subject to forced labor, and were used in the silver mines of Mexico. Mexico was already a feudalistic society under the Aztecs. It becomes even more so under the Spanish. After Cortes, what emerges in Mexico for several hundred years is a society with an Indian base and a European elite or ruling class. Mixed race people and black slaves will become an intermediate class between the whites and the indios.
The Spanish believed that Christianity, by which they meant Catholicism, was the one and only true religion. They had a mission from God to convert the heathens and pagans of the world to the worship of God. Warfare against pagan peoples who refused the summons to worship the Christian God was just. The conquest of these peoples, the confiscation of their property, and their enslavement were all proper in the mission to bring the worship of God to all of mankind.
When Pizarro conquered the Incas of Peru in 1531, he too confiscated the land and the king parceled it out to royal favorites and nobles and soldiers of fortune as encomiendas. The inhabitants of the land became serfs bound to the land and obligated to work for and obey their landlord and pay taxes and perform agricultural labor for him. They too were subject to forced labor as slaves.
The article entitled "Were The Spaniards That Cruel?" discusses these issues. Throughout Latin America, Indians were used in agriculture on the haciendas and encominedas (royal land grants, with control over the peasants living on the land; like feudalism). In Peru, Bolivia and the Andes region tens of thousands of Indians were worked to death in the silver mines, especially at Potosi, in Bolivia (1545). The Indians called Potosi the "mountain that eats men." Once an Indian went into the mines, he never returned alive again. Likewise Indian forced labor (slaves) were used in the gold and silver mines of Mexico. Peru and Mexico were the richest colonies of Spain. But let me make the point again, that the first slavery in the New World by Europeans was Indian slavery. Likewise, the Portuguese began with Indian slavery in Brazil.
V. SLAVERY: HOW IT BUILT THE NEW WORLD
The article entitled "Slavery: How It Built The New World" discusses the crucial role of slavery in the development of the New World. Slavery did not happen only in the United States. It was an integral part of the development of every single country in North and South America. That article describes Middle Passage and the conditions on the slave ships. It also describes the barbarous treatment inflicted on the enslaved Africans.
Please note that on page 67 of that article, column 1, it says that the Spanish brought African bondsmen to Hispaniola as early as 1505. This was the beginning of the use of black or African slaves in the New World. It dates from 1505, with the Spanish. The English, French and Dutch copied this practice from the Spanish and Portuguese. The English even borrowed the Spanish word "Negro" or black to describe the Africans.
Also please note that the article also says that "at least 10 million Africans were shipped to the Americas in chains." Of course, this does not include the ones who died on the way, or the ones who died in wars and died on the way from the interior of Africa down to the coast.
This article is also interesting because it relates the story of Oloudah Equiano. He was an Igbo, a member of an ethnic group in Nigeria. In 1758, when he was 11 years old, he was kidnapped by rival African tribesmen, and sold to European slavers. He was shipped to the English colony of Barbados, bought, and renamed Gustavus Vassa. In time he earned enough money to purchase his freedom, and became a member of the British navy. Ultimately as a free man he became a member of the English anti-slavery movement. In 1789 he published a narrative of his life and experiences. Interestingly, as a child abducted and sold into slavery, he did not know what the Europeans wanted Africans for. It turns out that many captured Africans did not realize the Europeans wanted them for labor, as slaves.
Rather, some of the
captives thought the Europeans were cannibals, and wanted to eat them.
Numerous narratives and slave accounts testify to this belief. Some Africans
thought that the Europeans were white due to malnutrition.