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Uzair US History Lecture Columbus JWT

Christopher Columbus, an Italian explorer working for Spain, led the first European expedition to the Americas in 1492. He believed he had reached Asia but had actually landed in the Bahamas. On later voyages he explored more of the Caribbean and reached the coast of South America, realizing a new continent had been found. However, it was Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian merchant on later voyages, who helped popularize the idea that the Americas were new continents separate from Asia, and America was eventually named after him. Europe looked westward for new colonies for several political, economic, and social reasons, including aspirations for new lands and trade routes, population growth, and religious persecution.

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131 views3 pages

Uzair US History Lecture Columbus JWT

Christopher Columbus, an Italian explorer working for Spain, led the first European expedition to the Americas in 1492. He believed he had reached Asia but had actually landed in the Bahamas. On later voyages he explored more of the Caribbean and reached the coast of South America, realizing a new continent had been found. However, it was Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian merchant on later voyages, who helped popularize the idea that the Americas were new continents separate from Asia, and America was eventually named after him. Europe looked westward for new colonies for several political, economic, and social reasons, including aspirations for new lands and trade routes, population growth, and religious persecution.

Uploaded by

Haseeb
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Lecture 1 US History (Discovery Of America, Why Europe Looked Westward)


Uzair Khan

Christopher Columbus and the Discovery of America:

Christopher Columbus was born and reared in Genoa, Italy. He spent his early seafaring
years in the service of the Portuguese. By the time he was a young man, he had developed
great ambitions. He believed he could reach East Asia by sailing west, across the Atlantic,
rather than east, around Africa. Columbus thought the world was far smaller than it actually
is. He also believed that the Asian continent extended farther eastward than it actually
does. Most important, he did not realize that anything lay to the west between Europe
and the lands of Asia.
Columbus failed to enlist the leaders of Portugal to back his plan, so he turned instead
to Spain. The marriage of Spain’s two most powerful regional rulers, Ferdinand of Aragon
and Isabella of Castile, had produced the strongest and most ambitious monarchy in
Europe. Columbus appealed to Queen Isabella for support for his proposed westward
voyage, and in 1492, she agreed. Commanding ninety men and three
ships—the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa María—Columbus left Spain in August 1492
and sailed west into the Atlantic. Ten weeks later, he sighted land and assumed he had
reached an island off Asia. In fact, he had landed in the Bahamas. When he pushed on
and encountered Cuba, he assumed he had reached China. He returned to Spain, bringing
with him several captured natives as evidence of his achievement. (He called the natives
“Indians” because he believed they were from the East Indies in the Pacific.)
But Columbus did not, of course, bring back news of the great khan’s court in China
or any samples of the fabled wealth of the Indies. And so a year later, he tried again, this
time with a much larger expedition. As before, he headed into the Caribbean, discovering
several other islands and leaving a small and short-lived colony on Hispaniola. On a third
voyage, in 1498, he finally reached the mainland and cruised along the northern coast of
South America. He then realized, for the first time, that he had encountered not a part of
Asia but a separate continent. (Excerpt from The Unfinished Nation)

Amerigo Vespucci and the Discovery of the New world:

Columbus ended his life in obscurity. Ultimately, he was even unable to give his name
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Lecture 1 US History (Discovery Of America, Why Europe Looked Westward)
Uzair Khan

to the land he had revealed to the Europeans. That distinction went instead to a Florentine
merchant, Amerigo Vespucci, who wrote a series of vivid descriptions of the lands
he visited on a later expedition to the New World and helped popularize the idea that the
Americas were new continents. (Excerpt from The Unfinished Nation)
Important Dates
 Columbus landed in America on 12th oct 1492
 First Voyage: Ships of Columbus Nina, Pinta, Santa Maria
 Three voyages of Columbus (1492-502)
 Amerigo Vespucci Two Voyages (1497-1504)
 Columbus Died in 1506
 America named after Amerigo Vespucci in 1507
 Amerigo Vespucci Died 1512

Why Europe Looked Westward


(Incentives of Colonizing America,
Reasons of Colonizing America)

Political Reasons/Incentives/Factors:
 Emergence of New Governments in Europe
 Aspirations of strong monarchies
 Acquiring New Lands
 Spreading Influence beyond borders (new world)
 Exploration of new naval route
 Technological Advancement in navigation
 Lure of new colonies

Economic Reasons/Incentives/Factors:
 Emergence of New Merchant Class
 Unexploited Resources of the new world (Rich Deposits of Gold and Silver)
 European population Growth
 Costly European Wars and economic incentives offered by the new world
 Incentives for European Agriculturalists
 Reduction in the amount of land for Crops due to increasing wool demand
 Scarcity of lands for food crops
 New World as a source of Raw Material
 New Trade route to Asia
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Lecture 1 US History (Discovery Of America, Why Europe Looked Westward)
Uzair Khan

Social Reasons:
 Social Problems in Europe
 Religious Persecution in Europe
 Emergence of protestant groups against Church
 New world offering freedom to preach (Puritans and Calvinists)
 Attraction of the Northern Culture

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