Thursday, June 20, 2013

Concept Map



Christopher Columbus


A.  Nina

A.  Pinta

A.  Santa Maria

I.    The Spanish Monarch gave him the money to do his explorations.

Columbus requested funding from several royal families in Europe for his Atlantic voyage.  He was denied many times before King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella  finally accepted his request.  They gave him 2,000,000 maravedis, which is about $6,000.  It does not seem like a lot of money, but in those times it was. 

A.  Columbus was born in present day Italy in 1451

I.    Columbus is noted "discovering the Americas". 

Columbus did not set out to discover a new land, he was just looking for a new route to Asia.  He was able to persuade the Spanish Monarch into giving him funding for his trip by promising them cheaper spices.


A.  Trade routes

During the 1400's people had to pay a lot of money to have spices brought by land to Europe.  Many times these spices were brought on the back of a camel.  Columbus originally set out to find a water route to Asia to hopefully be able to get spices and gold at a much cheaper rate.  The Monarch was very excited about this prospect. 

I.    He was in search of Gold and spices from Asia.

A.  Found something better than spices

Although he may not have successfully found a easier way to get to Asia, he found something much better... a new land.  Well, new to Europeans.  Because Columbus made this "mistake", Spain eventually colonized much of this area.  The colonization of the new world gave Spain much more money.

1.   Colonies

Spain went on to colonize part of North America, All of Central America and the majority of South America.  This colonization provided Spain with wealth and power.  This also opened the door for other European countries to colonize. 

A.  Spices were extremely valuable

I.    Columbus set the stage for future colonization of the new world

A.  France

A.  England

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