From the West African Sahara many ventured north, where an important trade in gold and salt developed.

Islam spread into W. Africa by the 11th Century, where the grasslands became Muslim. Enforced Muslim Law. Many of these              West African Kingdoms were Bureaucratic Empires, these were mainly in the grasslands. Grassland empires claimed semi-godlike status, to disguise Islam.

There were strong kinship bonds, that included not only immediate but the extended family as well.

Many practice polygamy which Europeans said was "barbaric." These acts were mainly economical in nature in that they used it to pay off debt.

Religion permeated West African life, in that they put religion as a spiritual presence pervading nature. Their artistic traditions were an essential component of religion. They practiced ancestor worship. Yet they were mainly monotheistic. 

Europe was at the height of the Renaissance when Columbus got on the boat and landed on San Salvador in 1492. This Renaissance is a glorification of the classics, such as Greek and Roman. After a 100 yr. recession there was money in Europe, which patrons used to commission paintings and sculptures.

There was a concern over social status in Europe. Which factors included: gender, wealth, inherited position, and political power. At the top of the social hierarchy was the king and his court followed by the masses. There was tension between states, between religions, and between the rich and the poor. The king used taxation to finance his kingdom and war.

The most significant religious conflict was between the established Roman Catholic church and the Protestant movements that arose in the Early Modern Period. For example in England, during Tudor rule when Henry VIII established the Church of England it was Protestant, when he died the reign passed to his sickly son, Edward VI who ruled for a short time, when Edward died, his eldest daughter Mary brought back Catholicism, and was known as "Bloody Mary" for killing protestants, when she died Elizabeth I "Virgin Queen" once again brought back Protestantism, (The Church of England is also known as the Anglican Church) which to this day remains the established Church.

The protestant reformation era left 4 major legacies: I) Created almost all major Christian traditions that would eventually take root in American soil: Protestantism, Catholicism, and radical Protestant sects. II) High value on reading and education III) Protestantism denied that God had given priest special powers. IV) There was a new crusading spirit in Europe, coinciding with the emergence of nation-states and overseas expansion, Europeans used this one to justify their enslavement of African people whom they saw inferior to them.

Between 70% and 80% of all Europeans were peasants who lived miserable lives. The lived in dire conditions and were dominated by the upper classes.

There was a rapid population growth. In England the number doubled from 2.5 million in 1500 to 5 million is 1620. More workers competed for fewer jobs.

Joint-Stock Companies: ancestor to modern corporation. 

Back to England: There was a militant minority Calvinist sect called Puritanism, they demanded a overhaul to "purify" the Church of England from all Catholic rituals. Puritans argued for the conversion experience that's when a soul is "reborn", the new convert was closer to God as a "saint" or member of the "elect", membership for the Church of England was given to anyone born in England, but to join the Puritan faith you had to become a saint. Elizabeth distrusted them, but maintained their loyalty. Yet James I opposed the Puritans and issued his famous "No bishop, no king" doctrine.

Separatist Puritans: Saints had to separate themselves from the corrupt state church, many left for Calvinist Holland, and a few founded Plymouth Plantation in New England

Non Separatist Puritans: Believed that Church of England could be reformed from within, some would later colonize Massachusetts Bay and Connecticut. 

There was Poverty, loneliness, and fear among English people, unemployment and low-wages was rampant.

Columbus hopped on the boat and came in 1492. In the 900's the Vikings came to North America.

There was trade with the Middle East for cloth, silks, and spices.

There was a "maritime revolution" which allowed for European Exploration.

Prince Henry "the Navigator" of Portugal encouraged Portuguese to go down to the African coast, searching for weak spots in Muslim defenses, and opportunities for trade. In 1488 Bartolomeu Diaz reached the Cape of Good Hope at Africa's southern tip. In 1498 Vasco da Gama reached India. By the time of Henry's death there was a profitable slave station in Arguin.

Slavery was well established in 15th Century West Africa.

Outsiders - first Muslims and then Europeans - turned African slavery into an intercontinental business and removed slaves from their native societies. The Portuguese kept out competitors in the slave-trade business until 1600.

Slave trade was a high-volume business that expanded, before it finally ended in the 1800's 12 million Africans would be shipped in dire conditions.

African slaves were treated exceptionally harsh.

Race became the basis for the "new slavery"

Columbus' success was the greatest miscalculation in history.

Columbus was America's first slave trader, and the first of the conquistadores. 

"Columbian Exchange" disease was brought to the new world - biological encounter of the Old and the New Worlds. Europeans brought horses, cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens, wheat, grains, coffee, sugar, numerous fruits and vegetables. African slaves carried rice and yams. America gave Europeans corn, a variety of beans, white and sweet potatoes, manioc, tomatoes, squash, pumpkins, peanuts, vanilla, cacao, avocados, pineapples, chili, tobacco, and turkeys.

Encomiendas: grants for the right to extract labor and other tribute from the Indians.

Requerimiento: Demanded that Indians convert to Christianity.

Gold was discovered in the new world.

Treaty of Tordesillas: divided all future discoveries between Spain and Portugal.

Henry VII of England ignored Tordesilla. He sent John Cabot west and Cabot claimed Nova Scotia, New Foundland, and the rich Grand Banks fisheries for England.

America was named for Amerigo Vespucci.

Vasco Nuñez de Balboa came into the Pacific Ocean when he crossed the isthmus of Panama.

In 1519 Portuguese Ferdinand Magellan went around the world. The voyage ended in 1522, when only one of his five ships and 15 soldiers finally returned to Spain.

Francis I of France thought that there was a "northwest passage" to Asia.

Jacques Cartier ascended to the St. Lawrence river valley.

1519 Hernan Cortés conquered the Mexican Empire.

Mestizo: (Mixed Spanish-Indian), was the largest population in Mexico and Latin America.

Mulatto: (European-African).

1600's: rise of English, French, and Dutch power, which made colonization possible.

Cabeza de Vaca got lost in Texan, went to New Mexico then finally got to Mexico with the help of Estevanico - a slave.

There was warfare, rivalries, and distrust among Europeans and Indians, whom Europeans deemed as "savages"

French first got into the fishing business then ventured into the trade for beavers, since there was wide demand for beaver hats in Europe. They recognized reciprocity with the Indians.

1609: Dutch East India Company: Became interested in North America when Henry Hudson came.

The Dutch built Albany, and established the colony of New Netherlands. Peter Minuit bought an island from local Indians and named it Manhattan, and the settlement, New Amsterdam.

Elizabeth's sea dogs pillaged the Spaniards and Dutch they consisted of Francis Drake, John Hawkins, Humphrey Gilbert, and Walter Raleigh.

England objective in the Western Hemisphere: I) Find Northwest passage to Asia and if possible discover gold on the way II) as Drake called it was to "singe the king of Spain's beard" by raiding the Spanish Fleet and ports from Spain to the West Indies.

Raleigh established Roanoke Island and that Island was lost. Raleigh dispatched Arthur Barlow to go find land, and he named the land Virginia, for the "Virgin Queen"

In 1588 Spanish Armada was defeated by the English Navy.

April 10, 1606: James I granted a charter authorizing overlapping grants of land in Virginia to two separate joint-stock companies, one in London the other in Plymouth.

Virginia Company of Plymouth got the lands extending south from Modern Maine to the Potomac River, and the Virginia Company of London, ran north from Cape Fear to the Hudson River.

Colonists would be business employees, not citizens of a separate political jurisdiction. Stockholders would regulate Colonists behaviors.

Virginia Company of London chose a site along the James River in May 1607 and named it Jamestown. Discipline fell apart as they started to look for gold, and neglected to plant crops. When relief ships arrived in January 1608, only 38 of the original 105 survived.

In September 1608, they named Capt. John Smith as their third president.

He organized work forces, laid rules for sanitation and hygiene to limit disease, and brought military discipline. Then the whole Pocahontas thing happened. Smith prevented Virginia from disintegrating.

When Smith returned to England in 1609, discipline again crumbled. They had not laid away sufficient food for the winter, expecting that the Indians would provide them with food. Of the 500 people at Jamestown in September 1609, about 400 died by May 1610.

New recruits, coupled with the imposition of military rule, enabled Virginians to win the first Anglo-Powhatan War (1610-1614). Tobacco emerged as Virginia's economic salvation.

To attract labor and capital the company gave 50 acre grants ("headrights") to anyone paying his or her ticket. Some enterprisers paid the passage of their indentured servants. Thousands of single young men came, but only a few women.

3 Problems faced by Virginia: I) Local officials systematically defrauded the shareholders by embezzling treasury funds, overcharging for supplies, and using company laborers to work their own tobacco field. II) Colony's population suffered from an exceptionally high death rate. III) Anglo - Powhatan relationship worsened.

Virginia included a handful of slaves by 1619 - the first in North America.

In 1620 Virginia Company of London gave a patent to some London merchants headed by Thomas Weston, who sent over 24 families in the Mayflower. In order to send lumber, fish, and furs back to England for seven years.. The leaders group was made up of Separatist puritans and they landed in Plymouth Rock. so they signed the Mayflower Compact, knowing that they weren't supposed to land there, which stated that they were a civil government under James I's sovereignty, so they established Plymouth Plantation. They were helped by Squanto. They had Thanksgiving dinner.

Importance of Pilgrims: I) Would help inspire the later American vision of sturdy, self-reliant, God-fearing folk crossing the Atlantic to govern themselves. II) Foreshadowed methods that later generations of European - Americans would use to gain mastery of Indians.

The transportation of Europeans into North America was hardly a story of inevitable triumph.