The history of New America is not so many centuries old. And it began in the 16th century. It was then that new people began to arrive on the continent discovered by Columbus. Settlers from many countries of the world had different reasons for coming to the New World. Some of them just wanted to start a new life. The second dreamed of getting rich. Still others sought refuge from religious persecution or government persecution. Of course, all these people belonged to different nationalities and cultures. They were distinguished from each other by the color of their skin. But all of them were united by one desire - to change their lives and create a new world almost from scratch. Thus began the history of the colonization of America.
Pre-Columbian period
People have inhabited North America for more than one millennium. However, information about the original inhabitants of this continent before the arrival of immigrants from many other parts of the world is very scarce.
As a result of scientific research, it was found that the first Americans were small groups of people who moved tocontinent from Northeast Asia. Most likely, they mastered these lands about 10-15 thousand years ago, passing from Alaska through the shallow or frozen Bering Strait. Gradually, people began to move inland, to the south of the American continent. So they reached Tierra del Fuego and the Strait of Magellan.
The researchers also believe that in parallel with this process, small groups of Polynesians moved to the continent. They settled in the southern lands.
Both those and other settlers who are known to us as the Eskimos and Indians are rightfully considered the first inhabitants of America. And in connection with long-term residence on the continent - the indigenous population.
Discovery of a new continent by Columbus
The Spaniards were the first Europeans to visit the New World. Traveling to a world unknown to them, they marked India, the Cape of Good Hope and the western coastal territories of Africa on the geographical map. But the researchers didn't stop there. They began to look for the shortest route that would lead a person from Europe to India, which promised great economic benefits to the monarchs of Spain and Portugal. The result of one of these campaigns was the discovery of America.
It happened in October 1492, it was then that the Spanish expedition, led by Admiral Christopher Columbus, landed on a small island located in the Western Hemisphere. Thus was opened the first page in the history of the colonization of America. Immigrants from Spain rush to this outlandish country. Following them inWestern hemisphere appeared inhabitants of France and England. The period of colonization of America began.
Spanish conquerors
The colonization of America by Europeans at first did not cause any resistance from the local population. And this contributed to the fact that the settlers began to behave very aggressively, enslaving and killing the Indians. The Spanish conquerors showed particular cruelty. They burned and plundered local villages, killing their inhabitants.
Already at the very beginning of the colonization of America, Europeans brought many diseases to the continent. The local population began to die from epidemics of smallpox and measles.
In the mid-16th century, Spanish colonists dominated the American continent. Their possessions stretched from New Mexico to Cape Gori and brought fabulous profits to the royal treasury. During this period of the colonization of America, Spain fought off all attempts by other European states to gain a foothold in this resource-rich territory.
However, at the same time, the balance of power began to change in the Old World. Spain, where the kings unwisely spent huge flows of gold and silver coming from the colonies, began to gradually lose ground, giving way to England, in which the economy was developing at a rapid pace. In addition, the decline of the previously powerful country, the mistress of the seas and the European superpower, was accelerated by the long-term war with the Netherlands, the conflict with England and the Reformation of Europe, which was fought with huge funds. But the last point of Spain's withdrawal into the shadows was the death in 1588 of the Invincible Armada. After that, the leaders in the process of colonizationAmerica became England, France and Holland. Settlers from these countries created a new immigration wave.
French colonies
Settlers from this European country were primarily interested in valuable furs. At the same time, the French did not seek to seize land, since in their homeland the peasants, despite the burden of feudal duties, still remained the owners of their allotments.
The beginning of the colonization of America by the French was laid at the dawn of the 17th century. It was during this period that Samuel Champlain founded a small settlement on the Acadia Peninsula, and a little later (in 1608) the city of Quebec. In 1615, the possessions of the French extended to Lakes Ontario and Huron. These territories were dominated by trading companies, the largest of which was the Hudson's Bay Company. In 1670, its owners received a charter and monopolized the purchase of fish and furs from the Indians. Local residents became "tributaries" of companies, caught in a network of obligations and debts. In addition, the Indians were simply robbed, constantly exchanging valuable furs they got for worthless trinkets.
UK possessions
The beginning of the colonization of North America by the British started in the 17th century, although their first attempts were made a century earlier. The settlement of the New World by subjects of the British crown accelerated the development of capitalism in their homeland. The source of the prosperity of the English monopolies was the creation of colonial trading companies that successfully worked in the foreign market. It was they who brought fabulous profits.
Features of the colonization of North America by Great Britain consisted in the fact that in this territory the government of the country formed two trading companies that had large funds. It was the London and Plymouth firms. These companies had royal charters, according to which they owned lands located between 34 and 41 degrees north latitude, and extended inland without any restrictions. Thus, England appropriated the territory that originally belonged to the Indians.
At the beginning of the 17th century. established a colony in Virginia. From this enterprise, the commercial Virginia Company expected great profits. At its own expense, the company delivered immigrants to the colony, who worked off their debt for 4-5 years.
In 1607 a new settlement was formed. It was the Jamestown colony. It was located in a swampy place where many mosquitoes lived. In addition, the colonists turned against themselves the indigenous population. Constant skirmishes with the Indians and disease soon claimed the lives of two-thirds of the settlers.
Another English colony - Maryland - was founded in 1634. In it, British settlers received plots of land and became planters and big businessmen. The workers at these sites were poor English people who worked off the cost of moving to America.
However, over time, instead of indentured servants in the colonies, the labor of Negro slaves began to be used. They began to be brought mainly to the southern colonies.
During the 75 years after the formation of the Virginia colony, the British created 12 more such settlements. These are Massachusetts and New Hampshire, New York and Connecticut, Rhode Island and New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania, North and South Carolina, Georgia and Maryland.
Development of the English colonies
The poor of many countries of the Old World sought to get to America, because in their view it was the promised land, giving salvation from debt and religious persecution. That is why the European colonization of America was on a large scale. Many entrepreneurs have ceased to be limited to recruiting immigrants. They started rounding up the people, soldering them and putting them on the ship until they sobered up. That is why there was an unusually rapid growth of the English colonies. This was facilitated by the agrarian revolution carried out in Great Britain, as a result of which there was a mass dispossession of peasants.
Robbed by their government, the poor began to look for the possibility of buying land in the colonies. So, if in 1625 1980 settlers lived in North America, then in 1641 there were about 50 thousand immigrants from England alone. Fifty years later, the number of inhabitants of such settlements amounted to about two hundred thousand people.
Behavior of migrants
The history of the colonization of America is overshadowed by a war of extermination against the natives of the country. The settlers took away land from the Indians, completely destroying the tribes.
In the north of America, which was called New England, people from the Old World went a slightly different way. Here the land was acquired from the Indians with the help of "trade deals". This subsequently became the reasonto the assertion of the opinion that the ancestors of the Anglo-Americans did not encroach on the freedom of the indigenous people. However, people from the Old World acquired huge tracts of land for a bunch of beads or for a handful of gunpowder. At the same time, the Indians, who were not familiar with private property, as a rule, did not even guess about the essence of the contract concluded with them.
The church also contributed to the history of colonization. She elevated the beating of Indians to the rank of a charitable deed.
One of the shameful pages in the history of the colonization of America is the award for scalps. Before the arrival of settlers, this bloody custom existed only among some tribes that inhabited the eastern territories. With the advent of the colonialists, such barbarism began to spread more and more. The reason for this was the unleashed internecine wars, in which firearms began to be used. In addition, the process of scalping greatly facilitated the spread of iron knives. After all, the wooden or bone tools that the Indians had before colonization greatly complicated such an operation.
However, the relations of settlers with the natives were not always so hostile. Ordinary people tried to maintain good neighborly relations. Poor farmers took over the agricultural experience of the Indians and learned from them, adapting to local conditions.
Immigrants from other countries
But be that as it may, the first colonists who settled in North America did not have a single religiousbeliefs and belonged to different social strata. This was due to the fact that people from the Old World belonged to different nationalities, and, consequently, had different beliefs. For example, English Catholics settled in Maryland. Huguenots from France settled in South Carolina. Swedes settled in Delaware, and Virginia was full of Italian, Polish, and German artisans. The first Dutch settlement appeared on Manhattan Island in 1613. Its founder was Henry Hudson. The Dutch colonies, centered on the city of Amsterdam, became known as New Netherland. Later, these settlements were captured by the British.
The colonialists entrenched themselves on the continent, for which they still thank God every fourth Thursday in November. America celebrates Thanksgiving. This holiday is immortalized in honor of the first year of life of immigrants in a new place.
The advent of slavery
The first black Africans arrived in Virginia in August 1619 on a Dutch ship. Most of them were immediately ransomed by the colonists as servants. In America, blacks became lifelong slaves.
Moreover, this status even began to be inherited. Between the American colonies and the countries of East Africa, the slave trade began to be carried out constantly. Local leaders willingly exchanged their young men for weapons, gunpowder, textiles and many other goods brought from the New World.
Development of the southern territories
As a rule, settlers chose the northern territoriesNew World because of their religious considerations. In contrast, the colonization of South America pursued economic goals. Europeans, with little ceremony with the indigenous people, resettled them on lands that were poorly suitable for existence. The resource-rich continent promised the settlers to receive large incomes. That is why in the southern regions of the country they began to cultivate plantations of tobacco and cotton, using the labor of slaves brought from Africa. Most goods were exported to England from these territories.
Settlers in Latin America
The territories south of the United States, the Europeans also began to develop after the discovery of the New World by Columbus. And today, the colonization of Latin America by Europeans is regarded as an unequal and dramatic clash of two different worlds, which ended in the enslavement of the Indians. This period lasted from the 16th to the beginning of the 19th century.
The colonization of Latin America led to the death of ancient Indian civilizations. After all, most of the indigenous population was exterminated by immigrants from Spain and Portugal. The surviving inhabitants fell under the subjugation of the colonizers. But at the same time, the cultural achievements of the Old World were brought to Latin America, which became the property of the peoples of this continent.
Slowly European colonists began to turn into the most growing and important part of the population of this region. And the importation of slaves from Africa began a complex process of formation of a special ethno-cultural symbiosis. And today we can say that the development of modernIt was the colonial period of the 16th-19th centuries that left an indelible imprint on Latin American society. In addition, with the arrival of Europeans, the region began to be involved in world capitalist processes. This has become an important prerequisite for the economic development of Latin America.
