The Search for Spices Europeans Explore the Seas

The Search for Spices

Europeans Explore the Seas • Crusades introduced Europeans to Asian goods. • Black Death and breakup of the Mongol Empire disrupted trade. • Most valued items were • spices, such as cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and pepper. • The cheif source of spices was the Moluccas

Motives • 1400's, Muslims and Italian merchants controlled most trade between Asia and Europe. • Europeans wanted to gain direct acces to Asian good • First Portugal sought a trade that bypassed the Mediterranean and then Spain did.

Improved Technology • Cartographers who, were mapmakers and they created more accurate maps and sea charts. • Astrolabe which could determine their latitude at sea. • Portuguese developed the caravel which was an advanced ship that combined the square sails of European ship with Arab triangular sails.

Portugal Sails Eastward • Portugal led the way for exploration by the 1400’s. • At Sagres Prince Henry gathered scientists and cartographers to prepare maps and train crew members for long voyages. • He then sent them out to explore the western coast of Africa. • In 1460 Henry died but the Portuguese still continued their quest. • The rounded tip became known as the Cape of Good Hope because it opened the way for a sea route to Asia.

India • In 1497 Vasco da Gama led a 10 -month voyage. • He acquired a cargo of spices that he sold at a profit of 3, 000 percent. • In 1502 he forced a treaty of friendship on the ruler Calicut. • He left Portuguese merchants there to buy spices when they were low and store them till the next fleet came. • The Portuguese seized key ports around the Indian Ocean to create vast trading post.

Columbus • Christopher Columbus wanted to reach the Indies by sailing west across the Atlantic. • He made two mistakes first he underestimated the size of the earth and two he did not know of the two continents in his way. • Ferdinand & Isabella financed his voyage. • On August 3, 1492 Columbus sailed west with three small ships the Pinta, the Nina, and the Santa Maria. • In 1493 he returned to Spain. • Other Europeans realized that Columbus had found a route to continents previously unknown to them.

Line of Demacration • Both Spain and Portugal pressed claims to the lands that Columbus explored. • In 1493 Pope Alexander VI set a Line of Demarcation dividing the non-European world into two zones. • Spain and exploring and trading rights in any lands west of the line and Portugal had the same rights east of the line. • In 1507 a German Cartographer labeled the region America and the Islands that Columbus had explored in the Caribbean became known as the West Indies.

The Search Continues • In 1513 Vasco Nunez de Balboa found a huge body of water which he named the South Sea. • On September 20, 1519 Ferdinand Magellan set out of Spain with five ships. • In November 1520 Magellan’s ships charted a passage that became known as the Strait of Magellan that emerged into Balboa’s South Sea • Magellan renamed it the Pacific-peaceful. Ocean. • Magellan sailed across the Pacific to the West Indies and ended up sailing for four months. • In 1512 the fleet reached the Philippines.

Search Continues • Only 1 ship and 18 sailors had completed the voyage. • On September 8, 1522 the survivors had reached Seville, they were the first people to circumnavigate the world. • In 1497 King Henry VII of England sent John Cabot to seek a more northerly route than the one Columbus had charted. • He found rich fishing land off of Newfoundland which he claimed for England. • French Captain Jacques Cartier explored the St, Lawrence River. • Henry Hudson who was sailing for the Dutch explored the Hudson River. • But neither of them had found a route to Asia but the search still continued for centuries.