Jamestown Culture Conflict Essay

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Throughout unit one we learned about the conflicts the English settlers faced as they came and settled in the new land. The first group of settlers knew very little about their voyage or what to expect when they arrived. The settlers had to deal conflict within their selves, the natives, the land, and the other settlers. Through the European pursuit to the new land they encountered a tremendous amount of conflict that lead to the loss of many men, leaving others fearful and confused, and causing conflict between the earlier settlers. It is hard to prepare for a trip when you know little about what is about to take place, but that is exactly what the English settlers did. We learned that the settlers established the colony of Jamestown with …show more content…

When the Europeans began settling in the new land many cultural differences began to arise. Consequently, this left the English settlers and the natives with fear and confusion. The natives of the new land had never seen anything like the Europeans; they had white skin, huge ships, dressed differently, and they had many different weapons. Christopher Columbus in his narrative, Report of the First Voyage, described them as “timid beyond cure” (“Report of the First Voyage” 18). He also stated that when he would men ashore to contact the natives “people without number have come to them, and as soon as they saw them coming, they fled; even a father would not stay for his son” (“Report of the First Voyage” 18). Christopher Columbus comes from a place with Kings and Queens and they pray to a God, so coming to a land that does not have either is weird and unheard of . “And they know neither sect nor idolatry, with the exception that all believe that the source of all power and goodness is in the sky, and they believe very firmly that I, with these ships and people, came from the sky…” (“Report of the First Voyage” 19). Columbus recognized that the natives were not ignorant, because they had many other well developed skills, they just had never seen anything like the settlers