The Iroquois: Indirect Discoverers Of The New World

• The Iroquois

• Hiawatha was a famous leader that inspired the Iroquois, which was the closest civilization to the nation-states of Mexico and Peru

• The Iroquois Confederacy had a military alliance that was threatening to other societies due to their political and organizational skills

• In agricultural groups that were more developed women managed the crops, while men hunted, fished, collected fuel, and cleared fields to plant

• Women had a lot of power and in groups like the Iroquois authority and possessions were given to the females of the family

• Europeans had the technology to change the land, which Native Americans lacked

• Native Americans respected nature and gave it spiritual properties, but they did have forest fires to create

1000 in a place with many wild grapes, so they named the area Vinland, which is known as Newfoundland today

• They were not supported by a powerful nation-state, so they had to leave their settlements and their discovery was lost with only Scandinavian sagas and songs giving them credit

• Christian crusaders tried to take over the Holy Land that the Muslims were controlling

• Exotic goods were brought over to Europe such as silk, drugs, perfumes, colorful draperies, and spices including sugar, which was rare o These were expensive in Europe, since they had to be shipped from the Spice Islands, which was Indonesia, China, and India through ships and camels o Europeans wanted to find a cheaper route to Asia or create other sources of supply o Europeans Enter Africa

• Marco Polo, who was an Italian that is considered a discoverer of the New World, told stories about his travels in China when he came back to Europe in 1295

• He wrote a book that included details of pearl and pagodas, which created more European interest in finding a less expensive way to the East

• Portuguese mariners overcame the issue of northerly winds and south-flowing currents around the coast of West Africa that the Europeans would not

• The Slave Trade was already occurring where Arab merchants and even Africans traded them o Slaves from father away were more expensive because they could not run back to their native tribes or be rescued o Slaves were mixed so they could not resist o African cultures and tribal identities were lost

• Arab and African practices were learned by the Portuguese that had slaves work on sugar plantations

• The plantation economy with commercial agriculture and slave labor formed the New World

• The Portuguese still looked for a water route to Asia

• In 1488 Bartholomeu Dias came to the southernmost top of the “Dark Continent”

• Vasco da Gama reached India and came back with jewels and spices

• They controlled the African coast and water route to India

• Spain united from the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella and removal of Muslim Moors after so much Christian-Islamic warfare o Columbus Comes upon a New World

• Scientific knowledge was shared by printing presses formed around 1450

• The mariner’s compass helped with the direction of the sea and might have been taken from the Arabs

• Christopher Columbus was an Italian that convinced Spanish monarchs to give him ships and a crew to sail