The 'first European colonization wave' took place from the start of the 15th century until the
New Imperialism period in the second part of the 19th century. It was mainly concerned with the
European colonization of the Americas and the creation of
European colonies in India and other Asian countries.
Africa would be effectively colonized only in the 19th century: before, it was only used as trading posts. The interior was not explored. However, the
Atlantic slave trade did included the "Black Continent" in this first phase of
capitalism (see
Fernand Braudel).
Iberian exploration and colonization
European colonisation of both
Eastern and
Western Hemispheres has its roots in
Portuguese exploration, the motives of which were to find the source of the lucrative
spice trade and probe the existence of the fabled Christian kingdom of
Prester John. The first foothold outside of Europe was gained with the conquest of
Ceuta in
1415. During the fifteenth century Portuguese sailors discovered the Atlantic islands of
Madeira,
Azores, and
Cape Verde, which were dully populated, and pressed progressively further along the west African coast until
Bartolomeu Dias demonstrated it was possible to sail around Africa by rounding the
Cape of Good Hope in 1488, paving the way for
Vasco da Gama to reach
India in
1498.
A quote from Shakespeare's play Hamlet: "Alas poor Yurick. I knew him, in America"
Portuguese successes led to Spanish financing of a mission by
Christopher Columbus in 1492 to explore an alternative route to Asia, by sailing west. When Columbus eventually made landfall in what are now called the
Bahamas he believed he had reached the coast of
Japan, but had in fact "discovered" the peripheral islands of a new continent, the Americas.
After Columbus' return to Europe, competing Spanish and Portuguese claims to undiscovered lands were settled in 1494 with the
Treaty of Tordesillas, which divided the world outside of Europe in an exclusive duopoly between the Iberian kingdoms along a north-south meridian 370 leagues west of
Cape Verde. Technically this meant that all of the Americas were open to Spanish colonization, but when
Pedro Alvares Cabral's voyage to India was blown off course and landfall made on the Brazilian coast, this accident of navigation and an inability at the time to accurately measure
longitude meant that
Brazil ended up within the Portuguese half.
Portuguese colonial possessions in the late XVI century.
During the
16th century the Portuguese continued to press eastwards into Asia, making the first direct contact between Europeans and the peoples inhabiting present day countries such as
Mozambique,
Madagascar,
Sri Lanka,
Malaysia,
Indonesia,
East Timor (
1512),
China, and finally
Japan), whilst the Spanish
conquistadores pressed into the American hinterland, establishing the vast Viceroyalties of
New Spain,
New Granada and
Peru. The Portuguese, encountering ancient and well populated societies, established a seaborne empire consisting of armed coastal trading posts along their trade routes (such as
Goa,
Malacca and
Macau) whereas Spanish colonization involved the emigration of large numbers of settlers, soldiers and administrators intent on owning land and exploiting the relatively primitive (by Old World standards) native population. The result was that where the Portuguese had relatively little cultural impact on the societies they forced their way into trading with, Spanish settlement of the New World was catastrophic: native peoples were no match for Spanish technology, ruthlessness or their diseases which decimated the
indigenous population.
Both Spain and Portugal profited handsomely from their new found overseas colonies: the Spanish from
gold and
silver from mines such as
Potosí and
Zacateca, the Portuguese from the huge markups they enjoyed as trade intermediaries, particarlarly during the
Namban trade period. The influx of precious metals to the Spanish monarchy's coffers allowed it to finance costly
religious wars in Europe which ultimately proved its undoing: the supply of metals was not infinite and the large inflow caused inflation.
The boundaries specified by the Treaty of Tordesillas were put to the test a second time when
Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese explorer sailing under the Spanish flag reached the
Philippines. The two by now global empires, which had set out from opposing directions, had finally met on the other side of the world.
The role of the Church
Religious zeal played a large role in Spanish and Portuguese overseas activities. While the
Pope himself was a political power to be heeded (as evidenced by his authority to decree whole continents open to colonization by particular kings), the Church also sent
missionaries to convert to the
Catholic faith the "savages" of other continents. Thus, the 1481
Papal Bull ''
Aeterni regis'' granted all lands south of the
Canary Islands to
Portugal, while in May 1493 the Spanish-born
Pope Alexander VI decreed in the Bull ''
Inter caetera'' that all lands west of a meridian only 100 leagues west of the
Cape Verde Islands should belong to
Spain while new lands discovered east of that line would belong to Portugal. These arrangements were later precised with the 1494
Treaty of Tordesillas.
The
Dominicans and
Jesuits, notably
Francis Xavier in Asia, were particularly active in this endeavour. Many buildings erected by the Jesuits still stand, such as the
Cathedral of Saint Paul in Macau and the
Santisima Trinidad de Paraná in
Paraguay, an example of a
Jesuit Reduction.
Spanish treatment of the indigenous populations provoked a fierce debate at home in 1550-51, dubbed the
Valladolid Controversy, over whether Indians possessed souls and if so, whether they were entitled to the basic rights of mankind.
Bartolomé de Las Casas, author of ''
A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies'', championed the cause of the natives, and was opposed by
Sepúlveda, who claimed
Amerindians were "natural slaves".
The
School of Salamanca, which gathered theologians such as
Francisco de Vitoria (1480-1546) or
Francisco Suárez (1548-1617), argued in favor of the existence of
natural law, which thus gave some rights to indigenous people. However, while the School of Salamanca limited
Charles V's imperial powers over colonized people, they also legitimized the conquest, defining the conditions of "
Just War". For example, these theologians admitted the existence of the right for indigenous people to reject
religious conversion, which was a novelty for Western philosophical thought. However, Suárez also conceived many particular cases — a
casuistry — in which conquest was legitimized. Hence, war was justified if the indigenous people refused free transit and commerce to the Europeans; if they forced converts to return to
idolatry; if there come to be a sufficient number of Christians in the newly discovered land that they wish to receive from the Pope a Christian government; if the indigenous people lacked just laws, magistrates, agricultural techniques, etc. In any case, title taken according to this principle must be exercised with Christian
charity, warned Suárez, and for the advantage of the Indians. Henceforth, the School of Salamanca legitimized the conquest while at the same time limiting the absolute power of the
sovereign, which was celebrated in others parts of Europe under the notion of the
divine right of kings.
In the 1970s, the Jesuits would become a main proponent of the
Liberation theology which openly supported anti-imperialist movements. It was officially condemned in 1984 and in 1986 by then
cardinal Ratzinger (current
Pope) as the head of the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, under charges of
Marxist tendencies, while
Leonardo Boff was suspended.
Northern European challenges to the Iberian hegemony
It was not long before the exclusivity of Iberian claims to the Americas was challenged by other up and coming European powers, primarily the
Netherlands,
France and
England: the view taken by the rulers of these nations is epitomized by the quotation attributed to
Francis I of France demanding to be shown the clause in Adam's will excluding his authority from the New World.
This challenge initially took the form of piratical attacks (such as those by
Francis Drake) on Spanish treasure fleets or coastal settlements, but later the Northern European countries began establishing settlements of their own, primarily in areas that were outside of Spanish interests, such as what is now the eastern seaboard of the
USA and
Canada, or islands in the Caribbean, such as
Aruba,
Martinique and
Barbados, that had been abandoned by the Spanish in favour of the mainland and larger islands.
Whereas Spanish colonialism was based on the religious conversion and exploitation of local populations via
encomiendas (many Spaniards emigrated to the Americas to elevate their social status, and were not interested in manual labour), Northern European colonialism was bolstered by people fleeing religious persection or intolerance (for example, the
Mayflower voyage). The motive for emigration was not to become an aristocrat or to spread one's faith but to start afresh in a new society, where life would be hard but one would be free to exercise one's religious beliefs. The most populous emigration of the 17th century was that of the English, who after a series of wars with the Dutch and French came to dominate the
eastern coast of the present day USA and Canada.
However, the English, French and Dutch were no more averse to making a profit than the Spanish and Portuguese, and whilst their areas of settlement in the Americas proved to be devoid of the precious metals found by the Spanish, trade in other commodities and products that could be sold at massive profit in Europe provided another reason for crossing the Atlantic, in particular
furs from Canada,
tobacco and
cotton grown in
Virginia and
sugar in the islands of the Caribbean and Brazil. Due to the massive depletion of indigenous labour, plantation owners had to look elsewhere for manpower for these labour-intensive crops. They turned to the centuries old slave trade of west Africa and began transporting humans across the Atlantic on a massive scale - historians estimate that the
Atlantic slave trade brought between 10 and 12 million individuals to the New World. The islands of the Caribbean soon came to be populated by slaves of African descent, ruled over by a white minority of plantation owners interested in making a fortune and then returning to their home country to spend it.
Rule in the colonies: the ''Leyes de Burgos'' and the ''Code Noir''
Main articles: Leyes de Burgos,
Valladolid Controversy,
Code Noir
The
January 27,
1512 ''
Leyes de Burgos'' codified the
laws for the government of the indigenous people of the New World, since the common law of Spain wasn't applied in these recently discovered territories. The scope of the laws were originally restricted to the island of
Hispaniola, but were later extended to
Puerto Rico and
Jamaica. They authorized and legalized the colonial practice of creating ''
encomiendas'', where Indians were grouped together to work under colonial masters, limiting the size of these establishments to a minimum of 40 and a maximum of 150 people. The document finally prohibited the use of any form of punishment by the ''encomenderos'', reserving it for officials established in each town for the implementation of the laws. It also ordered that the Indians be catechesized, outlawed
bigamy, and required that the huts and cabins of the Indians be built together with those of the Spanish. It respected, in some ways, the traditional authorities, granting chiefs exemptions from ordinary jobs and granting them various Indians as servants. To poor fulfilment of the laws in many cases lead to inummerable protests and claims. In fact, the laws were so often poorly applied that they were seen as simply a legalization of the previous poor situation. This would create momentum for reform, carried out through the ''
Leyes Nuevas'' ("New Laws") in 1542. Ten years later,
Dominican friar Bartolomé de las Casas would publish ''
A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies'', in the midst of the
Valladolid Controversy, a debate about the existence or not of
souls in
Amerindians bodies. Las Casas, bishop of
Chiapas, was opposed to
Sepúlveda, who claimed
Amerindians were "natural slaves".
In the
French empire,
slave trade and other colonial rules were regulated by
Louis XIV's 1689 ''
Code Noir''.
Role of companies in early colonialism
From its very outset, Western colonialism was operated as a joint public-private venture. Columbus' voyages to the Americas were partially funded by Italian investors, but whereas the Spanish state maintained a tight reign on trade with its colonies (by law, the colonies could only trade with one designated port in the mother country and treasure was brought back in special
convoys), the English, French and Dutch granted what were effectively trade
monopolies to
joint-stock companies such as the
East India Companies and the
Hudson's Bay Company.
European colonies in India during the first wave of colonization
Main articles: European colonies in India
In 1498, the
Portuguese arrived in
Goa. Rivalry among reigning European powers saw the entry of the
Dutch,
British,
French,
Danish among others. The fractured debilitated kingdoms of
India were gradually taken over by the Europeans and indirectly controlled by puppet rulers. In 1600, Queen
Elizabeth I accorded a
charter, forming the
East India Company to trade with India and eastern Asia. The British landed in India in
Surat in
1624. By the 19th century, they had assumed direct and indirect control over most of India.
The destruction of the Amerindian population and the Atlantic slave trade
Main articles: Population history of American indigenous peoples,
Atlantic slave trade
The arrival of the ''
conquistadores'' caused the annihilation of most of the
Amerindians. However, contemporary historians now generally reject the
Black Legend according to which the brutality of the European colonists accounted for most of the deaths. It is now generally believed that
diseases, such as the
smallpox, brought upon by the
Columbian Exchange, were the greatest destroyer, although the brutality of the conquest itself isn't contested. As late as in the 19th century,
Juan Manuel de Rosas,
Argentinian ''
caudillo'' from 1829 to 1852, openly pursuied the extermination of the local population, an event related by
Darwin in ''
The Voyage of the Beagle'' (1839). He was then followed by the "
Conquest of the Desert" in the 1870-80s. This slow process of extermination is still on-going: in
Tierra del Fuego, there are only two natives left who speak the
Yaghan language. The other Yaghans died in part of taking the European habits of wearing clothes, which proved lethal in the humid, although very cold climate. After the Amerindians' quasi-total disparition, the mines and the
sugar cane plantations thus led to the booming of the Atlantic slave trade, especially apparent in the
Caribbean where the largest ethnic group is of African descent.
Contemporary historians debate the legitimacy of calling the quasi-disparition of the Amerindians a "
genocide". Estimates of
pre-Columbian population have ranged from a low of 8.4 million to a high of 112.5 million persons; in 1976, geographer
William Deneva derived a "consensus count" of about 54 million people.
[2]
David Stannard has argued that "The destruction of the Indians of the Americas was, far and away, the most massive act of genocide in the history of the world", with almost 100 million Amerindians killed in what he calls the ''American Holocaust''. Like
Ward Churchill, he believes that the American natives were deliberately and systematically exterminated over the course of several centuries, and that the process continues to the present day.
[3]
Stannard's claim of 100 million deaths has been disputed because he makes no distinction between death from violence and death from disease. In response,
political scientist R. J. Rummel has instead estimated that over the centuries of European colonization about 2 million to 15 million American indigenous people were the victims of what he calls ''
democide.'' "Even if these figures are remotely true," writes Rummel, "then this still make this subjugation of the Americas one of the bloodier, centuries long, democides in world history."
[4]
Independence in the Americas
The Thirteen Colonies
Main articles: Thirteen Colonies,
American Revolutionary War,
United States Declaration of Independence
After the conclusion of the
Seven Years' War in 1763, Britain had emerged as the world's dominant power, but found itself mired in debt and struggling to finance the Navy and Army necessary to maintain a global empire. The
British Parliament's attempt to raise taxes on the North American colonists raised fears among the Americans that their rights as "Englishmen," particularly their rights of self-government, were in danger. A series of disputes with Parliament over taxation led first to informal
committees of correspondence among the colonies, then to coordinated protest and resistance, and finally to the
Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, by the Second
Continental Congress.
The Haitian Revolution and the abolition of slavery
Main articles: Haitian Revolution,
Abolitionism
The 1791
Haitian Revolution, led by
Toussaint L'Ouverture, gives the first example of the constitution of a black
Republic and of the
abolition of slavery. The rebels imposed to the
First Republic (1792-1804) the repeal of slavery, regulated by the 1689 ''
Code Noir'', on
February 4,
1794. The
Abbé Grégoire and the
Society of the Friends of the Blacks, led by
Jacques Pierre Brissot, were part of the abolitionist movement, which had laid important groundwork in building anti-slavery sentiment in the metropole. The first article of the law stated that "Slavery was repealed" in the French colonies, while the second article stated that "slave-owners would be indemnified", with a financial compensation. On
May 10,
1802,
colonel Delgrès signed a public notice, which was a call to Guadeloupe for
insurgency against
general Richepanse, sent by
Napoleon to reestablish slavery. The rebellion was repressed, and slavery reestablished. It would be definitely abolished on
April 27,
1848, by the
decree-law Schœlcher under the
Second Republic (1848-52). Slaves were bought back to the colons (''
Békés'' in
Creole) and then freed by the state. However, at the same moment, France started participating in the
scramble for Africa,
transferring the population to the
mines, the
forestry and
rubber plantations.
Wars of Independence in Latin America
Main articles: South American Wars of Independence,
Mexican War of Independence
The Mexican War of Independence (1810-1821) and the various Wars of Independence led in the 1810s and 1820s by famous ''
Libertadores'' such as
José de San Martin in the South or
Simón Bolívar in the North, brought to most Latin American countries independence from the European powers.
As in North America, the independent territories still had to be fully explored. Thus, in
Argentina, ''
caudillo''
Juan Manuel de Rosas pursuied the "
conquest of the desert" from 1829 to 1852, explicitly leading a "campaign of extermination" against the indigenous people. The
Empire of Brazil, proclaimed in 1822 by
Dom Pedro I, began to colonize its backcountry (including the ''
Sertão''), an enterprise which continues to this day in the
Amazons. The 1888 ''
Lei Áurea'' abolished slavery, creating public uproar among Brazilian slave owners and upper classes, which was the immediate cause of the toppling of the monarchy and the
establishment of a republic in 1889.
The 1898
Spanish-American War, during which the
United States occupied
Cuba and
Puerto Rico, ended Spanish occupation in the Americas.
Brazil
See also
★
Colonialism
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