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A Splendid Exchange Summary

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One expert is Cory Malone. He is a sophomore at Gettysburg College and according to him, the Columbian Exchange refers to period of cultural and biological exchanges between the New and Old Worlds. According to the editorial team on Shmoop, the Columbian Exchange is a phrase that describes the interchange of plants, animals, and diseases between the Old World and the Americas following Columbus’s arrival in the Caribbean in 1492. According to the site Wikipedia, the Columbian Exchange or Grand Exchange was the widespread transfer of animals, plants, culture, human populations, technology and ideas between the American and Afro- Eurasian. William J. Bernstein is the author of the book A splendid Exchange. William says that the exchange shaped …show more content…

When Columbus came from Spain and took a trip heading for the Americas, he brought over horses, rats, and pigs. With the Spanish bring over the horses it impacted the New World by them becoming very important in battles. In battles it gave the Spanish an advantage because they sat high above the ground, they could move very fast and the horses terrified the natives of the land. The horses also impacted the Spanish when they were in the new world because the horses are an important way to carry information for the explorers. The horses eventually multiplied so much that there started to be wild horses running around the Americas. The pigs impacted the explorers in the new world by giving them meat to eat. Pigs were the main meat source because they can adapt easily and they reproduced many offspring. The cattle were important because they were the main export from the New World. They were killed for meat and their hides. The colonists killed the cattle and sent the hides back to the Old World so they could make money. The rats, especially the black rat, came across to the New World by accident. They would come across the colonial ports and stowaway on ships. The rats carried a disease that plagued the colonists. The disease is called Bubonic Plague and Typhus. This plague affected the Natives in America because the plague killed off the animals that the natives depended on for living. All these animals impacted the New World in a negative way because they grazed so much that the colonists needed to move them to a place with a lot of

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