Gold and World History: Glittering Motivation for Exploration, Invasion and Development

Gold and silver brought the great wealth of European nations as well as the enslavement of the African people. This is demonstrated in an excerpt from a letter written in 1559 by Michele Soriano he states, “...great quantities of gold and silver are no longer found upon the surface of the earth, as they have been in past years; and to penetrate into the bowels of the earth requires greater effort… the Spaniards are not willing to do the work themselves, and the natives cannot be forced to do so… it is necessary to acquire negro slaves [enslaved Africans], who are brought from the coasts of Africa”. Spain’s interactions with its colonies in the Americas were frequent, therefore resources such as gold and silver began to reduce, this is why they had to dig deeper into the earth. Therefore it was essential for Europe to get laborers to work in the mines colonies because Spaniards were unwilling to do the work and the Native Americans were unable to do work due to the Emperors freed them. Michele Soriano also writes, “The fifth part of all that is produced goes to the king, but since the gold and silver is brought to Spain and he has a tenth part of that which goes to the mint…

Did you know that the Age of Exploration was one the most important time in history for the world. The Age of Exploration began in the early 1500’s in the nation of Portugal under leadership of Henry the Navigator. The first expedition to circle the globe was led by the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan. The causes of the Age of Exploration was to look for new trade routes and spread religion. The effects of the Age of Exploration were slavery and disease.

Columbus noticed that some of these Indians had little golden ornaments in their noses and ears, This made him take some of the Arawak Indians that they help prisoner onto the ship and insisted they guide him to where they were the source of the gold was, this had lead him to sail to what is now Cuba then to Hispaniola.# There bits of gold were visible in the rivers. Columbus and his crew built a fort and left thirty-nine crew members there to collect gold and store all they would find.

Christopher Columbus and Alvez Nunez Cabeza de Vaca were both explorers for Spain, but under different rulers and different times. The more famous, Christopher Columbus, came before de Vaca’s time. Columbus sailed a series of four voyages between 1492 and 1504 in search for a route to Asia which led accidentally to his discovery of new land inhabited with Indians. Christopher sailed under the Spanish monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella for his journey to the “Indies,” whom he was loyal to by claiming everything in their name. De Vaca , followed in Christopher’s footsteps and journeyed to Hispanionola for Spain’s emperor, Charlves V, the grandson of Ferdinand and Isabella. Both, Columbus and de Vaca composed a series of letters addressing the

The accumulation of wealth for individuals as well as nations, propelled European Exploration. For instance, Hernando Cortes travelled to Central America with a key motivation of obtaining gold. This can be exemplified in The Dispatches of Hernando Cortes to Emperor Charles V, 1519-1521, “‘I and my companions suffer from a disease of the heart which can only

The Europeans main goal revolved around the stability of power of the Spanish Crown. The Spanish Crown was focused on expanding their military so they needed resources such as gold to pay for the constantly increasing military budget. Columbus used this idea to help get resources such as, boats, men, food and weapons from the Spanish Crown. This is important because it describes the desperate need of gold that the Spaniards had which ultimately led to the gruesome acts they committed.

Gold & Silver: Gold and silver was the main reason of oversees exploitation and conquests for the money it provided for the Spanish empire. Brutal and violent acts were done to possess the metals. France, England, and Dutch also got the goods by stealing from Spain.

The first Spanish conquistadors’ motive that greatly affected the people living in the new world was the search for gold. You can see that this was a big motive by looking in documents two and three. In document two it talks about how Cortez got lots of money for going to the new world and he promised gold and Indian slaves to people going with him. This document shows how Cortez promised something valuable as gold to motivate people to accompany

Not only did the Gold Rush create a prosperous mining climate, it also indirectly lead to an even more booming agrarian economy; that in 1869 surpassed mining in employment and then later in 1879 became the leading element to the California economy10. By the late 1870’s, there was nearly 600,000 thousand people living in the Golden State11. In order to feed so many mouths so quick, many people that could not make it as a miner or in the now blooming cities decided to settle on plots of land and become farmers. Most preferred the farming lifestyle opposed to a miner’s life because it was safer. In addition, due to California’s vast natural resources, fertile abundant land and great weather, growing food and raising livestock was easy compared to the eastern United States and other parts of the world. The Gold Rush also permitted the cattle industry to once again flourish in the west as a cattle boom from the north was guided to California for sale to the

As the global flow of silver continues, societies started to change from their past ideals into societies that centered on commerce, impacting people’s lives greatly as seen in Documents 1, 3, 5, and 6. Document 1 is written by Ye Chunji, a Chinese county official during the Ming dynasty. In order to lower wedding expenses, he explains how necessary it is to conserve

Christopher Columbus is known for being an explorer and is said to have made one of the most important voyages in world history without even wanting to. Something else that is also believed is that he “opened up” the Americas to European nations, which changed the course of American history. Before he went on his voyage though, he was in need of resources. So he asked Portugal, France, Italy among many other countries but they all denied Columbus and thought his statement was incorrect. Columbus’ statement was that he had found a faster way to get to Asia than the Portuguese had, which was going around the continent of Africa. Columbus lived a majority of his life in Spain, so when it came to setting sail for the west, Spain was one of the first nations he asked for funding. Though it took Columbus a little more than a few years to convince a nation to fund his voyage, Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand from Spain subsequently granted to endow him in 1492. He would then leave for “Asia” on August 3, 1492. There are many unanswered questions and thoughts on why Spain decided to finally fund Columbus’ voyage, especially since he was an explorer that was born in Italy.

The Age of Exploration was a time period that has had significant influences in the modern world. It was the moment in which Europe was brought out of the Dark Ages and into an era of discovery. The risks taken within the 15th and 18th century allowed both positive and negative outcomes to be introduced to the European Exploration. There were many motives for this era, and many outcomes came about. However, they were both negative and positive. To summarize the motives of this age, a simple combination can be stated. The main purposes of the Age of Exploration was God, Gold, and Glory.

Hence, The Spanish explorations were most notably able to occur due to the King and Queen’s efforts to unify the Spanish nation and the growing competition between the unified Spain and its neighboring country, Portugal (Nardo, 1947). The King and Queen did many other things to improve and fund exploration in Spain, and perhaps the most significant thing they did was sponsor Christopher Columbus after he proposed an exploration to India, guaranteeing that he could discover and establish valuable trade routes from India to Eastern Asia (Nardo, 1947). The King and Queen agreed to sponsor him because Spain often sought out trade opportunities and wanted to find gold and valuable spices from Asia, specifically from India, and this exploration almost guaranteed all of that (Nardo, 1947). Therefore, the reasons for Spanish exploration include the desire to establish trade routes between India and Eastern Asia, to find valuable resources, the empire’s competition with Portugal, and the King and Queen’s unification of their kingdoms and sponsorship of Christopher

We know that many colonizers sought gold because possession of gold could give them the power to rule their colonies. We know that in some cases, “Whenever enough gold was found, the outsiders erected towns. The rest of the country was left to its original inhabitants, and the outraged Indians fought where they could to recover some portion of what they had lost.” (Damiana da Cunha, pg. 103) Gold could mean the difference between a full-on war with the outsiders and being left alone for the most part.

I will discuss how the Gold Rush, more than any other single event, impacted the social, economic, and political nature of the West Coast and the United States. I will break down the social, economic, and political ramifications of the Gold Rush on (a) the region, and (b) the United States as a whole.