The Age of European Exploration!
Growing power and wealth of both merchants and kings generated the means for the kings and their governments to pay the high costs of the increasingly essential voyages of exploration. These voyages were not only expensive, they were extremely difficult and very risky. But with great wealth and power as the possible payoff, the explorers and their royal financial backers had great motivation. And given the rivalries between the city-states of Europe, it became even more important to maintain a competitive edge. And competition drove progress.
What these merchants needed most to meet these growing demands was a more reliable set of trade routes to Asia. When Christopher Columbus set sail west across the Atlantic, he was convinced that he would find a shortcut to Asia. Columbus calculated that Japan was only about 3,000 miles from Europe. His miscalculations landed him instead in the West Indies, in the New World of North and South America. Columbus’s navigational blunder ushered in one of the most important periods in western history, an age of exploration marked by stunning discoveries, great conquests, and stirring feats of bravery. The European voyages of exploration in the 15th and 16th centuries forever changed the face of commerce, industry, culture, and society. But the European explorers who sought to claim the New World and its riches as their own also wrought tremendous destruction. Many of the native peoples of the Americas were exploited and killed by wars and disease, direct results of the European conquest.
Assignment
Listed below are 15 individuals who played an important role in world exploration in the 15th and 16th centuries. Choose one to research and answer the following questions.
1. Who is the person you have chosen?
2. What exactly did he accomplish — that is, why is this person important in history?
3. From your research, what interesting events happened in his life? Did these events contribute
in any way to the role he played in history?
4. Judge the person’s contribution to history. Were the things he did mainly good, mainly harmful, or a mixture? Explain your answer
1. Who is the person you have chosen?
2. What exactly did he accomplish — that is, why is this person important in history?
3. From your research, what interesting events happened in his life? Did these events contribute
in any way to the role he played in history?
4. Judge the person’s contribution to history. Were the things he did mainly good, mainly harmful, or a mixture? Explain your answer
Rubric 100pts:
- 50pts: Grammar and Spelling
- 50pts: 3 full sentence responses per question with all statements and opinions backed up by evidence from the research.
European Explorers
Christopher Columbus
Hernando Cortés
Jacques Cartier
Francisco Pizarro
Juan Ponce de Leon
Samuel de Champlain
Francisco Coronado
John Cabot
Henry Hudson
Vasco de Balboa
Pedro Cabral
Vasco da Gama
Ferdinand Magellan
Martin Frobisher
Henry the Navigator