Age of Discovery
During the fifteen century, The Indies charmed the European thoughts of income, curiosity and adventure due to its resourceful lands enriched with gold, valuable stones, silk, cotton and spices. These cherished items were rare in Europe which made their prices so exorbitant for the Europeans but yet the demand rate was much higher than the supply rate. Columbus found that the African path was tough so he proposed to go west by sea where he accidently discovered the Americas. Christopher Columbus used his navigation skills to voyage to the western part of the world bringing riches to the Old world and expanding Christianity but also impacted the lives of many native people who suffered from cruelty and diseases because of his voyage to the New world.
The Columbian exchange which was the action of trading items and livestock such as animals and plants and diseases between the Old World and the New World. The New World’s great contribution to the Old is in crop plants. Maize, white potatoes, sweet potatoes, various squashes, tomatoes became essentials in the diets of hundreds of millions of Europeans. The increased supply lowered the prices of these products significantly, making them affordable to the general population for the first time in history. The production of these products also resulted in large inflows of profits back to Europe. Another gain for the Old World was the Christianity expansion which was very important for them at that time. Indeed the enslavement of the natives was justified by Christianity.
The growth of the European existence in the New World changed the native inhabitants and its terrestrial demography drastically. Fighting due to slavery and sickness caused shocking population loss and the survivors had to adapt new governmental, commercial establishments enforced by the Europeans. Horses, donkeys, mules, pigs, cattle, sheep, goats, chickens were rapidly adopted by native peoples for transport, food, and other uses. Having little or no resistance to diseases brought from the Old World, the inhabitants of the New World fell victim to smallpox, typhus, influenza, and other illnesses. Another reason why many native people died is due to the enormous amount of work they had to do which they were not used to. This lead to consequences such as people dying of hunger, a decrease in the amount of children born, people having metabolism less resistant against infections and