Prepare Yourself:
|
|
1. Cahokia was the most complex Native American civilization to develop in North America. What role did geography play in the development of Cahokia and how did this allow for one city to influence so many other Mississippian communities as far away from Cahokia as 200 miles (southeast Missouri and northeast Arkansas are approx. that far away from Cahokia).
2. What was the situation like in Europe that allowed Columbus and other explorers from Europe to begin expanding and eventually reaching and settling the New World?
3. Explain how Cortez embodied the conquistador mantra of God, Gold, Glory.
2. What was the situation like in Europe that allowed Columbus and other explorers from Europe to begin expanding and eventually reaching and settling the New World?
3. Explain how Cortez embodied the conquistador mantra of God, Gold, Glory.
Unit Terms
- Paleo-Indians
- Maize
- Mesoamerica
- Aztecs
- The Mississippians
- Burial mounds
- Adena-Hopewell Culture
- Cahokia
- Algonquians
- The Renaissance
- Christopher Columbus
- Amerigo Vespucci
- Roman Catholicism
- Protestant Reformation
- Indulgences
- Martin Luther
- John Calvin
- Calvinism
- Protestants
- Church of England
- Conquistadores
- Hernan Cortes
- Tenochtitlan
- Montezuma
- Francisco Pizarro
- Juan Ponce de Leon
- Hernando de Soto
- Columbian Exchange
- Infectious diseases
- New France
- Roanoke Island
- Virginia Dare
- Croatoan
Primary Documents
Cortés Describes the Country
From Cortés, First Letter
This country, Most Potent Princes, where we now are in the name of Your Majesties, has fifty leagues (know what distance a league is) of coast on the one side and the other side of this town, the seacoast being low with many sand-hills, some of which are two leagues or more in length. The country beyond these sand-hills is level, with many fertile plains, in which are such beautiful river banks, that in all Spain there can be found no better; these are as grateful to the sight as they are productive in everything sown in them, and very orderly and well kept with walks, and facilities for grazing all kinds of animals. There is every kind of game in this country, and animals, and birds such as are familiar to us--deer, fallow deer, wolves, foxes, quails, doves, and pigeons, and two or three kinds of hares and rabbits,--so that there is no difference between this country and Spain as regards birds and animals; there are lions and tigers . . . .[Note, it is hard to determine what the Spaniards were calling lions and tigers since neither is native to Mexico]
[The letter then describes the physical geography of Mexico, specifically commenting on a mountain which the Spaniards believed was covered with snow, which seemed odd to them given the general climate in southern Mexico.]
The people who inhabit this country, from the Island of Cozumel, and the Cape of Yucatán to the place where we now are, are a people of middle size, with bodies and features well proportioned, except that in each province their customs differ, some piercing the ears, and putting large and ugly objects in them, and others piercing the nostrils down to the mouth, and putting in large round stones like mirrors, and others piercing their under lips down as far as their gums, and hanging from them large round stones, or pieces of gold, so weighty that they pull down the nether lip, and make it appear to be very deformed. The clothing which they wear is like long veils, very curiously worked. The men wear breechcloths about their bodies, and large mantles, very thin, and painted in the style of Moorish draperies. The women of the ordinary people wear, from their waists to their feet, clothes also very much painted, some covering their breasts and leaving the rest of the body uncovered. The superior women, however, wear very thin shirts of cotton, worked and made in the style of rochets. Their food is maize and grain, as in the other Islands, and potuyuca, as they eat it in the Island of Cuba, and they eat it broiled, since they do not make bread of it; they have their fishing, and hunting, and they roast many chickens, like those of the Tierra Firma, which are as large as peacocks. [These exceptionally large chickens were probably turkeys.]
There are some large towns well laid out, the houses being of stone, and mortar when they have it.
Everyday, before they undertake any work, they burn incense in the said mosques [temples] and sometimes they sacrifice their own persons, some hacking the body with knives; and they offer up to their idols all the blood which flows, sprinkling it on all sides of those mosques, at other times throwing it up towards the heavens, and practicing many other kinds of ceremonies, so that they undertake nothing without first offering sacrifice there.
They have another custom, horrible, and abominable, and deserving punishment, and which we have never before seen in any other place, and it is this, that, as often as they have anything to ask of their idols, in order that their petition may be more acceptable, they take many boys or girls, and even grown men and women, and in the presence of those idols they open their breasts, while they are alive, and take out the hearts and entrails, and burn the said entrails and hearts before the idols, offering that smoke in sacrifice to them. Some of us who have seen this say that it is the most terrible and frightful thing to behold that has ever been seen. So frequently, and so often do these Indians do this, according to our information, and partly by what we have seen in the short time we are in this country, that no year passes in which they do not kill and sacrifice fifty souls in each mosque; and this is practiced, and held as customary, from the Isle of Cozumel to the country in which we are now settled. Your Majesties may rest assured that, according to the size of the land, which to us seems very considerable, and the many mosques which they have, there is no year, as far as we have until now discovered and seen, when they do not kill and sacrifice in this manner some three or four thousand souls. Now let Your Royal Highnesses consider if they ought not to prevent so great an evil and crime, and certainly God, Our Lord, will be well pleased, if, through the command of Your Royal Highnesses, these peoples should be initiated and instructed in our Very Holy Catholic Faith . . . .
From Cortés, First Letter
This country, Most Potent Princes, where we now are in the name of Your Majesties, has fifty leagues (know what distance a league is) of coast on the one side and the other side of this town, the seacoast being low with many sand-hills, some of which are two leagues or more in length. The country beyond these sand-hills is level, with many fertile plains, in which are such beautiful river banks, that in all Spain there can be found no better; these are as grateful to the sight as they are productive in everything sown in them, and very orderly and well kept with walks, and facilities for grazing all kinds of animals. There is every kind of game in this country, and animals, and birds such as are familiar to us--deer, fallow deer, wolves, foxes, quails, doves, and pigeons, and two or three kinds of hares and rabbits,--so that there is no difference between this country and Spain as regards birds and animals; there are lions and tigers . . . .[Note, it is hard to determine what the Spaniards were calling lions and tigers since neither is native to Mexico]
[The letter then describes the physical geography of Mexico, specifically commenting on a mountain which the Spaniards believed was covered with snow, which seemed odd to them given the general climate in southern Mexico.]
The people who inhabit this country, from the Island of Cozumel, and the Cape of Yucatán to the place where we now are, are a people of middle size, with bodies and features well proportioned, except that in each province their customs differ, some piercing the ears, and putting large and ugly objects in them, and others piercing the nostrils down to the mouth, and putting in large round stones like mirrors, and others piercing their under lips down as far as their gums, and hanging from them large round stones, or pieces of gold, so weighty that they pull down the nether lip, and make it appear to be very deformed. The clothing which they wear is like long veils, very curiously worked. The men wear breechcloths about their bodies, and large mantles, very thin, and painted in the style of Moorish draperies. The women of the ordinary people wear, from their waists to their feet, clothes also very much painted, some covering their breasts and leaving the rest of the body uncovered. The superior women, however, wear very thin shirts of cotton, worked and made in the style of rochets. Their food is maize and grain, as in the other Islands, and potuyuca, as they eat it in the Island of Cuba, and they eat it broiled, since they do not make bread of it; they have their fishing, and hunting, and they roast many chickens, like those of the Tierra Firma, which are as large as peacocks. [These exceptionally large chickens were probably turkeys.]
There are some large towns well laid out, the houses being of stone, and mortar when they have it.
Everyday, before they undertake any work, they burn incense in the said mosques [temples] and sometimes they sacrifice their own persons, some hacking the body with knives; and they offer up to their idols all the blood which flows, sprinkling it on all sides of those mosques, at other times throwing it up towards the heavens, and practicing many other kinds of ceremonies, so that they undertake nothing without first offering sacrifice there.
They have another custom, horrible, and abominable, and deserving punishment, and which we have never before seen in any other place, and it is this, that, as often as they have anything to ask of their idols, in order that their petition may be more acceptable, they take many boys or girls, and even grown men and women, and in the presence of those idols they open their breasts, while they are alive, and take out the hearts and entrails, and burn the said entrails and hearts before the idols, offering that smoke in sacrifice to them. Some of us who have seen this say that it is the most terrible and frightful thing to behold that has ever been seen. So frequently, and so often do these Indians do this, according to our information, and partly by what we have seen in the short time we are in this country, that no year passes in which they do not kill and sacrifice fifty souls in each mosque; and this is practiced, and held as customary, from the Isle of Cozumel to the country in which we are now settled. Your Majesties may rest assured that, according to the size of the land, which to us seems very considerable, and the many mosques which they have, there is no year, as far as we have until now discovered and seen, when they do not kill and sacrifice in this manner some three or four thousand souls. Now let Your Royal Highnesses consider if they ought not to prevent so great an evil and crime, and certainly God, Our Lord, will be well pleased, if, through the command of Your Royal Highnesses, these peoples should be initiated and instructed in our Very Holy Catholic Faith . . . .