Native Americans Before European Explorations

Both the Spanish and Portuguese explorers were poor to understand the Native Americans of the New World, which led to their inhumane treatment and poor consideration. Portugal was the leading country in the European exploration of the world in the 15th century. The Spanish, desperate not to fall behind in the race for new goods, immediately hired Italian explorer Christopher Columbus to lead the expedition. Both Portugal and Spain, upon seeing the natives of the land they discovered, immediately thought them as “savages” and “barbarians” that had no sense of social class. Spain’s first expedition was with Columbus. Columbus, trying to find a way to sail west to India and China, accidentally discovered lands such as present-day Cuba and The Bahamas near the Americas. After bringing new goods such as avocado, squash, corn, and tropical fruits, monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella were pleased that new land was found, and Christian missionaries hoped to spread Christianity to the New World. The monarchs also were content in realizing …show more content…
He decided to lead a small group of men, no more than 600, to Mexico in Central America, where he discovered the Aztec nation. The Aztecs were a strong, large nation with advanced technologies and a powerful military base. During the first battle between the Conquistadors(Cortez and his men) and the Aztecs, the conquistadors lost. They were only able to conquer the nation through giving the Aztecs the disease smallpox, which they were not immune to. He then conquered the nation, taking the goods of Mexico, such as silver, and treating the Aztecs as slaves. The conquistadors did not colonize in the land they conquered, they only took as many goods as possible before moving to the next piece of land. It was only until the the 1570s when they then thought of stopping the military conquests and colonizing in their