well hey there and welcome back to Himler's History now in the last video we talked about all the different peoples that lived in the Americas before the Europeans arrived and in this video all those people about to meet white so if you're ready to get them brain cows milked I stand at the ready to milk them let's get to it so basically in this video we're going to talk about why European states started exploring the Americans and we'll talk about what happened when they finally did so why do the Europeans want to go exploring anyway well for one the population was starting to rebound after the devastation of the black plague also individual European states were experiencing a political unification which resulted in centralized governments led by powerful monarchs and agricultural and commercial profits gave rise to a wealthy upper class that wanted to scratch their itch for luxury goods imported from Asia and it was that last one that really created the impulse for exploration and since you're all good students of world history I assume what you're thinking is well why didn't they just utilize all the existing land-based trading routes that stretched across all of Afroureurasia excellent question during the 14th and 15th centuries those land-based trade routes were largely controlled by Muslims and therefore Europeans were unable to establish an exchange of goods with Asia on their own terms so that made the Europeans want to find a water-based route to Asia so that they could get their trade-off and the first major player in this respect was Portugal our buddy Prince Henry the Navigator decided to attempt to find a passage to Asia via the Atlantic Ocean but not by sailing out into the ocean he just wanted to go around Africa and that's exactly what his fleet did portugal established what's known as a trading post empire all along the African coast and eventually found their way to dominance in the lucrative Indian Ocean trade and they were able to do this because they harnessed maritime technology in new ways for example they made use of trading ships called caravl which were nimble and dedicated only to trade as opposed to war they also used updated maritime charts and astronomical tables to help with planning their routes they improved their navigation with borrowed technology like the astrolab and the stern post rudder in lay terms they made good boat and sailed real good but seeing how profitable Portugal's trade was becoming Spain wanted a piece of that juicy economic pie too so the monarchs of Spain Isabella and Ferdinand after having united Spain under the Catholic Christian banner and after the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslims got in the game as well but with an additional motive spreading Christianity and after they had established trading posts in Africa and India and Asia a scrappy Italian sailor by the name of Christopher Columbus came to Ferdinand and Isabella seeking a sponsorship to try to find a route to Asia by sailing west oh and obviously he wanted to prove that the earth was round because that definitely wasn't an established fact for like 1,700 years since the ancient Greeks anyway Ferdinand and Isabella thought this was a pretty good idea since Portugal basically controlled the African routes and the Italian citystates controlled the Mediterranean routes and so in 1492 Columbus set sail west across the Atlantic and a few months later he ran into a continent that nobody knew was there except for the Vikings anyway Columbus landed in what he thought was the East Indies but what was actually the Caribbean specifically the island of San Salvador and because he thought that this was the Indies he called the inhabitants Indians now those inhabitants were hospitable to Columbus and his crew and they helped the Spaniards explore the islands but they made the huge mistake of wearing gold jewelry because when Columbus saw that he was like they rich so long story short Columbus sailed back to Spain with samples of all this gold jewelry and a few of the natives whom he had enslaved and informed everyone that there was more for the taking and so more Spaniards set out to explore the Caribbean and South America and I'll tell you more about that in another video now it had become clear within about a decade that Columbus had not in fact discovered a sea-based route to Asia but that was neither here nor there because when Columbus set foot on San Salvador it set off a process that would change the world in drastic ways in something that became known as the Columbian Exchange but we'll have to wait for that story in the next video all right that's what you need to know about unit one topic three of AP US history if you think I make good video like the Portuguese make good boat then go ahead and subscribe and I'll keep making videos for you if you need help getting an A in your class and a five on your exam in May then grab my review packet right here and all your dreams will come true i am Laura