HIST 190 Chapter 1: Chapter 1- A New World
Document Summary
Historians no longer use the word discovery to describe the europeans because the americas were already home to the natives. New crops, diets and people"s existence transformed the natural environment. People of both north and south america developed immunity to germs that accompanied the colonies. In africa, europeans found a supply of unfree labor that helped exploit fertile lands: about 7. 7 million people who came to the new world was african slaves. Europeans dreamt of a land of abundance, riches and ease beyond the western horizons. Americas were envisioned as a religious refuge, a society of equals, a source of power and glory. The residents of the americas were not from one place, they came with hundreds of languages and numerous types of societies: many descended from hunters and fishers that came across the land bridge 15,000- 60,000 years ago: history did not begin with the coming of europeans.
