European Exploration and Discovery

First European country to enter into direct trade with the Far East and establish colonies was:

• Spain
• France
• Britain
• Portugal

The Spanish empire in America was characterized by:

• the introduction of a manorial-like system, the encomienda
• a large creole class of higher-level colonial government officials
• the relatively large white population
• its enormous African slave population

Which of the following group benefited from the inflation of the sixteenth century?

• landowning nobility
• merchants
• peasants
• all of these groups benefited

Why did the English, Dutch, and French governments fail to begin colonization of the Americas and direct trade with the Orient until more than 100 years after Columbus discovered America?

• their geographical positions put them at a disadvantage for trans-oceanic movement
• the northern countries lacked suitable ships and the advanced technology to make long voyages
• domestic troubles and religious controversies delayed organized action
• Western European bankers refused to loan monarchs money for such ventures

Spain's expansion in the Americas was made particularly easy by:

• the absence of prior civilizations among the native peoples
• the impact of imported diseases on the Indian population
• Spain's leadership in European banking and commerce
• the belief that Europe had much to learn from the religions and customs of other peoples

The Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) granted Portugal the eastern trade route to the Indies and Brazil; lands to the west of Brazil were given to:

• England
• Italy
• Spain
• France

The technological innovations in maritime technology by the 1500s were important because?

• they made it cheaper to sail
• they increased the number of slaved needed to sail the ships
• they required literate sailors
• hey made it possible for Europeans to sail anywhere

By the 16th century the center of commercial activity had shifted from the Mediterranean to the:

• Atlantic Ocean
• Red Sea
• Indian Ocean
• Baltic Sea

Encomiendas in the Spanish New World were:

• local councils of aristocratics who assisted the viceroys
• grants permitting owners to take income or labor from land and its inhabitants
• special schools set up in the Franciscan missions to educate native Indian children
• elected colonial assemblies