Cortes & Colombus

At the beginning of the fifteenth century, the world was a quite small place for Europeans. While they knew about China and Southern Africa, their worldview was still focused on Europe and the Mediterranean. Within 200 years, Europe would be almost all over the world with settlement on various continents. By 1700, most of the coastline of the Americas would be under the domination of Europeans. Meanwhile, with the European conquest of the Nuvus Mondus -the New …

…discovered lands. These efforts eventually gave birth to the mercantilist system and, hence, capitalism. On the other hand, with the raw material obtained from these newly discovered lands, the economies of the European countries started to grow. To make up for the need of increased labor, Europeans engaged in a disgracing practice: slave trade. The age of exploration has illustrated the darker side of Europe, which foreshadowed the future concerns in the history of modernization.