Causes and Motivations
A main motive for European exploration was to find a direct sea route to Asia for valuable goods. Name this motive.
What is a desire for a direct sea route to Asia or a trade for spices and luxury goods
Which explorer’s voyage to India helped establish a vast trading empire for Portugal?
Vasco de Gama
What is the best title for a large-scale transfer of crops, animals, people, and diseases between the Americas and Eurasia/Africa?
The Columbian Exchange.
In the triangular trade, what term describes the ocean journey that carried enslaved Africans to the Americas?
Which country established viceroyalties in much of Mesoamerica and South America and used the encomienda system?
Spain
One cause listed in the original diagram was the desire to spread a particular religion. Which religion did many Europeans aim to spread during the Age of Exploration?
What is Christianity?
Which voyage is considered the first to circumnavigate the globe (name the leader associated with the expedition)?
Ferdinand Magellan
Name two important crops that moved from the Americas to Europe.
Potatoes and maize (corn). (Also acceptable: tomatoes, cacao, squash, beans, etc.)
Olaudah Equiano wrote about conditions on ships carrying enslaved Africans. What single word best summarizes those conditions?
Horrific or brutal
Which nation controlled much of the Asian spice trade and developed a powerful joint‑stock company by 1700?
The Netherlands (also acceptable, the Dutch)
Explain how competition among European nations could push countries to explore and claim overseas lands.
Nations raced to claim territory and resources to increase wealth and power; this competition led to more exploration and colonization to secure trade routes and colonies before rivals.
Which 1494 agreement divided newly discovered lands between Spain and Portugal?
Treaty de Tordesillas
Name two important items that traveled from Europe to the Americas.
Disease and Horses (also acceptable: sugar, wheat, pigs etc.
Explain in one or two sentences how growing European demand for sugar affected the demand for enslaved labor.
Increasing European demand for sugar expanded plantation agriculture in the Americas, which in turn increased the demand for enslaved labor to work on those plantations.
What was one major economic effect of the Commercial Revolution in Europe?
It helped spur modern capitalism, including growth of banking, investing, joint-stock companies, and expanded trade networks.
Identify and explain one technological advance that made long ocean voyages possible.
Improved ship design (e.g., the caravel), navigational instruments (e.g., the astrolabe), or the magnetic compass—these allowed longer, more accurate sea voyages.
Explain the long-term significance of Christopher Columbus’s voyages in one clear sentence
Columbus’s voyages began sustained contact between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres, initiating widespread exchange of people, goods, ideas, plants, animals, and diseases.
The population of Native Americans in Mesoamerica fell from about 25 million in 1500 to about 2–4 million by 1620. What was the primary cause of this decline?
Introduction of diseases (such as smallpox) to which indigenous peoples had no immunity.
Give two specific hardships enslaved Africans experienced on ship voyages
They were chained together and packed tightly below decks with little fresh air or sanitation; many suffered disease, flogging, and death.
Explain how mercantilism created national wealth for European "mother countries" like England.
England bought raw materials cheaply from colonies, manufactured finished goods, sold them at higher prices, and maintained a favorable balance of trade, bringing wealth (gold and silver) into the country.
Describe two economic reasons (not religious) that drove European exploration and explain how those reasons connect to mercantilism
(1) Desire for direct access to Asian spices and luxury goods to increase trade profits; (2) search for precious metals and new markets. Both supported mercantilist goals of accumulating wealth and maintaining a favorable balance of trade.
Match each explorer to a short accomplishment (one–three words each): Vasco da Gama, Ferdinand Magellan, and Christopher Columbus
Vasco da Gama — opened sea route to India; Ferdinand Magellan — expedition that circumnavigated the globe; Christopher Columbus — voyages to the Americas under Spanish sponsorship.
Explain one positive effect and one negative effect of the Columbian Exchange, giving one sentence for each.
Positive: Europe gained nutritious crops (like the potato) that supported population growth.
Negative: The Americas suffered catastrophic population loss and social disruption due to introduced diseases.
Explain how the expansion of the European slave trade changed relationships among African states in the 1600s and 1700s.
Many African states competed to capture and sell people to European traders, increasing internal warfare and shifting political power toward states that profited from the slave trade.
Compare and contrast indentured labor (servitude) and enslaved labor.
Similarity: both systems provided labor for colonial economies.
Difference: indentured servants worked for a fixed term in exchange for passage and a promise of freedom or land; enslaved laborers were forced to work without freedom (often for life) and were treated as property.