1. The Worlds of Fifteenth Century
Part I
Strayer Chapter 13

2. Introduction
• 1492, the year Columbus sailed across the
Atlantic in an attempt to find an all water
route to Asia, and instead found the Americas
radically changed the world by uniting the Old
World (Africa, Asia, and Europe) with the New
World
• What did the different regions of the world
look like before 1492?

3. Paleolithic Persistence
• Hunting gathering and pastoral societies
• Still relied on Paleolithic (Old Stone Age)
technology
• Found in Australia, Siberia, arctic coastlands,
parts of Africa, parts of the Americas
• Despite Old Stone Age technology, they did
change over time, just VERY slowly!

4. Case Study: Australia
• Made up of about 250 different hunting/
gathering groups
• Did adopt some technology from outsiders
frex. Outrigger canoes, fish hooks, and
mythology
• Despite contact with New Guinea, did not
adopt farming

5. Change Over Time
• Change:
– Changed the environment, “firestick farming”
burned away underbrush to make hunting easier
– Traded goods over hundreds of miles blending
cultural ideas across time and space
• Continuity:
– Maintained Paleolithic technology

6. Case Study: Pacific Northwest
• Chinookan, Tulalip, and Skagit tribes
• Had access to more than 300 edible plant and
animal species  hunting and gathering
• Differed from Australia b/c:
– Permanent villages with large sturdy homes
– Economic specialization
– Social classes sometimes including slaves
– Extensive food storage

7. Similarity: Australia and Pacific
Northwest
• Lost hunting/gathering lands as agriculture
expanded

8. Agricultural Village Societies
• Found in: North America, Amazon River Basin,
Southeast Asia, Africa south of the Equator
• Fully agricultural
• Avoided incorporation into larger empires
• Avoided oppressive political institutions
• Did not develop city or state-based societies
• Usually small village-based societies
• Usually had class and gender-based equality

9. Case Study: West Africa
• Yoruba-speaking people of
Nigeria; Yoruba, Bini, and
Igbo peoples
• Many rival city-states each
made up of walled towns
ruled by kings (sometimes
women!)
• Like ancient Mesopotamia
and Greece, did not form
single state or empire

10. • Most successful city-state =
Benin
• Conquered 201 towns
• Replaced kinship leaders
with administrative chiefs
• Sponsored extensive trade
• Patronized arts

11. • Igbo people lived east of the Niger River
• Rejected kingship and state-building
• Wealth helped men earn ranks
• Women’s associations and rituals mediated
problems
• Kinship groups balanced power to avoid
conflict
• Similar to society in Things Fall Apart by
Chinua Achebe

12. Similarities: Yoruba, Bini, and Igbo
peoples
• Were not isolated or self contained
• Traded with each other and with more distant
peoples
• Shared common artistic styles
• Switched from matrilineal to patrilineal
systems of descent
• Declined as a result of the transatlantic slave
trade

13. Case Study: Iroquois
• Iroquois peoples of New York:
Onondaga, Seneca, Cayuga,
Oneida, Mohawk
• Frequent warfare among groups
as populations grew
• Women held high status by
farming maize and bean using
techniques from Mesoamerica
• Men’s status was based on
warfare

14. • Conflict led to political innovations:
– Loose confederation of tribes
– “Great Law of Peace” led by a council of elders
lead the Iroquois League of Five Nations and
settled disputes, blood feuds, and tribal conflicts,
and coordinated communication with outside
peoples
– Expressed value of a limited government, social
equality, and personal freedoms
– Men usually held political offices
– Women selected and could depose leaders