Atlantic Expansion

From the period of 1450-1700, the expansion of trade, due to the Atlantic, resulted in the endless migration of people, cultural transformation and destruction, the worldwide movement of trade, and the disorienting experiences of cross-cultural encounters. New technology, knowledge of the earth, and navigation tactics greatly assisted the explorers in expanding out of the Mediterranean Sea. This was the era in which modern global economic system began to develop, paving the pathway of the Commercial Revolution. Portugal and Spain were the leading countries in European trade expansion leading to the conquests of the Americas, the increase of the population, the price revolution, and changes in commerce and production. However, the wars left Spain very much weakened, and opened the way for the English, Dutch, and French to profit from the economic changes and play leading roles in the global economic system.
Europeans had explored only their Atlantic coasts before the fifteenth century. In the fifteenth century, improvements in shipbuilding, the rigging of sails, and the adoption of the mariner’s compass made it attainable to sail in the open ocean. When the Portuguese settled in the Azores Islands around 1450, they discovered westerly winds to assure a safe return to Europe and a pathway to Asia. In 1498 the Portuguese navigator Vasco de Gama landed on the Malabar Coast where he found a busy commercial population. Before these discoveries, Europeans had never actually traveled to the source of the goods. Now, they would travel to the source and bring back the goods to Europe or other countries. The Portuguese built fortified stations on the Malabar Coast, resulting in Europe’s first commercial-colonial empires. In 1492 when Columbus had discovered America, it provided Spain with mines for precious metal. It also resulted in the importation of African slaves for cheap labor. In 1520, the Spanish expedition, led by Magellan, circumnavigated the globe for the first...