Chapter 2 Section Summary
Chapter 2 Section Summary
2.1 The Protestant Reformation
In the sixteenth century, many European Christians were critical of practices within the Catholic Church. Some scholars in northern Europe had turned to Christian humanism as a means of making people more pious and thus achieving religious reform. Martin Luther, a German monk, began the Protestant Reformation when he publicly objected to the church’s sale of indulgences. Luther was excommunicated, but the printing press enabled his ideas to spread throughout Europe. Luther taught that faith alone was needed for salvation and that scripture was the only source of Christian authority.
Luther’s ideas became popular among many, including Ulrich Zwingli and John Calvin in Switzerland. Followers of John Calvin, called Calvinists, spread his teachings to the Netherlands, Scotland, France, and England. A variety of Anabaptist churches were also established that rejected infant baptism. In England, Henry VIII rejected the pope’s authority after the pope refused to grant him an annulment. As Protestantism gained adherents, religious wars erupted throughout Europe. The Council of Trent, called by the Roman Catholic Church in 1545, reaffirmed some aspects of church doctrine while also passing reforms that attempted to eliminate some of the problems that led to the Reformation. Wars over religion continued for many years.
2.2 Crossing the Atlantic
With the fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans in 1453, Europeans found themselves forced to deal with Muslim middlemen to access the prized goods of South and East Asia. European countries thus began seeking an all-water route to the eastern lands they called the Indies, aided by navigational technologies from the Middle East and motivated by religious zeal and desire for profit. The Portuguese were the first to explore the Atlantic, claiming islands off the coast of Africa and voyaging down its western shore. In 1488, the Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa.
The Spanish monarchs Isabella I of Castille and Ferdinand II of Aragon financed the voyages of Christopher Columbus, who landed in the Caribbean in 1492 believing it was part of the Indies. He did not find great wealth there, but Spanish exploration continued. Hernán Cortés conquered the wealthy Aztec Empire in Mexico and Francisco Pizarro the silver-rich Inca Empire in Peru.
To protect their respective interests, in 1494 Spain and Portugal negotiated the Treaty of Tordesillas, which drew a line through the Atlantic awarding the Americas, with the exception of Brazil, to Spain. Animals, foods, and other resources flowed in both directions along the Columbian Exchange, forever altering the culture and economies of North and South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa. Diseases also traveled west with the Europeans and wiped out as much as 95 percent of the Indigenous peoples in the Western Hemisphere. Both Europeans and Ind