Mainly all original westward exploration was due to desires for gold and riches and in the case of the English this was no exception. After the recent victory over the Spanish ambitious English monarchs used the combination of overcrowding and overwhelming patriotism to fuel an energetic boom of westward exploration. While the northern English colonies did not find the gold and treasures that they were looking for they did find ways to create opportunities for financial growth. Virginia, the location of the first English settlement, used tobacco exportation as an effective money making operation. The Carolinas came later and was created and advertised as a location for the poor under-class to have a second chance at wealth.
Revolutionary Protestant Changes During the Times of Martin Luther Imagine experiencing the constant feeling of being taken advantage of by a more powerful force. Imagine what it has felt like to not have a say or movement in the areas surrounding you. Everyday life in the majority of Europe became submerged in these feelings because of the Roman Catholic Church which during the 1500s had an over extensive amount of power. The Roman Catholic Church had not only immense religious authority because it remained as the main religion of Europe, but in addition had a vast political influence in Europe. Its political power mainly came from the excessive expanse of wealth and economic success.
The Crusades were a series of religiously sanctioned military campaigns, called by the Pope, with the main goal of restoring Christian control of the Holy Land. The crusaders came from all over western Europe. The main series of Crusades occurred between 1095 and 1291, although many unnumbered crusades were taken up for various reasons. Although the Crusaders were succesful in taking the Holy land, they were unable to keep the land under Christian control. Crusades effected the English people politically, economically, and by exposing the Englishmen to new cultures.
A multiplicity of factors worked together to fashion this new political order. Indeed the very nature of medieval society defies this separation. Feudalism as created by William tied people to the land for social, religious and economic reasons. The Church was a sincere religious institution and, at the same time, a massive multi-national money making machine that was one of the most powerful political influences in Europe. It is very hard and wrong to separate out individual aspects of change as this would be to fail to recognise the nature of the
Three Factors which Influenced the Crusades The Crusades began in 1095 and ended in 1291. They consisted of nine major wars involving Christians, Muslims, and Jews. They are renowned for showing the power that religion has to mobilize civilizations against each other. Besides religious reasons, which were predominant factors throughout all of the wars, social and economic elements were present as well. A primary cause of the Crusades was religious differences between the Muslims and the Christians.
The crusades affected western culture because of their biblical practices that threatened it. By 1905, Urban II’s call for a crusade was only part of a larer shifting in theological interpretations and justification of warfare: the Reconquista in Spain, for instance, had been under way for over two centuries and was rooted in a re-fashioned understanding of just war theory. The explicit pilgrimage and warfare gave the First Crusade a unique potency that triggered widespread enthusiasm across feudal social boudaries. Pilgrimage was a common practice during Middle Ages and, given the perils of travel, pilgrims often armed themselves for defense. The ideology of the crusade, however, was one rooted in the practice redemptive pilgrimage as well as conquest.
Though there were many reasons for this movement, the economics of these new lands along with religious freedoms were two of the main reasons for migration. War and limitations on land use caused a dire need for expansion. Persecution for religious beliefs made it desirable to seek new homes to freely practice versus the active suppression. After a very costly war and a shift in demands, the English had a burning desire to obtain land. “Because of the worldwide demand for wool was growing rapidly, landowners were converting their land from fields for crops to pastures for sheep” (Brinkley, 2010).
As the Black Death ravaged across medieval Europe, the effects on the land and the economy were devastating. Before we look at the way the plagues affected Europe, I find it is important to first look at the state of the economy and its problems just before the plagues arrived. One of the earlier and main disasters was the climate, the “Little Ice Age” (1). The temperature of the world dropped at what is agreed roughly 2C. The sudden drop in temperature meant shorter summers and in that case shorter growing seasons.
Nationalism also helped the push for westward expansion and the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine is a policy of the United States introduced on December 2, 1823. It stated that further efforts by European countries to colonize land or interfere with states in the Americas would be viewed as acts of aggression requiring U.S. intervention. However, this did not last long and was broken predominantly by the Panic of 1819, which caused mass bank failures, unemployment shot up, and a slump in agriculture. The Panic of 1819 was the first major financial crisis and depression the U.S. faced.
The main symptom of the plague is swelling of lymph nodes, and that creates a blackish color. From this they got a second name for the plague: The Black Death. The bubonic plague first started in Central Asia, but historians believe that it was spread from Mongolian merchants into Europe. Much like silk and spices, the plague followed global trade routes, reaching every populous corner of the earth in less than 30 years. Caffa, Constantinople, Cairo, Venice, Genoa, Tunis, Gibraltar, all were conquered by Y. pestis.