D GOAL 4 CONSIDER THE IMPACT OF THE COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE
Reading
A. Discuss this question with a partner.
Which of these were brought to the
Americas by European explorers and
colonists?
horses
peanuts
tomatoes
malaria
cattle
tobacco
B. Write answers to the questions.
1. In your own words, what was the
Columbian Exchange?______________
________________________________
________________________________
2. Whats one thing that wasnt in
your country before the Columbian
Exchange?_______________________
________________________________
________________________________
3. Why were the Native Americans
in Tsenacomoco called Powhatan
Indians?_________________________
________________________________
________________________________
4. Why did the colonists sometimes find
empty farm fields near the Jamestown
Colony? _________________________
________________________________
________________________________
5. Why were the Old World animals a
problem for the Powhatan Indians?
________________________________
________________________________
6. Why do you think the Old World
diseases were especially deadly for
Native Americans?_________________
________________________________
________________________________
106 Life in the Past
The New World
The Columbian
Exchange
place to grow tobacco, a New World plant that the Spanish
discovered in the Caribbean. Tobacco from Virginia could
be shipped to Europe and sold, and the colonys investors in
When European explorer Christopher Columbus landed on
the island he named San Salvador in 1492, he began a process
known as the Columbian Exchange. Columbus was followed
by explorers, soldiers, and colonists from Spain, Portugal, the
Netherlands, France, and England. The Europeans brought
with them a great number of plants, animals, and diseases that
the New World had never seen. And soon, countries in the Old
World smoked American tobacco and tasted corn, tomatoes,
peanuts, chili peppers, and potatoes for the first time.
The first European settlement in what is now the United
States began on May 14, 1608, when an English ship landed
on Jamestown Island in the present-day state of Virginia. The
Jamestown Colony was founded in the middle of an Indian
empire called Tsenacomoco, an area of about 8,000 square
miles with more than 14,000 people. The principal Indian chief
was Powhatan, father of the legendary Pocahontas, and the
settlers called the native people Powhatan Indians.
Before the arrival of the English, the Powhatan Indians
used to grow corn, hunt wild animals such as deer, and
gather wild plants for food. When a cornfield started to
produce less corn, the Indians would plant in another area.
The Jamestown colonists saw these empty fields as a perfect
England were eager to make a profit.
The Jamestown colonists also introduced several kinds
of domestic animals to the New World, including pigs,
cattle, horses, and chickens. The Indians had no large
domestic animals, and so they had no fences around their
cornfields. They were soon competing with the colonists
animals for both crops and wild food. The corn that the
Indians stored for the winter months, meanwhile, became a
favorite food for an animal the English brought accidentally
in their shipsblack rats.
In addition to the rats, colonists carried diseases from
the Old World that Native Americans had never been
exposed to. Diseases such as malaria, smallpox, measles,
and cholera were not always deadly to Europeans, but
killed a large percentage of native people in the Americas.
The Columbian Exchange, therefore, came at a very high
cost, but without a doubt, it was one of the most significant
events in modern human history.
C. Discuss this question with a partner. In the
following lines from the article, what is the
relationship between the noun phrases on
each side of the comma (,) or dash ()?
1. P
 owhatan, father of the legendary
Pocahontas
2. tobacco, a New World plant
3. an animal the English brought
accidentally in their shipsblack rats.
Writing
Imagine that the Columbian Exchange
never happened. If you live in a New World
country, the rest of the world doesnt know
you exist. If you live in an Old World coun-
try, you know nothing about the Americas.
Write a journal entry about a day in your
life. What do you eat? What animals do you
see? What do you do on a typical day?
Goal 4 Consider the
impact of the
Columbian
Exchange
Share your journal entry with a
partner. How was your imaginary day
different from a day in your real life?
In your opinion, is the world better
or worse because of the Columbian
Exchange?
Lesson D 107