Modern wonders of the Americas Statue of Liberty The Statue of Liberty is installed on Liberty Island (formerly Bedlow) at the entrance to the New York port. The most grandiose monument in North America was opened in October 1886, but the idea of ​​such a monument was born

Alperovich Moisey Samuilovich, Slezkin Lev Yurievich ::: Formation of independent states in Latin America (1804-1903)

By the time the European colonialists discovered and conquered America, it was inhabited by numerous Indian tribes and peoples at various stages of social and cultural development. Some of them managed to reach a high level of civilization, others led a very primitive lifestyle.

The oldest known Mayan culture on the American continent, the center of which was the Yucatan Peninsula, was characterized by a significant development of agriculture, craft, trade, art, science, and the presence of hieroglyphic writing. With the preservation of a number of institutions of the clan system, the Maya also developed elements of a slave society. Their culture had a strong influence on neighboring peoples - Zapotecs, Olmecs, Totonacs, etc.

Central Mexico in the 15th century ended up under the rule of the Aztecs, who were the successors and heirs of more ancient Indian civilizations. They had a developed agriculture, construction equipment reached a high level, and various trade was conducted. The Aztecs created many outstanding monuments of architecture and sculpture, the solar calendar, and had the beginnings of writing. The emergence of property inequality, the emergence of slavery and a number of other signs testified to their gradual transition to a class society.

Quechua, Aymara and other peoples, distinguished by their high material and spiritual culture, lived in the region of the Andean highlands. In the XV - early XVI century. a number of tribes in this area subjugated the Incas, who formed a vast state (with the capital in Cuzco), where the official language was Quechua.

Indian tribes of Pueblo (Hosti, Zuni, Tagno, Keres, etc.) inhabiting the basin of the Rio Grande del Norte and Colorado rivers, inhabiting the basins of the Orinoco and Amazon rivers Tupi, Guarani, Caribbean, Arawak, Brazilian Kayapo, inhabitants of the Pampa and the Pacific the coasts of the warlike Mapuche (which the European conquerors began to call the Araucans), the inhabitants of various regions of modern Peru and Ecuador, the Indians of Colorado, Jivaro, Saparo, the La Plata tribes (Diagita, Charrua, Kerandi, etc.) "Patagonian Teuelchi, Indians of Tierra del Fuego - she, yagan, chono - were at different stages of the primitive communal system.

At the turn of the XV-XVI centuries. the original process of development of the peoples of America was forcibly interrupted by the European conquerors - the conquistadors. Speaking about the historical destinies of the indigenous population of the American continent, F. Engels pointed out that "the Spanish conquest cut short any further independent development."

The conquest and colonization of America, which had such fatal consequences for its peoples, were due to the complex socio-economic processes that were taking place then in European society.

The development of industry and trade, the emergence of the bourgeois class, the formation of capitalist relations in the bowels of the feudal system caused in the late 15th - early 16th centuries. . in countries Western Europe the desire to open new trade routes and seize the untold wealth of East and South Asia. For this purpose, a number of expeditions were undertaken, in the organization of which Spain took the main part. The main role of Spain in the great discoveries of the 15th-16th centuries. was determined not only by its geographical position, but also by the presence of numerous ruined nobility, which after the end of the reconquest (1492) could not find use for themselves and feverishly searched for sources of enrichment, dreaming of discovering the fabulous "golden country" - Eldorado overseas. "... Gold was that magic word that drove the Spaniards across the Atlantic Ocean to America," wrote F. Engels, "gold is what the white man demanded first of all, as soon as he stepped on the newly discovered coast."

At the beginning of August 1492, a flotilla under the command of Christopher Columbus, equipped with funds from the Spanish government, left the port of Palos (in southwestern Spain) in a westerly direction and after a long voyage in the Atlantic Ocean on October 12 reached a small island, which the Spaniards gave the name San -Salvador ", that is," Holy Savior "(the locals called him Guanahani). As a result of the travels of Columbus and other navigators (the Spaniards Alonso de Ojeda, Vicente Pinsona, Rodrigo de Bastidas, the Portuguese Pedro Alvarez Cabral, etc.) by the beginning of the 16th century. were opened central part The Bahamas, the Greater Antilles (Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, Jamaica), most of the Lesser Antilles (from the Virgin Islands to Dominica), Trinidad and a number of small islands in the Caribbean; surveyed the northern and a significant part of the eastern coast of South America, most of the Atlantic coast of Central America. Back in 1494, the Treaty of Tordesillas was concluded between Spain and Portugal, delimiting the spheres of their colonial expansion.

Numerous adventurers, ruined nobles, mercenary soldiers, criminals, etc., in pursuit of easy money from the Iberian Peninsula, rushed to the newly discovered territories in pursuit of easy money. By deception and violence, they seized the lands of the local population and declared them the possessions of Spain were Portugal. In 1492, Columbus founded on the island of Haiti, which he called Hispaniola (that is, "little Spain"), the first colony "Navidad" ("Ryuzhdestvo"), and in 1496 he founded the city of Santo Domingo here, which became a bridgehead for the subsequent conquest of the entire island and the conquest of its indigenous inhabitants. In 1508-1509 Spanish conquistadors began to seize and colonize Puerto Rico, Jamaica and the Isthmus of Panama, whose territory they called Golden Castile. In 1511, the detachment of Diego de Velazquez landed in Cuba and began its conquest.

Plundering, enslaving and exploiting the Indians, the invaders brutally suppressed any attempt to resist. They barbarously destroyed and destroyed entire cities and settlements, brutally dealt with their population. An eyewitness to “the events, the Dominican monk Bartolomé de Las Casas, who personally watched the bloody“ knocked down ”of the conquistadors, said that they hanged and drowned the Indians, cut them into pieces with swords, burned them alive, roasted over low heat, poisoned with dogs, not sparing even the elderly, women and children. “Robbery and robbery is the only goal of the Spanish adventurers in America,” K. Marx pointed out.

In search of treasures, the conquerors sought to discover and capture more and more new lands. “Gold,” Columbus wrote to the Spanish royal couple from Jamaica in 1503, “is perfection. Gold creates treasures, and the one who owns it can do whatever he wants, and is even able to lead human souls to paradise. "

In 1513, Vasco Nunez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama from north to south and reached the Pacific coast, and Juan Ponce de Leon discovered the Florida peninsula, the first Spanish possession in North America. In 1516, the expedition of Juan Diaz de Solis explored the basin of the Rio de la Plata ("Silver River"). A year later, the Yucatan Peninsula was discovered, and soon the Gulf Coast was explored.

In 1519-1521. Spanish conquistadors, led by Hernan Cortez, conquered Central Mexico, destroying the ancient Indian culture of the Aztecs here and setting their capital Tenochtitlan on fire. By the end of the 20s of the XVI century. they conquered a vast area from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean, as well as most of Central America. Subsequently, the Spanish colonialists continued their advance south (Yucatan) and north (up to the basin of the Colorado and Rio Grande del Norte, California and Texas).

After the invasion of Mexico and Central America, troops of the conquistadors poured into the South American continent. Since 1530, the Portuguese began a more or less systematic colonization of Brazil, from where they began to export the valuable wood "pau-brasil" (from which the name of the country originated). In the first half of the 30s of the XVI, century. the Spaniards, led by Francisco Pizarro and Diego de Almagro, conquered Peru, destroying the Inca civilization that had developed here. They began the conquest of this country with a massive massacre of unarmed Indians in the city of Cajamarca, signaled by the priest Valverde. The Inca ruler Atahualpa was treacherously captured and executed. Moving south, the Spanish conquerors, led by Almagro, invaded in 1535-1537 within the country, which they called Chile. However, the conquistadors encountered stubborn resistance from the warlike Araucanians and failed. At the same time, Pedro de Mendoza began the colonization of La Plata.

Numerous detachments of European conquerors also rushed to the northern part of South America, where, according to their ideas, the mythical country of El Dorado was rich in gold and other jewels. The financing of these expeditions was also attended by the German bankers Welser and Echinger, who received from their debtor, Emperor (and King of Spain) Charles V, the right to colonize the southern coast of the Caribbean Sea, which at that time was called "Tierra Firme". In search of Eldorado, the Spanish expeditions of Ordaz, Jimenez de Quesada, Benalcazar and detachments of German mercenaries under the command of Echinger, Speyer, Federman penetrated in the 30s of the 16th century. in the basins of the Orinoco and Magdalena rivers. In 1538, Jimenez de Quesada, Federman and Benalcazar, moving respectively from the north, east and south, met on the plateau of Cundinamarca, near the city of Bogota.

In the early 40s, Francisco de Orella did not reach the Amazon River and descended along its course to the Atlantic Ocean.

At the same time, the Spaniards, led by Pedro de Valdivia, undertook a new campaign in Chile, but by the beginning of the 50s they were able to capture only the northern and central parts of the country. The penetration of the Spanish and Portuguese conquerors into the interior regions of America continued in the second half of the 16th century, and the conquest and colonization of many regions (for example, southern Chile and northern Mexico) dragged on for a much longer period.

However, the vast and rich lands of the New World were also claimed by other European powers — England, France, and Holland — who had successfully attempted to seize various territories in South and Central America, as well as a number of islands in the West Indies. To this end, they used pirates - filibusters and buccaneers, who plundered mainly Spanish ships and the American colonies of Spain. In 1578, the English pirate Francis Drake reached the coast of South America in the La Plata region and crossed the Strait of Magellan into the Pacific Ocean. Seeing the threat to their colonial possessions, the Spanish government equipped and sent a huge squadron to the shores of England. However, this "Invincible Armada" was defeated in 1588, and Spain lost its sea power. Soon another English pirate, Walter Raleigh, landed on the northern coast of South America, trying to find the fabulous Eldorado in the Orinoco Basin. The raids on Spanish possessions in America were made in the 16th-17th centuries. the British Hawkins, Cavendish, Henry Morgan (the latter plundered Panama in 1671), the Dutch Ioris Spielbergen, Schouten and other pirates.

The Portuguese colony of Brazil was also exposed in the XVI-XVII centuries. attacks by French and English pirates, especially after its inclusion in the Spanish colonial empire in connection with the transfer of the Portuguese crown to the king of Spain (1581-1640). Holland, which during this period was at war with Spain, managed to capture part of Brazil (Pernambuca), and hold it for a quarter of a century (1630-1654).

However, the fierce struggle of the two largest powers - England and France - for world supremacy, their mutual rivalry, caused, in particular, by the desire to seize the Spanish and Portuguese colonies in America, objectively contributed to the preservation of most of them in the hands of weaker Spain and Portugal. Despite all attempts by rivals to deprive the Spanish and Portuguese of their colonial monopoly, South and Central America, with the exception of a small territory of Guiana, divided between England, France and Holland, as well as the Mosquito Coast (on the east coast of Nicaragua) and Belize (southeast of Yucatan) , which were the object of British colonization, until the beginning of the XIX century. . continued to remain in the possession of Spain and Portugal.

Only in the West Indies, for which during the XVI - XVIII centuries. England, France, Holland and Spain fought fiercely (moreover, many islands repeatedly passed from one power to another), the positions of the Spanish colonialists were significantly weakened. By the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th century. they managed to save only Cuba, Puerto Rico and the eastern half of Haiti (Santo Domingo). The western half of this island Spain had to cede to France under the Riswick Peace Treaty of 1697, which founded a colony here, which in French began to be called Saint-Domingue (in the traditional Russian transcription - San Domingo). The French also captured (as early as 1635) Guadeloupe and Martinique.

Jamaica, most of the Lesser Antilles (Saint Kitts, Nevis, Antigua, Montserrat, Saint Vincent, Barbados, Grenada, etc.), the Bahamas and Bermuda archipelagos were in the 17th century. captured by England. Its rights to many islands belonging to the Lesser Antilles group (Saint Kitts, Nevis, Montserrat, Dominica, Saint Vincent, Grenada) were finally secured by the Versailles Peace Treaty of 1783. In 1797, the British captured the Spanish island of Trinidad, located near north-east coast of Venezuela, and in early XIX v. (1814) achieved official recognition of their claims to the small island of Tobago, which had actually been in their hands since 1580 (with some interruptions).

The islands of Curacao, Aruba, Bonaire and others came under Dutch rule, and the largest of the Virgin Islands (Sainte Croix, Saint Thomas and Saint John), initially captured by Spain, and then being the object of a fierce struggle between England, France and Holland, in 30-50-ies of the XVIII century. were bought by Denmark.

The discovery and colonization of the American continent by the Europeans, where pre-feudal relations had reigned supreme, objectively contributed to the development of the feudal system there. At the same time, these events were of great world-historical significance for accelerating the development of capitalism in Europe and drawing the vast territories of America into its orbit. “The discovery of America and the sea route around Africa,” K. Marx and F. Engels pointed out, “created a new field of activity for the rising bourgeoisie. The East Indies and Chinese markets, the colonization of America, exchange with colonies, the increase in the number of means of exchange and goods in general gave an unheard of until then impetus to trade, navigation, industry and thus caused the rapid development of the revolutionary element in the disintegrating feudal society. " The discovery of America, in the words of Marx and Engels, paved the way for the creation of a world market that "brought about a colossal development of trade, shipping and overland communications."

However, the conquistadors were inspired, as WZ Foster noted, “by no means the ideas of social progress; their only goal was to capture everything they could for themselves and their class. " At the same time, during the conquest, they mercilessly destroyed the ancient civilizations created by the indigenous population of America, and the Indians themselves were enslaved or exterminated. Thus, having seized vast areas of the New World, the conquerors barbarously destroyed the forms of economic life, social structure, and original culture that had reached a high level of development among some peoples.

In an effort to consolidate their dominance over the occupied territories of America, the European colonialists created here the corresponding administrative and socio-economic systems.

From the Spanish possessions in North and Central America in 1535 the Viceroyalty of New Spain was formed with the capital in Mexico City. Its structure by the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th century. included the entire modern territory of Mexico (with the exception of Chiapas) and the southern part of the current United States (the states of Texas, California, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, part of Colorado and Wyoming). The northern border of the Viceroyalty was not precisely established until 1819 due to territorial disputes between Spain, England, the United States and Russia. Colonies of Spain in South America, with the exception of its Caribbean coast (Venezuela), and the southeastern part of Central America (Panama) formed in 1542 the Viceroyalty of Peru, the capital of which was Lima.

Some areas, nominally under the rule of the Viceroy, were in fact independent political and administrative units ruled by captains-general who were directly subordinate to the Madrid government. So, most of Central America (with the exception of Yucatan, Tabasco, Panama) was occupied by the Captaincy General of Guatemala. Spanish possessions in the West Indies and on the Caribbean coast “until the second half of the 18th century. formed the Captaincy General of Santo Domingo. The Viceroyalty of Peru until the 30s of the XVIII century. included the general-captaincy of New Gra.nada (with the capital in Bogota).

Along with the formation of vice-kingdoms and captaincy-generals, in the process of the Spanish conquest, special administrative and judicial collegia, the so-called audiences, were established in the largest colonial centers, which had advisory functions. The territory under the jurisdiction of each audience constituted a certain administrative unit, and its boundaries in some cases coincided with the boundaries of the corresponding captaincy general. The first audience - Santo Domingo - was created in 1511. Later, by the beginning of the 17th century, the audiences of Mexico City and Guadalajara were established in New Spain, Guatemala in Central America, Lima, Quito, Charcas (covering the basin of La - Fees and Upper Peru), Panama, Bogota, Santiago (Chile).

It should be noted that although the governor of Chile (who was also the head of the audience) was subordinate and accountable to the Peruvian viceroy, due to the remoteness and military importance of this colony, its administration enjoyed much greater political independence than, for example, the authorities of the audience of Charcas or Quito. In fact, she dealt directly with the royal government in Madrid, although she depended on Peru for certain economic and some other issues.

In the XVIII century. the administrative and political structure of the American colonies of Spain (mainly its possessions in South America and the West Indies) has undergone significant changes.

New Granada was transformed into a Viceroyalty in 1739. It included the territories that were under the jurisdiction of the audiences of Panama and Quito. After the Seven Years' War of 1756-1763, during which the Cuban capital Havana was occupied by the British, Spain had to cede Florida to England in exchange for Havana. But the Spaniards then received the French colony of West Louisiana with New Orleans. Following this, in 1764, Cuba was transformed into a captaincy general, which also included Louisiana. In 1776, another new viceroyalty was created - Rio de la Plata, which included the former territory of the audience of Charcas: Buenos Aires and other provinces of modern Argentina, Paraguay, Upper Peru (present-day Bolivia), "East Coast" ( "Banda Oriental"), as the territory of Uruguay was called at that time, located on the eastern bank of the Uruguay River. Venezuela (with the capital in Caracas) was transformed into an independent captaincy general in 1777. The following year, the status of captaincy general was granted to Chile, whose dependence on Peru now assumed an even more fictitious character than before.

By the end of the XVIII century. there was a significant weakening of Spain's positions in the Caribbean. True, according to the Versailles Peace Treaty, Florida was returned to her, but in 1795 (according to the Basel Peace Treaty) the Madrid government was forced to cede Santo Domingo to France (i.e., the eastern half of Haiti), and in 1801 - to return it to her. Louisiana. In this regard, the center of Spanish rule in the West Indies moved to Cuba, where the audience from Santo Domingo was transferred. The governors of Florida and Puerto Rico were subordinate to the captain general and the audience of Cuba, although legally these colonies were considered as being directly dependent on the metropolis.

The system of government of the American colonies in Spain was built on the type of the Spanish feudal monarchy. The supreme power in each colony was exercised by a viceroy or captain-general. The governors of individual provinces were subordinate to him. The cities and rural districts into which the provinces were divided were governed by the governors' governors and senior alcaldes. They, in turn, were subordinate to the hereditary elders (caciques), and later the elected heads of the Indian villages. In the 80s of the XVIII century. in Spanish America, the administrative division into commissaries was introduced. In New Spain, 12 quartermasters were created, in Peru and La Plata - 8 each, in Chile - 2, etc.

Viceroys and captains-generals enjoyed broad powers. They appointed provincial governors, corregidors and senior alcaldes, issued orders concerning various aspects of colonial life, were in charge of the treasury and all the armed forces. Viceroys were royal governors and in church affairs: since the Spanish monarch had the right of patronage in relation to the church in the American colonies, the viceroy on his behalf appointed priests from among the candidates nominated by the bishops.

The audiences that existed in a number of colonial centers performed mainly judicial functions. But they were also charged with overseeing the activities of the administrative apparatus. However, the audiences were only advisory bodies, the decisions of which were not binding on the Viceroys and Captain-Generals.

The brutal colonial oppression led to a further decrease in the Indian population of Latin America, which was greatly facilitated by the frequent epidemics of smallpox, typhus and other diseases introduced by the conquerors. The resulting catastrophic labor situation and a sharp decline in the number of taxpayers seriously affected the interests of the colonialists. In this regard, at the beginning of the 18th century. the question arose about the liquidation of the institution of encomienda, which by that time, as a result of the spread of character, had managed to largely lose its former significance. The royal government hoped to get new workers and taxpayers at its disposal in this way. As for the Spanish-American landowners, most of them, due to the landlessness of the peasantry and the development of the character system, were no longer interested in preserving the encomienda. The elimination of the latter was also due to the growing resistance of the Indians, which led in the second half of the 17th century. to numerous uprisings.

By decrees of 1718-1720 the institution of encomienda in the American colonies of Spain was formally abolished. However, in fact, it was preserved in places in a hidden form or even legally for many years. In some provinces of New Spain (Yucatan, Tabasco), encomienda were officially abolished only in 1785, and in Chile - only in 1791. There is evidence of the existence of encomienda in the second half of the 18th century. and in other areas such as La Plata and New Granada.

With the abolition of the encomienda, the large landowners retained not only their estates - "hacienda" and "estancia", but in fact also the power over the Indians. In most cases, they seized all or part of the land of the Indian communities, as a result of which landless and land-poor peasants, deprived of freedom of movement, were forced to continue working on estates as peons. The Indians, who somehow escaped this fate, fell under the rule of the Corregidors and other officials. They had to pay a poll tax and serve labor service.

Along with the landlords and the royal government, the oppressor of the Indians was the Catholic Church, in whose hands were huge territories. The enslaved Indians, who were subjected to the most severe oppression, were attached to the vast possessions of the Jesuit and other spiritual missions-reductions (of which there were especially many in Paraguay). The church also received huge revenues from collecting tithes, payments for religious services, all kinds of usurious operations, "voluntary" donations from the population, etc.

Thus, by the end of the 18th-beginning of the 19th century. the majority of the Indian population of Latin America, deprived of personal freedom, and often of land, found themselves in fact in feudal dependence on their exploiters. However, in some inaccessible areas, remote from the main centers of colonization, there remained independent tribes that did not recognize the power of the invaders and offered them stubborn resistance. These free Indians, stubbornly avoiding contact with the colonialists, basically still retained the old primitive communal system, traditional way of life, their language and culture. Only in the XIX-XX centuries. most of them were conquered, and their lands were expropriated.

In some areas of America there was also a free peasantry: the "llanero" - on the plains (llanos) of Venezuela and New Granada, the "gaucho" - in southern Brazil and on La Plata. In Mexico, there were small farm-type land holdings - "ranches".

Despite the extermination of most of the Indians, in many countries of the American continent, a number of indigenous people survived. The bulk of the Indian population was made up of exploited, enslaved peasants who suffered under the yoke of landowners, royal officials and the Catholic Church, as well as workers in mines, manufactory, artisans and craft workshops, loaders, domestic servants, etc.

Negroes imported from Africa worked mainly on plantations of sugar cane, coffee, tobacco and other tropical crops, as well as in the mining industry, in factories, etc. Most of them were slaves, but even those few who were nominally considered free, in their own way the position actually did not differ much from the slaves. Although throughout the XVI-XVIII centuries. Many millions of African slaves were imported into Latin America, due to the high mortality caused by overwork, unusual climate and diseases, their number in most colonies by the end of the 18th - early 19th centuries. was small. However, in Brazil, it exceeded late XVIII v. 1.3 million people with a total population of 2 to 3 million. The population of African descent also predominated in the West Indies and was quite numerous in New Granada, Venezuela and some other regions.

Along with Indians and Negroes in Latin America, from the very beginning of its colonization, a group of population of European origin appeared and began to grow. The privileged elite of colonial society were the natives of the metropolis - the Spaniards (who in America were contemptuously called "gachupins" or "chapetons") and the Portuguese. These were mainly representatives of the noble nobility, as well as wealthy merchants, in whose hands the colonial trade was. They occupied almost all of the highest administrative, military and church positions. Among them were large landowners and mine owners. The natives of the metropolis boasted of their origin and considered themselves a superior race in comparison not only with the Indians and Negroes, but even with the descendants of their compatriots, the Creoles, who were born in America.

The term "creole" is rather arbitrary and imprecise. Creoles in America were called "purebred" descendants of Europeans born here. However, in fact, most of them had, to one degree or another, an admixture of Indian or Negro blood. Most of the landowners came from among the Creoles. They also replenished the ranks of the colonial intelligentsia and lower clergy, and occupied secondary positions in the administrative apparatus and the army. Relatively few of them were engaged in commercial and industrial activities, but they owned most of the mines and manufactories. Among the Creole population, there were also smallholders, artisans, small business owners, etc.

Possessing nominally equal rights with the natives of the metropolis, Creoles were in fact discriminated against and were appointed to senior positions only on an exceptional basis. In turn, they disdained the Indians and the "colored" in general, treating them as representatives of a lower race. They prided themselves on the supposed purity of their blood, although many of them had absolutely no reason to do so.

In the course of colonization, there was a process of mixing of Europeans, Indians, Negroes. Therefore, the population of Latin America at the end of the XVIII - beginning of the XIX century. in their own way ethnic composition was extremely heterogeneous. In addition to Indians, Negroes and colonists of European origin, there was a very large group that arose from a mixture of various ethnic elements: whites and Indians (Indo-European mestizos), whites and blacks (mulattos), Indians and Negroes (Sambo).

The mestizo population was deprived of civil rights: mestizos and mulattos could not hold official and officer positions, participate in elections of municipal bodies, etc. Representatives of this large group of the population were engaged in handicrafts, retail trade, free professions, served as managers, clerks, overseers for wealthy landowners. They constituted the majority among the small landowners. Some of them, towards the end of the colonial period, began to penetrate the ranks of the lower clergy. Part of the mestizos turned into peons, workers in factories and mines, soldiers, and constituted a declassed element of cities.

In contrast to the ongoing mixing of various ethnic elements, the colonialists sought to isolate and oppose to each other the natives of the metropolis, Creoles, Indians, Negroes and mestizos. They divided the entire population of the colonies into racial groups. However, in fact, belonging to one category or another was often determined not so much by ethnic characteristics as by social factors. So, many wealthy people, who were in the anthropological sense mestizos, were officially considered Creoles, and the children of Indian women and whites who lived in Indian villages were often considered by the authorities as Indians.

The tribes belonging to the linguistic groups of the Caribbean and Arawak also made up the population of the islands of the West Indies.

Formed by the Parana and Uruguay rivers, the estuary (widened mouth) is the Atlantic Ocean bay.

K. Marxi F. Engels, Works, vol. 21, p. 31.

The same, p. 408.

This was one of the Bahamas, according to most historians and geographers, the one that was later called Fr. Watling, and recently re-named San Salvador.

Later, they began to call the entire Spanish colony in Haiti and even the island itself.

Archives of Marx and Engels, vol. VII, p. 100.

The Travels of Christopher Columbus. Diaries, letters, documents, M.,. 1961, p. 461.

From the Spanish "el dorado" - "gilded". The idea of ​​Eldorado arose among the European conquerors, apparently on the basis of highly exaggerated information about some of the rituals common among the Chibcha Indian tribes inhabiting the northwest of South America, who, when electing the supreme leader, covered his body with gilding and brought gold and emeralds as a gift to their deities ...

That is, "solid land", in contrast to the islands of the West Indies. In a more limited sense, this term was used later to designate the part of the Isthmus of Panama adjacent to the South American mainland, which made up the territories of the Daria, Panama and Veraguas.

The last attempt of this kind was made in the 70s of the 18th century. the Spaniard Rodriguez.

About the fate of Santo Domingo at the turn of the XVIII-XIX centuries. see page 16 and chap. 3.

K. Marxi F. Engels, Works, vol. 4, p. 425.

WZ Foster, Essay on the Political History of America, Ed. foreign lit., 1953, p. 46.

This city was built on the site of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan, destroyed and burned by the Spaniards.

K. Marx and F. Engels, Works, vol. 23, p. 179.

Gachupins (Spanish) - "people with spurs", chapetons (Spanish) - literally "newcomers", "newcomers".

The history of the peoples of the American continent before their meeting with the Europeans in the 16th century. developed independently and almost without interaction with the history of the peoples of other continents. The written records of ancient America are very scarce, and the available ones have not yet been read. Therefore, the history of the American peoples has to be reconstructed mainly from archaeological and ethnographic data, as well as oral tradition recorded during the period of European colonization.

By the time the Europeans invaded America, the level of development of its peoples was not the same in different parts of the continent. The tribes of most of North and South America were at different stages of the primitive communal system, while the peoples of Mexico, Central America and the western part of South America were already developing class relations at that time; they created high civilizations. It was these peoples who first of all underwent conquest; Spanish conquerors in the 16th century destroyed their states and culture and enslaved them.

Initial settlement of America

America was settled from the North East Asia tribes related to the Mongoloids of Siberia. In their anthropological type, the American Indians and, to an even greater extent, the Eskimos who moved to America later, are similar to the population of North and East Asia and are part of the large Mongoloid race. The development of vast areas of the new continent with alien natural conditions, alien flora and fauna presented difficulties for the settlers, overcoming which required great efforts and a long time.

The resettlement could begin at the end of the Ice Age, when between Asia and America, obviously, there was a land bridge at the site of the present Bering Strait. In the post-glacial era, resettlement could also continue by sea. Judging by the geological and paleontological data, the settlement of America took place 25-20 thousand years before our time. Eskimos settled along the Arctic coast in the 1st millennium AD. e. or even later. The tribes of hunters and fishermen resettled by separate groups, whose material culture stood at the level of the Mesolithic, moved in search of prey, as can be concluded from archaeological sites, from north to south along the Pacific coast. The similarity of some elements of the culture of the indigenous population of South America with the culture of the peoples of Oceania gave rise to the theory of the settlement of the entire American continent from Oceania. There is no doubt that connections between Oceania and South America took place in antiquity and played a certain role in the settlement of this part of America. However, some similar elements of culture could develop independently, and the possibility of later borrowings is not excluded. For example, the sweet potato culture spread from South America to Oceania, and banana and sugarcane were introduced to America from Asia.

Ethnographic and linguistic data indicate that the movements of ancient Indian tribes took place over vast areas, and often tribes of one language families were settled between tribes of other language families. The main reason for these relocations was, obviously, the need to increase the land area with extensive farming (hunting, gathering). However, the chronology and concrete historical setting in which these migrations took place remain unreported as yet.

1. North America

By the beginning of the XVI century. the population of North America consisted of a large number of tribes and nationalities. According to the types of economy and historical and ethnographic community, they were divided into the following groups: coastal hunters and fishermen of the Arctic zone - Eskimos and Aleuts; fishermen and hunters of the northwest coast; hunters of the northern strip of present-day Canada; farmers of eastern and southeastern North America; buffalo hunters - prairie tribes; wild seed gatherers, fishermen and hunters are the tribes of California; peoples with developed irrigated agriculture in the southwest and south of North America.

Arctic coast tribes

The main industrial activity of the Eskimos was hunting for seals, walruses, whales, polar bears and arctic foxes, as well as fishing. The weapons were darts and harpoons with movable bone tips. A spear thrower was used. The fish was caught with fishing rods with bone hooks. The walrus and the seal provided the Eskimo with almost everything he needed: meat and fat were used for food, fat was also used for heating and lighting the dwelling, leather was used to cover the boat, and a canopy was made of it for the inside of the snow hut. Fur of bears and arctic foxes, deer and musk ox skins were used to make clothes and shoes.

The Eskimos ate most of their food raw, which protected them from scurvy. The name Eskimos comes from the Indian word "Eskimantiik", which means "eating raw meat."

Indians of the northwest coast

The Tlingits were typical of this group. Their main source of livelihood was fishing; salmon fish were their main food. The deficiency in plant food was compensated by the collection of wild berries and fruits, as well as algae. For each type of fish or sea animals, there were special harpoons, darts, spears, nets. The Tlingits used bone and stone polished tools. Of the metals they knew only copper, which they found in its native state; it was forged in a cold way. Embossed copper tiles served as a medium of exchange. Pottery was not known. Food was cooked in wooden vessels, throwing hot stones into the water.

This tribe had neither agriculture nor animal husbandry. The only domesticated animal was the dog, which was used for hunting. An interesting way the Tlingits obtained wool: they drove wild sheep and goats into fenced areas, sheared them and set them free again. Capes were woven from wool; later, shirts were made from woolen fabric.

The Tlingits lived part of the year by the ocean. Here they hunted sea animals, mainly sea otters. Houses were built of logs carved with stone adze, without windows, with a smoke hole in the roof and a small door. In the summer, the Tlingits climbed up the rivers to fish for salmon and to gather fruits in the forests.

The Tlingits, like the other Indians of the northwest coast, developed an exchange. Dry fish, crushed into powder, fish oil and furs were exchanged for cedar products, spearheads and arrowheads, as well as various decorations made of bone and stone. Prisoner-of-war slaves were also exchanged.

The main social unit of the northwestern tribes was the clan. The clans, named after the totem animals, were united in phratries. Individual tribes stood at different stages of the transition from the maternal to the paternal clan; among the Tlingits, at birth, the child received the name of the maternal clan, but in adolescence he was given a second name - according to the paternal clan. When the marriage was concluded, the groom worked for the bride's parents for a year or two, then the young went to the husband's clan. The particularly close relationship between the maternal uncle and nephews, partial maternal inheritance, the relatively free position of a woman - all these traits indicate that the tribes of the northwest coast retained significant remnants of matriarchy. There was a home community (barabora) that kept a common household. The development of exchange contributed to the accumulation of surpluses among the elders and leaders. Frequent wars and the capture of slaves further increased their wealth and power.

The presence of slavery is a characteristic feature of the social system of these tribes. The folklore of the Tlingits, like some other northwestern tribes, paints a picture of an embryonic form of slavery: slaves were in the possession of the entire tribal community, or rather its subdivisions, the barabora. These slaves — several per barrack — did housework and took part in fishing. It was patriarchal slavery with the collective ownership of prisoner-of-war slaves; slave labor did not constitute the basis of production, but played an auxiliary role in the economy.

Indians of eastern North America

The tribes of the eastern part of North America - the Iroquois, Muskog tribes, etc. - lived sedentary, were engaged in hoe farming, hunting and gathering. They made tools from wood, bone and stone, and used native copper, which was processed by cold forging. Iron was not known to them. Weapons were bow and arrows, stone-topped clubs and a tomahawk. The Algonquian word "tomahawk" was then called a curved wooden club with a spherical thickening at the combat end, sometimes with a bone tip.

The wigwam served as the dwelling of the coastal Algonquian tribes - a hut made from the trunks of young trees, the crowns of which were joined together. The domed skeleton formed in this way was covered with pieces of tree bark.

Among the tribes of eastern North America at the beginning of the 16th century. the primitive communal system prevailed.

The most typical of the entire group of eastern tribes were the Iroquois. The lifestyle and social structure of the Iroquois were described in the second half of the 19th century. the famous American scientist Lewis Morgan, who reconstructed the main features of their system before colonization.

The Iroquois lived around Lakes Erie and Ontario and on the Niagara River. The central part of what is now New York State was occupied by five Iroquois tribes: the Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, and Mohawks. Each tribe had a different dialect. The main source of existence of the Iroquois was hoe farming of the slash-and-burn type. The Iroquois grew corn (maize), beans, peas, sunflowers, watermelons, zucchini, and tobacco. They collected wild berries, nuts, chestnuts, acorns, edible roots and tubers, and mushrooms. Their favorite delicacy was maple juice, which was digested and consumed in the form of molasses or hardened sugar.

In the area of ​​the Great Lakes, the Indians collected wild rice, which formed dense thickets along the muddy shores. For harvesting they went by boat, moving with the help of long poles. The women sitting in the canoe grabbed bunches of rice stalks, bent their ears down and, hitting them with sticks, wrapped the grains that fell to the bottom of the boat.

Hunting for deer, elk, beaver, otter, marten and other forest animals played an important role. They received a lot of prey from driven hunting. In the spring and summer they were fishing.

Hoes and axes made of polished stone served as the tools of the Iroquois. Knives and arrowheads and spearheads were made of native copper. Pottery was developed, albeit without a potter's wheel. For the manufacture of clothing, the Iroquois processed hides, especially deer, making suede.

The so-called long houses were the home of the Iroquois. The basis of these houses was made up of wooden posts driven into the ground, to which plates of bark were tied with the help of bast ropes. Inside the house there was a central passage about 2 m wide; here, at a distance of about 6 m from one another, foci were located. There were holes in the roof above the hearths for smoke to escape. Wide platforms ran along the walls, fenced off on both sides by piers. Each married couple had a separate dormitory about 4 m long, open only to the hearth. For every four rooms, located opposite each other in pairs, one hearth was set up, on which food was cooked in a common cauldron. Usually in one such house there were 5-7 hearths. There were also common storerooms adjacent to the house.

The Long House clearly shows the character of the smallest social unit of the Iroquois, the Ovachira. Ovachira consisted of a group of blood relatives, the descendants of one progenitor. It was a matriarchal clan community in which production and consumption were collective.

The land - the main means of production - belonged to the clan as a whole, the Ovachirs used the plots allotted to them.

A man who married, went to live in the house of his wife's ovachira and took part in the household work of this community. He continued at the same time to maintain belonging to his ancestral community, performing social, religious and other duties with his relatives. The children belonged to the Ovachira and the mother's clan. The men hunted and fished together, cut down the forest and cleared the soil, built houses and fenced off the villages from enemies. The women of the Ovachira jointly cultivated the land, sowed and planted plants, reaped the harvest and put stocks in common pantries. The oldest woman was in charge of agricultural and household work, and she also distributed food supplies. Hospitality was widespread among the Iroquois. In an Iroquois village, there could be no hungry as long as there were supplies in at least one house.

All power within the ovachira belonged to women. The head of the ovachira was a ruler chosen by women mothers. In addition to the ruler, women-mothers chose a military leader and a "foreman for peacetime." The latter was called sachem by European authors, although "sachem" is an Algonquian word and the Iroquois did not use it. The rulers, sachems, and chieftains of war constituted the council of the tribe.

After the colonization of America began, but before the Iroquois came into contact with the Europeans, around 1570, five Iroquois tribes formed an alliance: the Iroquois League. Legend attributes her organization to the mythical Hiawatha. The League was headed by a council, which was made up of the sachems of the tribes. The council was attended not only by the sachems, but also by the ordinary members of the tribe. If an important issue was to be resolved, then the tribes of the League would gather entirely. The elders were seated by the fire, the rest were seated around. Everyone could participate in the discussion, but the final decision was made by the Council of the League; it had to be unanimous. Voting took place by tribe; each tribe thus had a veto. The discussion proceeded in strict order, with great solemnity. The Iroquois League reached its zenith in the 1770s.

Forest hunting tribes of Canada

In the forests of modern Canada lived tribes of several language families: the Athapaskan (Kuchina, Chaypewai), Algonquian (part of the Ojibwe-Chippewa, Montagnier-Nascapi, part of the Cree) and some others. The main occupation of these tribes was the hunt for caribou deer, elk, bear, wild sheep, etc. Fishing and collection of wild-growing seeds were of secondary importance. The main weapons of the forest tribes were bows and arrows, clubs, clubs, spears and stone-tipped knives. The Forest Indians had dogs, which they harnessed to a wooden useless sled - a toboggan; luggage was transported on them during the travels. In the summer they used birch bark shuttles.

The Indians of the forests of the North lived and hunted in groups representing tribal groups. During the winter, individual groups of hunters moved through the forest, and almost never met one another. In the summer, the groups gathered in the traditional places of summer camps, located along the banks of the rivers. Here there was an exchange of hunting products, tools and weapons, festivals were organized. Thus, inter-tribal ties were maintained, exchange trade developed.

Prairie indians

Numerous Indian tribes lived on the prairies. The most typical of them were the Dakotas, Comanches, Arapahs and Cheyens. Both of the tribes put up especially stubborn resistance to the European colonialists.

Despite belonging to different linguistic families, the Prairie Indians were united by common features of economic activity and culture. Their main source of livelihood was bison hunting. Bison provided meat and fat for food, fur and leather for clothes and shoes, and also for covering huts. The Prairie Indians hunted on foot, ( Only in the second half of the 18th century. the Indians have tamed the horse. Introduced once by the first colonists from Europe, these animals, partially feral, formed herds of so-called mustangs. The Indians caught and circled them.) with dogs using a bow and arrow. The hunt was collective. Individual hunting was prohibited. The one who violated the ban was severely punished.

The Prairie Indians did not know metal; they used stone axes and hammers, flint knives, scrapers and arrowheads. Military weapons were bows, spears and clubs with stone pommels. They used round and oval shields made of bison skin.

Most of the prairie tribes were dwelling in a conical buffalo tent. In the camp, which was a temporary settlement, tents were set up in a circle - this way it was more convenient to repel sudden attacks of enemies. A tribal council tent was erected in the center.

The Prairie Indians lived in tribes, divided into clans. At the time of the arrival of the Europeans, some of the tribes still had a matriarchal organization. Others have already completed the transition to the paternal family.

California indians

The Californian Indians were one of the most backward indigenous groups in North America. A characteristic feature of this group was extreme ethnic and linguistic fragmentation; the tribes of California belonged to several dozen small linguistic groups.

The Indians of California did not know either settling or farming. They lived by hunting, fishing and gathering. The Californians invented a way to remove tannin from acorn flour and bake tortillas from it; they also learned how to remove poison from the tubers of the so-called soap root. They hunted deer and small game with bows and arrows. Hunting by corral was used. The Californians had two types of dwelling. In the summer they lived mainly under canopies of branches covered with leaves, or in conical huts made of poles covered with bark or branches. In winter, semi-underground domed dwellings were built. Californians wove waterproof baskets from young tree shoots or roots, in which they boiled meat and fish: the water poured into the basket was brought to a boil by immersing hot stones in it.

The Californians were dominated by the primitive communal system. The tribes were divided into exogamous phratries and clans. The tribal community, as an economic collective, owned a common hunting territory and fishing grounds. Californians retained significant elements of the maternal gender: the large role of women in production, the maternal account of kinship, etc.

Indians of Southwest North America

The most typical of this group were the Pueblo tribes. Archaeological data allow us to trace the history of the Pueblo Indians to the first centuries of our era. In the VIII century. the Pueblo Indians were already engaged in agriculture and created a system of artificial irrigation. They planted corn, beans, pumpkin and cotton. They had developed pottery, but without a potter's wheel. The ceramics was distinguished by the beauty of the form and the richness of the ornament. They used a loom and made fabrics from cotton fiber.

The Spanish word "pueblo" means a village, a community. The Spanish conquerors gave this name to a group of Indian tribes after the villages that struck them, which were one common dwelling. The pueblo's dwelling consisted of a single mud brick building, the outer wall of which enclosed the entire village, making it inaccessible to outside attack. The living quarters descended in ledges into the fenced yard, forming terraces, so that the roof of the lower row served as a courtyard area for the upper one. Another type of pueblo dwelling is caves dug in the rocks, also descending in ledges. Up to a thousand people lived in each of these villages.

In the middle of the 16th century, during the invasion of the Spanish conquerors, the Pueblo villages were communities, each of which had its own territory with irrigated lands and hunting grounds. The cultivated land was distributed among the clans. In the XVI-XVII centuries. maternal gender still predominated. The clan was headed by the "oldest mother" who, along with the male military leader, regulated intra-clan relationships. The household was run by a consanguineous group, which consisted of the woman - the head of the group, her single and widowed brothers, her daughters, as well as the husband of this woman and the husbands of her daughters. The household used a plot of ancestral land allotted to him, as well as a granary.

Spiritual culture of the Indians of North America

The dominance of tribal relations was reflected in the religion of the Indians - in their totemistic beliefs. The word "totem" in the language of the Algonquins literally meant "his kind." Animals or plants, according to the names of which the genera were named, were considered a totem. Totems were considered, as it were, relatives of members of a given genus, having a common origin with them from mythical ancestors.

The beliefs of the Indians were permeated with animistic ideas. The more advanced tribes had a rich mythology; from the host of nature spirits, the supreme spirits were singled out, who were credited with ruling the world and the destinies of people. Shamanism prevailed in cult practice.

The Indians knew well the starry sky, the location of the planets and were guided by them in their travels. Having studied the surrounding flora, the Indians not only consumed wild plants and fruits for food, but also used them as medicines.

The modern American pharmacopoeia borrowed a lot from traditional Indian medicine.

The artistic creativity of the North American Indians, in particular their folklore, was very rich. In fairy tales and songs, the nature and life of the Indians were poetically depicted. Although the heroes of these legends were often animals and the forces of nature, their life was depicted by analogy with human society.

In addition to poetry, the Indians also had historical legends that were told by the elders at meetings. Among the Iroquois, for example, when a new sachem was approved, one of the elders told the audience about the events of the past. During the story, he went through the drops of white and purple beads, carved from shells, fastened in the form of wide stripes or sewn in the form of a pattern onto strips of fabric. Known to Europeans under the Algonquian name of wampum, these stripes were commonly used as decorations. They were worn in the form of belts or shoulder straps. But the wampum also played the role of a mnemonic means: when speaking, the speaker ran his hand over the pattern formed by beads, and, as it were, recalled distant events. Wampum was also transmitted through messengers and ambassadors to neighboring tribes as a sign of authority, served as a kind of symbol of trust and commitment not to break promises.

The Indians developed a system of conventional signs with the help of which they conveyed messages. Signs carved on the bark of trees or composed of branches and stones, the Indians provided the necessary information. Over long distances, messages were transmitted using fires, smoking during the day, and burning with a bright flame at night.

The pinnacle of the spiritual culture of the Indians of North America was their rudimentary writing - pictography, picture writing. The Dakotas made up annals or calendars painted on leather; the drawings conveyed in chronological order the events that took place in a given year.

2. South and Central America, Mexico

Large areas of South America were inhabited by tribes with primitive technology belonging to various linguistic families. Such were the fishermen and gatherers of Tierra del Fuego, the hunters of the steppes of Patagonia, the so-called pampas, the hunters and gatherers of eastern Brazil, the hunters and farmers of the forests of the Amazon and Orinoco basin.

Fire-dwellers

Fire-dwellers were among the most backward tribes in the world. The Tierra del Fuego archipelago was inhabited by three groups of Indians: Selknam (she), Alakalufs, Yamana (Yagans).

Selknam lived in the northern and eastern parts of Tierra del Fuego. They hunted the guanaco llama and collected the fruits and roots of wild plants. Their weapons were bow and arrows. The islands of the western part of the archipelago were inhabited by Alakalufs, who were engaged in fishing and collecting molluscs. In search of food, they spent most of their lives in wooden boats, moving along the coast. Hunting for birds with bows and arrows played a lesser role in their lives.

Yamana lived by collecting shellfish, fishing, hunting seals and other marine animals, as well as birds. Their tools were made of bone, stone and shells. A bone harpoon with a long belt served as a weapon in the marine industry.

Yamana lived in separate clans called ukur. This word denoted both the dwelling and the community of relatives living in it. In the absence of members of a given community, their hut could be occupied by members of another community. The gathering of many communities was rare, mostly when the sea washed up a dead whale; then, provided with food for a long time, the yamans organized festivities. In the Yaman community, there was no stratification, the oldest members of the group did not use power over their relatives. A special position was occupied only by healers, who were credited with the ability to influence the weather and heal from diseases.

Pampa Indians

By the time of the European invasion, the Pampa Indians were walking wandering hunters. ( In the middle of the 18th century, the inhabitants of the Pampa - Patagonians began to use horses for hunting.) The main object of hunting and a source of food were guanacos, which were hunted with a bol - a bundle of belts with weights attached to them. There were no permanent villages among the pampa hunters; in temporary camps, they erected tent-sheds of 40-50 guanaco skins, which served as housing for the entire community. The clothes were made of leather; the main part of the costume was a fur cloak, which was pulled together at the waist with a belt.

The Patagonians lived and roamed in small groups of blood relatives, uniting 30-40 married couples with their offspring. The power of the leader of the community was reduced to the right to give orders during the transitions and on the hunt; the chiefs hunted along with others. The hunt itself was of a collective nature.

In the religious beliefs of the Pampa Indians, animistic beliefs occupied a significant place. The Patagonians inhabited the world with spirits; the cult of deceased relatives was especially developed.

The Araucans lived in southern central Chile. Influenced by the Quechua tribes, the Araucanians were engaged in agriculture and bred llamas. They developed the dressing of fabrics from the wool of the llama-guanaco, pottery and the processing of silver. The southern tribes were engaged in hunting and fishing. The Araucanians became famous for their stubborn resistance to European conquerors for over 200 years. ( In 1773, the independence of Araucania was recognized by the Spaniards. Only in late XIX v. the colonialists took possession of the main territory of the Araucanians.)

East Brazilian Indians

The tribes of the group that lived on the territory of Eastern and Southern Brazil - Botocuda, Canella, Kayapo, Shawanty, Kaingang and others, smaller, were mainly engaged in hunting and gathering, making transitions in search of game and edible plants. The most typical of this group were the Botocuds, or Boruns, who inhabited the coast before the invasion of the European colonialists, and were later driven into the interior of the country. Their main tool was a bow, with which they hunted not only small animals, but also fish. The women were gathering. The habitation of the Botocuds was a wind barrier, covered with palm leaves, common to the entire nomad. Instead of dishes, they used wicker baskets. A peculiar decoration of the botocuda were small wooden discs inserted into the cuts of the lips - "botoka" in Portuguese. Hence the name botocuda.

The social structure of the Botocuds and tribes close to them is still poorly studied. It is known, however, that in their group marriage, the relationship between the sexes was regulated by the laws of exogamy. The Botocuda maintained a maternal account of kinship.

In the XVI century. "Forest Indians" of Brazil resisted the Portuguese invaders, but it was suppressed.

Amazon and Orinoco rainforest Indians

During the initial period of European colonization, numerous tribes lived in the northeastern and central parts of South America, belonging to different linguistic groups, mainly to the Arawaks, Tupi-Guarani and Caribs. They were mainly engaged in slash farming and lived sedentary.

In a tropical forest, wood was the main material for making tools and weapons. But these tribes also had polished stone axes, which served as one of the main objects of inter-tribal exchange, since there were no suitable stone rocks on the territory of some tribes. Bone, shells, and forest fruit shells were also used to make tools. Arrowheads were made from animal teeth and sharpened bones, bamboo, stone, and wood; the arrows were feathering. An ingenious invention of the Indians of the tropical forests of South America was the arrow-throwing tube, the so-called sarbakan, which was also known to the tribes of the Malacca Peninsula.

For fishing, boats were built from bark and single-wood dugouts. Weaved nets, nets, top and other tackle. They beat the fish with a prison, shot at it with bows. Having achieved great art in weaving, these tribes used a wicker bunk - a hammock. This invention, under its Indian name, was distributed all over the world. To the Indians of the tropical forests of South America, mankind is also indebted to the discovery of the medicinal properties of the cinchona bark and the vomit root of the ipecacuanha.

The rainforest tribes were engaged in slash-and-burn agriculture. The men prepared the plots, made fires at the roots of trees, and chopped down the trunk with stone axes. After the trees dried up, they were felled, the branches were burned. Ash served as a fertilizer. The landing time was determined by the position of the stars. The women loosened the ground with knotty sticks or sticks with the shoulder bones of small animals and shells planted on them. They cultivated a root crop of cassava, corn, sweet potatoes, beans, tobacco, and cotton. Forest Indians learned how to cleanse cassava from poison by squeezing out the juice containing hydrocyanic acid, drying and frying flour.

The Indians of the Amazon and Orinoco Basin lived in tribal communities and had a common household. For many tribes, each community occupied one large dwelling, which made up the entire village. Such a dwelling was a round or rectangular structure, covered with palm leaves or branches. The walls were made of pillars intertwined with branches, they were covered with mats and plastered over. In this collective dwelling, each family had its own hearth. Hunting and fishing grounds were collectively owned by the community. The products obtained from hunting and fishing were shared among everyone. Before the invasion of the Europeans, the majority of the tribes were dominated by the maternal clan, however, a transition to the paternal clan was already outlined. Each village was a self-governing community with an elder leader. These tribes by the beginning of the 16th century. there was still not only a union of tribes, but also a common intra-tribal organization.

The artistic creativity of the described Indian tribes was expressed in dances performed to the sounds of primitive musical instruments (horns, flutes), in games that imitated the habits of animals and birds. Love for adornments manifested itself in painting the body with a complex pattern using plant juices and in the manufacture of elegant attire from multi-colored feathers, teeth, nuts, seeds, etc.

Ancient peoples of Mexico and Central America

The peoples of the southern part of the northern continent and Central America have created a developed agricultural culture and, on its basis, a high civilization.

Archeological data, finds of stone tools and the skeleton of a fossil man, indicate that man appeared on the territory of Mexico 15-20 thousand years ago.

Central America is one of the earliest cultivated areas for corn, beans, pumpkins, tomatoes, green peppers, cocoa, cotton, agave, and tobacco.

The population was unevenly distributed. Sedentary agricultural areas - in central Mexico and the highlands of southern Mexico - were densely populated. In areas with a predominance of switch farming (for example, in the Yucatan), the population was more dispersed. Large areas of northern Mexico and southern California were rarely inhabited by roving hunting and gathering tribes.

The history of the tribes and peoples of Mexico and Yucatan is known from archaeological finds, as well as from the Spanish chronicles of the times of the conquest.

The archaeological period of the so-called Early Cultures (up to the 3rd century BC) was the Neolithic period, the period of gathering, hunting and fishing, the time of the dominance of the primitive communal system. In the period of the Middle cultures (III century BC - IV century AD), agriculture arose in the form of slash-and-burn, shifting During this period, differences in the level of development of tribes and peoples of different parts of Mexico and Yucatan begin to make themselves felt ... In central and southern Mexico and in the Yucatan, class societies already emerged during this period. But development did not stop there. On the verge of our era, the peoples of these regions of America rose to a higher level.

Mayan

The Maya are the only people in America to have left written records.

At the beginning of our era in the southern part of Yucatan, northeast of Lake Peten Itza, the first city-states began to form. Oldest famous monument- a stone stele in the city of Vashaktun - dated 328 AD. e. Somewhat later, cities arose in the valley of the Womasinta River - Yaxchilan, Palenque and in the extreme south of Yucatan - Copan and Quirigua. The inscriptions here are dated to the 5th and early 6th centuries. From the end of the IX century. dated inscriptions are cut off. From this time oldest cities Maya ceased to exist. Further Maya history developed in the north of Yucatan.

The main type of Maya production was slash-and-burn agriculture. The forest was cleared with stone axes, and thick trees only cut or ripped off their bark in a ring-like manner; the trees dried up on the vine. The dried and fallen forest was burned out before the onset of the rainy season, which was determined by astronomical observations. Just before the rains began, the fields were sown. The land was not cultivated in any way, the farmer only made a hole with a sharp stick and buried the grains of corn and beans in it. The crops were protected from birds and animals. The corn cobs were tilted downward to dry in the field and then harvested.

On the same plot, it was possible to sow in a row no more than three times, since the yield was increasingly decreasing. The abandoned area was overgrown, and after 6-10 years it was again burned out, preparing for sowing. Abundance free land and the high productivity of maize provided farmers with significant wealth, even with such a primitive technique.

The Maya obtained animal food from hunting and fishing. They had no pets. Birds were hunted using throwing pipes that shot clay balls. Flint-tipped darts were also used as combat weapons. The bow and arrow of the Maya were borrowed from the Mexicans. From Mexico, they received copper hatchets.

There were no ores in the Mayan country and metallurgy could not arise. From Mexico, Panama, Colombia and Peru, objects of art and jewelry were delivered to them - precious stones, shells and metal products. The Maya made fabrics from cotton or agave fibers on a loom. Ceramic vessels were decorated with convex molding and painting.

Intensive exchange trade was carried out within the Maya country and with neighboring peoples. In exchange came agricultural products, cotton yarn and fabrics, weapons, stone products - knives, arrowheads, mortars. From the coast came salt and fish, from the central part of the peninsula - corn, honey, fruits. Slaves were also replaced. Cocoa beans were the universal equivalent; there was even a rudimentary credit system.

Although fabrics and vessels were made mainly by farmers, there were already skilled artisans, especially goldsmiths, stone carvers, and embroiderers. There were also merchants who delivered goods over long distances by water and overland, with the help of porters. Columbus met off the coast of Honduras a dugout boat from Yucatan, loaded with fabrics, cocoa and metal products.

The inhabitants of the Mayan village constituted the neighboring community; usually its members were people with different generic names. The land belonged to the community. Each family received a plot of land cleared from the forest, after three years this plot was replaced by another. Each family collected and stored the harvest separately, and she could exchange it. Apiaries and perennial plantings remained in the permanent ownership of individual families. Other work - hunting, fishing, salt extraction - was done together, but the food was shared.

In Maya society, there was already a division into free and slaves. The slaves were mostly prisoners of war. Some of them were sacrificed to the gods, others were left as slaves. There was also the enslavement of criminals, as well as the debt slavery of fellow tribesmen. The debtor remained a slave until his relatives ransomed him. Slaves performed the most difficult work, built houses, carried luggage and served the noble. Sources do not make it possible to clearly determine in which branch of production and to what extent slave labor was predominantly used. The dominant class was the slave-owners - nobles, high military men and priests. The noble ones were called almskhen (literally - "the son of father and mother"). They owned plots of land as private property.

The rural community performed duties in relation to the nobles and priests: the community members cultivated their fields, built houses and roads, delivered them various supplies and products, in addition, maintained a military detachment and paid taxes to the supreme power. In the community, stratification was already outlined: there were richer and poorer members of the community.

The Maya had a patriarchal family that owned property. To get a wife, a man had to work for her family for some time, then she went to her husband.

The supreme ruler of the city-state was called khalach-vinik (“ great person"); his power was unlimited and hereditary. The high priest was the advisor to the ha-lach-viyik. The villages were ruled by his governors - the batabs. The position of the batab was lifelong; he was obliged to unquestioningly obey the halach-vinik and coordinate his actions with the priests and two or three advisers who were with him. The batabes monitored the fulfillment of duties and exercised judicial power. During the war, the batab was the commander of a detachment in his village.

In the Mayan religion, by the beginning of the 16th century. ancient beliefs receded into the background. By this time, the priests had already created a complex theological system with cosmogonic myths, made up their own pantheon and established a magnificent cult. The personification of heaven - the god Itzamna was placed at the head of the host of celestials along with the goddess of fertility. Itzamna was considered the patron saint of the Mayan civilization, he was credited with the invention of writing. According to the teachings of the Mayan priests, the gods ruled the world one by one, replacing each other in power. " The Maya religious beliefs also included primitive figurative representations of nature (for example, it rains because the gods pour water from four giant jugs placed in the four corners of the sky). The priests also created the doctrine of the afterlife, corresponding to the social division of the Mayan society; the priests assigned themselves a special, third heaven. Fortune-telling, prophecies, oracles played the main role in the cult.

The Maya developed a number system; they had a twenty-digit score that arose from finger counting (20 fingers).

Maya achieved significant success in astronomy. Sunny year was calculated by them with an accuracy of one minute. Mayan Astronomers Calculated Time solar eclipses, they knew the periods of rotation of the moon and planets. In addition to astronomy, the priests were familiar with the rudiments of meteorology, botany and some other sciences. The Mayan calendar was in the hands of the priests, but it was based on the practical division of the year into seasons of agricultural work. The main units of time were a 13-day week, a 20-day month, and a 365-day year. The largest unit of chronology was the 52-year cycle - "calendar circle". The Mayan chronology was conducted from the initial date corresponding to 3113 BC. e.

The Maya attached great importance to history, the development of which was associated with the invention of writing - the highest achievement of Mayan culture. Writing, like the calendar, was invented by the Maya in the first centuries of our era. In the Maya manuscripts, the text and figures illustrating it run parallel. Although writing has already separated from painting, some written signs differ little from drawings. The Maya were painted on paper made from ficus bast with paints using brushes.

Maya writing is hieroglyphic, and, as in all similar writing systems, it uses phonetic signs of three kinds - alphabetic and syllabic, ideographic - denoting whole words and key ones - explaining the meaning of words, but not readable. ( Maya writing remained undeciphered until recently. The basics of decoding it have been discovered recently.) Writing was entirely in the hands of the priests, who used it to write myths, theological texts and prayers, as well as historical chronicles and epic texts. ( The Mayan manuscripts were destroyed by the Spanish conquerors in the 16th century, only three manuscripts survived. Some fragmentary texts have survived, albeit in a distorted form, in books written in Latin letters during the colonial period - the so-called Chilam Balam books ("Books of the Jaguar Prophet").)

In addition to books, written monuments of Mayan history are inscriptions carved on stone walls that the Maya erected every 20 years, as well as on the walls of palaces and temples.

Until now, the main sources of Mayan history were the works of Spanish chroniclers of the 16th-17th centuries. The Mayan Chronicles, written by the Spaniards, report that in the 5th century. there was a "minor invasion" on the east coast of Yucatan, here came "the people from the east." It is possible that these were immigrants from the cities near Lake Peten Itza. At the turn of the 5th-6th centuries, the city of Chichen Itza was founded in the center of the northern part of the peninsula. In the 7th century, the inhabitants of Chichen Itza left this city and moved to the southwestern part of Yucatan. In the middle of the X century. their new homeland was attacked by immigrants from Mexico, apparently the Toltec people. After that, the “Itza people”, as the chronicle further calls them, returned to Chichen Itza. The Itza people of the 10th century. were a mixed Maya-Mexican group formed as a result of the Toltec invasion. For about 200 years, the descendants of the Toltec conquerors ruled in Chichen Itza. During this period, Chichen Itza was the largest cultural center, majestic architectural monuments were erected here. The second most important city at that time was Uxmal, which also had magnificent buildings. In the X century. not far from Chichen Itza, another city-state arose - Mayapan, which did not experience the Toltec influence. By the XII this city had reached great power. Hunak Keel, who seized power in the Maya Pan, invaded Chichen Itza in 1194 and seized the city. The Itza people rallied and captured the Mayapan in 1244. They settled in this city, mingling with their recent opponents, and, as the chronicle says, "since then they are called Maya." Power in Mayapan was seized by the Kokom dynasty; its representatives robbed and enslaved the people with the help of Mexican mercenaries. In 1441, the inhabitants of the cities dependent on Mayapan revolted, led by the ruler of Uxmal. Mayapan was captured. According to the chronicle, "those who were inside the walls were driven out by those who were outside the walls." A period of civil strife has begun. The rulers of cities in different parts of the country "made each other's food tasteless." So, Chel (one of the rulers), having occupied the coast, did not want to give any fish or salt to Kokom, and Kokom did not allow to deliver game and fruits to Chel.

Part of one of the Mayan temple buildings in Chichen Itza, the so-called "House of the Nuns". The era of the "New Kingdom"

Mayapan after 1441 was significantly weakened, and after the epidemic of 1485 it was completely deserted. Part of the Maya - Itza people settled in the impenetrable forests near Lake Peten Itza and built the city of Tah Itza (Tayya Sal), which remained inaccessible to the Spaniards until 1697. The rest of Yucatan was captured in 1541-1546. European conquerors who suppressed the heroic Mayan resistance.

The Maya created a high culture that dominated Central America. Their architecture, sculpture and fresco painting achieved significant development. One of the most remarkable monuments of art is the Bonampak temple, opened in 1946. Under the influence of Mayan hieroglyphics, writing arose among the Toltecs and Zapotecs. The Mayan calendar spread to Mexico.

Toltecs of Teotihuacan

In the valley of Mexico City, according to legend, the first large people were the Toltecs. Back in the 5th century. The Toltecs created their own civilization, famous for the monumental architectural structures of the Toltecs, whose kingdom existed until the 10th century, belonged in language to the Nahua group. Their largest center was Teotihuacan, the ruins of which have survived to the present day northeast of Lake Teshkoko. The Toltecs already cultivated all those plants that the Spaniards found in Mexico. They made thin fabrics from cotton fiber, their vessels were distinguished by a variety of shapes and artistic painting. The weapons were wooden spears and clubs with inserts made of obsidian (volcanic glass). From obsidian you used to sharpen knives. In large villages, bazaars were organized every 20 days, where exchange trade was conducted.

Statue of Chak Mool in front of the "Temple of Wars" Chichen Itza

Teotihuacan, whose ruins cover an area of ​​5 km in length and about 3 km in width, was all built up with stately buildings, apparently palaces and temples. They were built from hewn stone slabs, fastened with cement. The walls were covered with plaster. The entire territory of the settlement is paved with gypsum slabs. Temples rise on truncated pyramids; The so-called Pyramid of the Sun has a base of 210 m and rises to a height of 60 m. The pyramids were built of adobe bricks and faced with stone slabs, and sometimes plastered. Near the Pyramid of the Sun, buildings with mica floors and well-preserved frescoes have been discovered. The latter depict people playing ball with sticks in their hands, ritual scenes and mythical subjects. In addition to painting, temples were richly decorated with sculptures made of hewn and polished porphyry and jade, depicting symbolic zoomorphic creatures, for example, a feathered snake - a symbol of the god of wisdom. Teotihuacan was undoubtedly an iconic center.

Residential settlements are still poorly researched. A few kilometers from Teotihuac-na are the remains of one-story houses made of adobe bricks. Each of them consists of 50-60 rooms located around courtyards and connected by passages. Obviously, these were the dwellings of family communities.

The social structure of the Toltecs is unclear Judging by the differences in clothing and jewelry made of gold and silver, jade and porphyry, the nobility differed greatly from the ordinary members of society; the position of the priesthood was especially privileged. The construction of huge, richly decorated cult centers required the labor of masses of communes and slaves, probably from prisoners of war.

The Toltecs had a writing system, apparently, hieroglyphic; signs of this writing are found in the painting on vases. No other written monuments have survived. The Toltec calendar was similar to the Mayan calendar.

Tradition lists nine Toltec kings who ruled between the 5th and 10th centuries, and reports that during the reign of the ninth king Topiltsin in the 10th century, due to local uprisings, foreign invasions and disasters caused by hunger and plague, the kingdom collapsed, many moved to the south - in Tabasco and Guatemala, and the rest disappeared among the aliens.

The time of the Teotihuacan Toltecs is noted by the common culture of the population of the Anahuac plateau. At the same time, the Toltecs were associated with the peoples located to the south of them - the Zapotecs, the Mayans, and even, through them, with the peoples of South America; This is evidenced by the finds of Pacific shells in the valley of Mexico and the spread of a special style of painting vessels, probably originating from South America.

Zapoteki

Under the influence of the culture of Teotihuacan were the people of southern Mexico - the Zapotecs. Near the city of Oaxaca, where the capital of the Zapotecs was, preserved monuments of architecture and sculptures that speak of the existence of a developed culture and a pronounced social differentiation among the Zapotecs. The complex and rich burial cult, which can be judged from the tombs, testifies to the fact that the nobility and the priesthood were in a privileged position. The sculptures on ceramic burial urns are interesting for the depiction of the clothes of noble persons, in particular the magnificent headdresses and grotesque masks.

Other peoples of Mexico

The influence of the Teotihuacan Toltec culture spread to another large cult center located southeast of Lake Teshkoko-Cholulu. The group of temples created here in antiquity was later rebuilt into one grand pyramid-platform with altars erected on it. The Cholul pyramid is located on a hill lined with stone slabs. It is the largest architectural structure in the ancient world. Cholula's painted ceramics are rich, varied and carefully finished.

With the decline of the Toltec culture, the influence of the Mixtecs from the Puebla region, located southeast of Lake Teshkoko, penetrated the valley of Mexico City. Therefore, the period from the beginning of the XII century. is called Misteca Puebla. During this period, cultural centers of a smaller scale emerged. Such, for example, was the city of Teshcoco on the eastern shore of the Mexican lakes, which retained its importance even during the Spanish conquest. There were archives of pictographic manuscripts, on the basis of which, using oral traditions, the Mexican historian, Aztec by origin, Ishtlilpochitl (1569-1649) wrote his history of ancient Mexico. He reports that around 1300 two new tribes settled on the territory of Teshkoko, who came from the Mixtek region.They brought with them writing, a more developed art of weaving and pottery. The ruler Teshkoko Kinatsin subdued about 70 neighboring tribes, who paid him tribute. Kuluakan was a serious rival of Teshkoko. In the struggle of the Kuluakans against the Teshkoks, the tenochk tribe, friendly to the Kuluakans, played an important role.

Aztecs

According to legend, the tenochki, which originated from one of the tribes of the Nahua group, originally lived on the island (now believed to be in Western Mexico). This mythical homeland of the tenochka was called Astlan; hence the name Aztecs, more correctly astek. B first quarter of the XII century. the tenochki began their journey. At this time, they retained a primitive communal system. In 1248 they settled in the Valley of Mexico in Chapultepec and were subordinate to the Coulois tribe for some time. In 1325, the tenochki founded the settlement of Tenochtitlan on the islands of Lake Teshkoko. For about 100 years, tenochki were dependent on the Tepanec tribe, paying tribute to it. At the beginning of the 15th century. their military power has increased. Around 1428, under the leadership of the leader Itzcoatl, they won a number of victories over their neighbors - the Teshkoko and Tlakopan tribes, entered into an alliance with them and formed a confederation of three tribes. The Tenochki have taken the leading position in this confederation. The Confederation fought against the hostile tribes that surrounded it from all sides. Her domination somewhat extended beyond the Mexico City Valley.

The tenochki, who merged with the inhabitants of the Mexico City Valley, who spoke the same language as the tenochki (the Nahuatl language), quickly developed class relations. Tenochki, who adopted the culture of the inhabitants of the Valley of Mexico City, went down in history under the name of the Aztecs. Thus, the Aztecs were not so much creators as inheritors of the culture called after them. From the second quarter of the 15th century. the flourishing of the Aztec society and the development of its culture begins.

Aztec economy

The main branch of production of the Aztecs was irrigated agriculture. They created the so-called floating gardens - small artificial islands; At the swampy shores of the lake, liquid earth with mud was dug out, it was collected in heaps on rafts of reeds and trees were planted here, fixing the islets thus formed with their roots. In this way, useless wetlands were transformed into vegetable gardens, traversed by canals. In addition to corn, which served as the main food, beans, pumpkins, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, agave, figs, cocoa, tobacco, cotton, as well as cacti were planted; cochineal was bred on the latter - insects that emit a purple dye, A kind of mash - pulque was made from agave juice; besides her, her favorite drink was chocolate, which was cooked with pepper. ( The word "chocolate" itself is of Aztec origin.) Agave fiber was used for strings and ropes, and sacking was also woven from it. The Aztecs obtained rubber from Vera Cruz and guayula juice from northern Mexico; they made balls for ritual games.

From the peoples of Central America through the Aztecs, Europe received crops of corn, cocoa, tomatoes; from the Aztecs, Europeans learned about the properties of rubber.

The Aztecs bred turkeys, geese, ducks. The only domestic animal was a dog. Dog meat is also halo food. The hunt did not play any significant role.

Labor tools were made of wood and stone. Obsidian blades and points worked particularly well; flint knives were also used. The main weapons were bow and arrows, then darts with throwing boards.

The Aztecs did not know iron. Copper mined in nuggets was forged and also cast by melting a wax mold. Gold was cast in the same way. In the art of casting, forging and minting gold, the Aztecs achieved great skill. Bronze appeared late in Mexico and was used for religious and luxury items.

Aztec weaving and embroidery stand in a row best achievements in this area. Especially famous is the Aztec embroidery with feathers. The Aztecs achieved great skill in ceramics with complex geometric patterns, stone carving and mosaics of precious stones, jade, turquoise, etc.

The Aztecs had a developed exchange trade. Spanish soldier Bernal Diaz del Castillo described the main market in Tenochtitlan. He was amazed by the huge mass of the people and the huge number of products and supplies. All goods were placed in special rows. At the edge of the market, near the fence of the temple pyramid, there were sellers of golden sand, which was kept in the shafts of goose feathers. A rod of a certain length served as a unit of exchange. Pieces of copper and tin played a similar role; cocoa beans were used for small transactions.

The social structure of the Aztecs

The Aztec capital Tenochtitlan was divided into 4 districts (meykaotl) with elders at the head. Each of these districts was divided into 5 quarters - kal'pulli. Calpulli were originally patriarchal clans, and the meikaotli that united them were phratries. By the time of the Spanish conquest, a home community lived in one dwelling - the Sencalli, a large patriarchal family of several generations. The land belonging to the whole tribe was divided into plots, each of which was cultivated by the home community. In addition, each village had land allocated for the maintenance of priests, military leaders, and special "military lands", the harvest from which went to supply the soldiers.

The land was cultivated jointly, but upon marriage, the man received an allotment for personal use. The allotments, like the entire land of the community, were inalienable.

Aztec society was divided into classes of free and slave. Slaves were not only prisoners of war, but also debtors who fell into slavery (until they worked off their debt), as well as the poor who sold themselves or their children, and those who were expelled from the communities. Diaz reports that the slave line in the main market was no less than the Lisbon slave market. The slaves wore collars attached to flexible poles. Sources do not indicate in which branches of labor the slaves were employed; most likely, they were used in the construction of large structures, palaces and temples, as well as artisans, porters, servants, and musicians. On the conquered lands, the military leaders received tributaries as trophies, whose position resembled the position of serfs - tlamayti (literally - "land hands"). A group of free artisans has already appeared, selling the products of their labor. True, they continued to live in the ancestral quarters and did not stand out from the common households.

Thus, along with the remnants of communal relations and the absence of private ownership of land, there was slavery and private ownership of agricultural products and crafts, as well as slaves.

Each calpulli was headed by a council, which included elected elders. The elders and leaders of the phratries formed a tribal council, or a council of chiefs, which included the main military leader of the Aztecs, who had two titles: "leader of the brave" and "orator".

The question of determining the social structure of the Aztecs has its own history. The Spanish chroniclers, describing Mexico, called it a kingdom, and the head of the Aztec union, Montezuma, captured by the Spaniards, they called the emperor. The view of ancient Mexico as a feudal monarchy prevailed until the middle of the 19th century. Based on the study of the chronicles and descriptions of Bernal Diaz, Morgan came to the conclusion that Montezuma was the leader of the tribe, not a monarch, and that the Aztecs retained a tribal system.

However, Morgan, polemically strengthening the significance of the elements of the tribal organization preserved among the Aztecs, undoubtedly overestimated their share. The data of the latest research, mainly archaeological, indicate that the society of the Aztecs in the XVI century. was class, that private property and relations of domination and subordination existed in it; the state arose. With all this, it is undoubted that many remnants of the primitive communal system were preserved in the Aztec society.

Aztec religion and culture

The Aztec religion reflected the process of transition from a tribal system to a class society. In their pantheon, along with personifications of the forces of nature (god of rain, god of clouds, goddess of corn, gods of flowers), personifications of social forces also appear. Huitzilopochtli - the patron god of the tenochki - was revered both as the god of the sun and as the god of war. The most complex is the image of Quetzalcoatl, the ancient deity of the Toltecs. He was depicted as a feathered serpent. This is the image of a benefactor god who taught people agriculture and crafts. According to the myth, he retired to the east, from where he must return.

The Aztec ritual included human sacrifice.

The Aztecs, partly under the influence of the Toltecs, developed a writing system that was transitional from pictography to hieroglyphics. Historical legends and myths were captured with realistic drawings and partly symbols. The description of the wandering of the tenochki from the mythical homeland in the manuscript known as the "Codex of Boturini" is indicative. The clans into which the tribe was divided are indicated by drawings of houses (in basic elements) with family coats of arms. The date is marked with the image of a flint - "the year of one flint". But in some cases, the sign depicting an object already had a phonetic meaning. From the Maya, through the Toltecs, the chronology and calendar came to the Aztecs.

The most significant works of Aztec architecture that have survived to this day are the stepped pyramids and temples decorated with bas-reliefs. Sculpture and especially painting of the Aztecs are magnificent historical monument, since they reproduce the living life of the carriers of the Aztec culture.

Ancient peoples of the Andes region

The Andes region is one of the significant centers of ancient irrigated agriculture. The oldest monuments of a developed agricultural culture here date back to the 1st millennium BC. e., its beginning should be attributed to approximately 2000 years earlier.

The coast at the foot of the Andes was devoid of moisture: there are no rivers and almost no rain. Therefore, the earliest of all was agriculture on the mountain slopes and on the Peruvian-Bolivian plateau, irrigated by streams flowing down from the mountains during the melting of snow. In the basin of Lake Titicaca, where there are many species of wild tuberous plants, primitive farmers cultivated potatoes, which from here spread throughout the Andes region, and then penetrated into Central America. Quinoa was especially widespread from cereals.

The Andes region is the only one in America where animal husbandry has developed. Llama and alpaca were tamed, giving wool, skins, meat, fat. The inhabitants of the Andes did not use milk. Thus, among the tribes of the Andean region in the first centuries of our era, the development of productive forces reached a relatively high level.

Chibcha, or muiska

A group of tribes of the Chibcha language family, who lived on the territory of present-day Colombia in the Bogota River Valley, also known as "Muisca", created one of the most developed cultures of ancient America.

The valley of Bogota and the surrounding mountain slopes are rich in natural moisture; together with a mild, even climate, this contributed to the formation of densely populated areas here and the development of agriculture. The country of Muisca was inhabited in ancient times by primitive tribes of the Arabian language family. The Chibcha tribes entered the territory of present-day Colombia from Central America, across the Isthmus of Panama.

By the time of the European invasion, Muisca was growing many cultivated plants: potatoes, quinua, corn on the mountain slopes; in the warm valley - cassava, sweet potatoes, beans, pumpkin, tomatoes and some fruits, as well as cotton, tobacco and cocu shrubs. Coca leaves are the narcotic drug of the Andes region. The land was cultivated with primitive hoes - gnarled sticks. There were no pets other than dogs. Fishing was widely developed. Hunting was of great importance as the only source of meat food. Since hunting for big game (deer, wild boars) was a privilege of the nobility, ordinary members of the tribe could, with the permission of noble persons, hunt only rabbits and birds; they also ate rats and reptiles.

The tools of labor - axes, knives, millstones - were made of hard rocks. The weapons were spears with tips made of burnt wood, wooden clubs, slinges. Of the metals, only gold and its alloys with copper and silver were known. Many methods of processing gold were used: massive casting, flattening, stamping, overlay with sheets. Muisca's metalworking technique makes a major contribution to the original metallurgy of the peoples of America.

The great achievement of their culture was weaving. Threads were spun from cotton fiber and a cloth was woven, even and dense. The canvas was painted with the printing method. Cloaks - cloths made of this fabric served as Muiska's clothes. The houses were built of wood and reeds coated with clay.

Exchange played an important role in the Muisca household. There was no gold in the valley of Bogota, and the Muisca received it from the province of Neiva from the Puan tribe in exchange for their products, as well as tributes from their conquered neighbors. The main objects of exchange were emeralds, salt and linen. Interestingly, the muisca themselves exchanged raw cotton from the panche neighbors. Salt, emeralds and chibcha linen were transported along the Magdalena River to the large bazaars that took place on the coast, between the present cities of Neiva, Coelho and Beles. Spanish chroniclers report that gold was exchanged in the form of small discs. Cloths were also used as a unit of exchange.

The Muisca lived in patriarchal families, each in a different home. The marriage was carried out with a ransom for the wife, the wife moved to her husband's house. Polygamy was common; ordinary members of the tribe had 2-3 wives, noble ones - 6-8, and the rulers - several dozen. By this time, the clan community began to disintegrate and its place began to be taken by the neighboring community. We have no information about what were the forms of land use and land tenure.

Written and archaeological sources show the incipient process of class formation. Spanish chroniclers report the following social groups: heralds - the first persons at the court, mustache - noble persons and getcha - military of the highest rank, guarding the borders. These three groups exploited the labor of the so-called "tax payers" or "dependent".

The nobility was distinguished by clothing and ornaments. Only the ruler had the right to wear painted robes, necklaces and tiaras. The palaces of rulers and noble persons, although wooden, were decorated with carvings and paintings. The nobles were carried on stretchers lined with gold plates. The introduction of the new ruler into his duties was especially magnificent. The ruler went out to the shore of the sacred lake Guata-vita. The priests smeared his body with resin and sprinkled it with golden sand. Having left on a raft with the priests, he threw offerings into the lake and, having washed himself with water, returned. This ceremony served as the basis for the legend of the "Eldorado" ( Eldorado is Spanish for golden.), which became widespread in Europe, and "Eldorado" became synonymous with fabulous wealth.

If the life of the Muisca nobility is described by the Spaniards in some detail, then we have very few descriptions of the working conditions and the situation of the masses of the ordinary population. It is known that "those who paid the tax" contributed it with agricultural products, as well as handicraft products. In case of arrears in the house of the debtor, the emissary of the ruler settled with a bear or puma until the debt was paid off. A special group was made up of artisans. The Chronicler reports that the inhabitants of Guatavita were the finest goldsmiths; therefore "many Guatavites lived scattered throughout all regions of the country, making gold products."

Sources about slaves are especially scanty. Since the sources do not describe slave labor, it can be concluded that it did not play a significant role in production.

Religion

Muisca mythology and pantheon were poorly developed. Cosmogonic myths are scattered and confused. In the pantheon, the main place was occupied by the goddess of the earth and fertility - Bachue. One of the main ones was the god of exchange. In the cult practice of Muiska, the first place was occupied by the veneration of the forces of nature - the sun, the moon, the sacred lake Guatavita, etc. Boys were sacrificed to the sun in order to end the drought.

The cult of ancestors occupied an important place. The bodies of noblemen were mummified, they were put on golden masks. Mummies supreme rulers, according to beliefs, brought happiness, they were carried to the battlefield. The main deities were considered the patrons of the nobility and warriors, the common people were associated with the temples of other deities, where modest gifts could be sacrificed. The priesthood was part of the ruling elite of society. The priests collected from the community members and received food, gold and emeralds from the nobility.

Muisca on the eve of the Spanish conquest

There are no written monuments left from the Muisca culture. Chroniclers recorded a few oral traditions that embrace the events of only two generations on the eve of the Spanish conquest. According to these legends, around 1470 Saganmachik, a sipa (ruler) of the kingdom of Bakata, with an army of 30 thousand people made a campaign against the principality of Fusagasuga in the valley of the Pasco river. Frightened Fusagasugs fled, throwing down their weapons, their ruler recognized himself as a vassal of the vassal, in honor of which a sacrifice to the sun was performed.

Soon the ruler of the Guatavita principality rebelled against Bakata, and the vulture of the latter, Saganmachik, had to ask for help from the ruler of the Tunha kingdom, Michua. Having provided the requested help, Michua invited Sipa Saganmachik to come to Tunhu and justify the crimes that the rebellious prince of Guatavita attributed to him. Sipa refused, and Michua did not dare to attack Bakata. Further, the legend tells how Saganmachik fought back the neighboring Panche tribe. The war with him lasted 16 years. After defeating the punch, Saganmachik attacked Michua. In a bloody battle, in which 50 thousand soldiers participated on each side, both rulers were killed. The victory remained with the Bakatans.

After that, Bakata's vulture became Nemekene (literally means "jaguar bone"). He also, according to legend, had to repel the attack of the Panche and suppress the uprising of the Fusagasugians. Military clashes with the latter were particularly stubborn; in the end their prince capitulated. Nemekene sent his garrisons into the defeated provinces and began to prepare for the massacre of the Tunha ruler. Gathering an army of 50-60 thousand and having made human sacrifices, he went on a campaign; in a terrible battle, Nemeken was wounded, the Bakatans fled, pursued by the Tunhi warriors. On the fifth day after returning from the campaign, Nemekene died, leaving the kingdom to his nephew Tiskesus.

During the reign of the latter, when he intended to take revenge on the ruler of Tunja, the Spanish conquistadors invaded Bakata.

Thus, the small unstable Muisca associations did not rally into a single state, the process of state formation was interrupted by the Spanish conquest.

Quechua and other peoples of the Inca state

The ancient history of the peoples of the central region of the Andes became known thanks to archaeological research of the last 60-70 years. The results of these studies, along with the data from written sources, allow us to outline the main periods of the ancient history of the peoples of this region. First period, approximately 1st millennium BC e. - the period of the primitive communal system. The second period began on the verge of the 1st millennium and lasted until the 15th century; this is the period of the emergence and development of class society. The third is the period in the history of the Inca state; it lasted from the beginning of the 15th century. until the middle of the XVI century.

During the first period, ceramics and construction techniques began to develop, as well as gold processing. The erection of large buildings of hewn stone, which had a cult purpose or served as dwellings of tribal leaders, involves the use of the labor of ordinary tribesmen by the nobility. This, like the presence of finely minted gold items, speaks of the disintegration of the clan community that began by the end of the first period. The linguistic affiliation of the carriers of these cultures is unknown.

In the second period, two groups of tribes came to the fore. On the northern coast in the VIII-IX centuries. the Mochica culture was widespread, the carriers of which belonged to an independent language family... From this time, the remains of canals stretching for hundreds of kilometers, and ditches that brought water to the fields, have been preserved. The buildings were erected from raw bricks; paved roads were laid. The Mochica tribes not only consumed gold, silver and lead in their native form, but also smelted them from ore. Alloys of these metals were known.

Of particular interest is the Mochica ceramics. It was made without a potter's wheel, which the Andean peoples never used later. Vessels of moche, molded in the form of figures of people (most often heads), animals, fruits, utensils and even entire scenes, represent a sculpture that introduces us to the life and life of their creators. Such is, for example, the figure of a naked slave or a prisoner with a rope around his neck. In the painting on ceramics, there are also many monuments of the social system: slaves carrying their masters on a stretcher, reprisals against prisoners of war (or criminals) who are thrown from rocks, battle scenes, etc.

In the VIII-IX centuries. the development of the most significant culture of the pre-Inca period - tiauanako began. The site that gave it its name is located in Bolivia, 21 km south of Lake Titicaca. Above-ground structures are located on an area of ​​about 1 sq. km. Among them is a complex of buildings called Kalasasaya, which includes the Gate of the Sun, one of the most remarkable monuments of ancient America. The boulder arch is decorated with a bas-relief of a figure with a face surrounded by rays, which is obviously the personification of the sun. Basalt and sandstone deposits are found no closer than 5 km from the Kalasasaya structures. Thus, slabs of 100 tons or more, of which the Gate of the Sun was built, were brought here by the collective efforts of many hundreds of people. Most likely, the Gate of the Sun was part of the complex of the Temple of the Sun - the deity depicted in the bas-relief.

The tiahuanako culture developed over the course of 4-5 centuries, starting from the 8th century, in different parts Peruvian-Bolivian region, but its classical monuments are in the homeland of the Aymara people, whose tribes were, obviously, the creators of this high culture. In the tiauanaco sites of the second period, dating from about the X century, in addition to gold, silver and copper, bronze also appears. Ceramics and weaving with artistic ornamentation developed. In the XIV-XV centuries. on the northern coast the culture of the Mochica tribes flourishes again, which in the later period is called Chimu.

Archaeological sites testify that the peoples of the Andes region already from the 10th century. BC e. knew irrigated agriculture and tamed animals, they began to develop class relations. In the first quarter of the 15th century. the state of the Incas arose. His legendary story was recorded by the Spanish chroniclers of the era of the conquest. The emergence of the Inca state was seen as the result of the invasion of the Cusco valley by highly developed peoples who conquered the original inhabitants of this valley.

The main reason for the formation of the Inca state is not conquest, but the process of internal development of society in ancient Peru, the growth of productive forces and the formation of classes. In addition, the latest archaeological data persuade scientists to abandon the search for the ancestral home of the Incas outside the territory of their state. Even if we can talk about the arrival of the Incas in the valley of Cuzco, then there was a movement of only a distance of several tens of kilometers, and this happened long before the formation of their state.

On the highlands, in the valleys and on the coast of the Andes region, many small tribes of several linguistic groups lived, primarily Quechua, Aymara (stakes), Mochica and Pukina. The Aymara tribes lived in the basin of Lake Titicaca, on the plateau. The Quechua tribes lived around the Cusco Valley. In the north, on the coast, lived the Mochica or Chimu tribes. The resettlement of the Pukin group is now difficult to establish.

Formation of the Inca state

Since the XIII century. in the valley of Cuzco, the so-called Early Incan culture begins to develop. The term Inca, or rather the Inca, has acquired a varied meaning: the dominant stratum in the state of Peru, the title of ruler and the name of the people as a whole. Initially, the name of the Inca was borne by one of the tribes that lived in the Cuzco valley before the formation of the state and apparently belonged to language group Quechua. The Incas of their heyday spoke the Quechua language. The close relationship of the Incas with the Quechua tribes is also evidenced by the fact that the latter received a privileged position in comparison with others and were called "Inca by privilege"; they did not pay tribute, and from among them they did not recruit Yanacun slaves to work for the Incas.

Historical legends of the Incas call 12 names of the rulers that preceded the last supreme Inca - Atahualpa, and report their wars with neighboring tribes. If we accept the approximate dating of these genealogical traditions, then the beginning of the strengthening of the Inca tribe and, possibly, the formation of a union of tribes, can be dated to the first decades of the 13th century. However, the reliable history of the Incas begins with the activities of the ninth ruler - Pachacuti (1438-1463). From this time, the rise of the Incas begins. A state was formed, which began to grow rapidly. Over the next hundred years, the Incas conquered and subjugated the tribes of the entire Andean region, from southern Colombia to central Chile. According to rough estimates, the population of the Inca state reached 6 million people.

The material culture and social structure of the Inca state are known not only from archaeological, but also from historical sources, mainly Spanish chronicles of the 16th-18th centuries.

Inca economy

Mining and metallurgy are of particular interest in Inca technology. The extraction of copper and tin was of the greatest practical importance: the alloy of both gave bronze. Silver ore was mined in huge quantities, and silver was very widespread. Lead was also used. The Quechua language has a word for iron, but apparently it meant meteoric iron, or hematite. There is no evidence of iron mining and iron ore smelting; there is no native iron in the Andes region. Axes, sickles, knives, crowbars, tops for military clubs, tongs, pins, needles, bells were cast from bronze. The blades of bronze knives, axes and sickles were calcined and forged to give them greater hardness. Jewelry and cult objects were made of gold and silver.

Along with metallurgy, the Incas reached a high level in the development of ceramics and weaving. The fabrics of wool and cotton, preserved from the time of the Incas, are distinguished by their richness and delicacy of decoration. They produced fleecy fabrics for clothing (such as velvet) and carpets.

Agriculture in the Inca state achieved significant development. About 40 species of useful plants were cultivated, the main of which were potatoes and corn.

The valleys crossing the Andes are narrow, deep gorges with steep slopes, along which streams of water flow down during the rainy season, washing away the soil layer; in dry weather, no moisture remains on them. To preserve moisture in the fields located on the slopes, it was necessary to create a system of special structures, which the Incas systematically and regularly maintained. The fields were arranged in stepped terraces. The lower edge of the terrace was reinforced with masonry, which held back the soil. Branch canals ran from the mountain rivers to the fields: a dam was built at the edge of the terrace. The channels were laid out with stone slabs. A sophisticated system created by the Incas, which diverted water over long distances, provided irrigation and at the same time protected the soil of the slopes from erosion. Special officials were appointed by the state to supervise the serviceability of structures. The land was cultivated by hand; no draft animals were used. The main tools were a spade (tipped with hardwood and, less often, bronze) and a hoe.

Weaver. Drawing from the Chronicle of Poma de Ayala

Two main roads ran across the country. A canal was laid along the roads, on the banks of which fruit trees grew. Where the road ran through the sandy desert, it was paved. Bridges were built at the intersection of roads with rivers and gorges. Through narrow rivers and crevices, tree trunks were thrown, which were crossed by wooden beams. Suspension bridges passed through wide rivers and chasms, the construction of which is one of the biggest achievements Inca techniques. The bridge was supported by stone pillars, around which five thick ropes, woven from flexible branches or lianas, were fixed. The three lower ropes that formed the bridge itself were intertwined with branches and lined with wooden beams. The ropes, which served as railings, intertwined with the lower ones, protecting the bridge from the sides.

As you know, the peoples of ancient America did not know wheeled transport. In the Andes region, goods were transported in packs on llamas. In those places where the river was too wide, they were crossed by a pontoon bridge or by a ferry, which was an improved raft of beams or beams of very light wood, which went on oars. Such rafts lifted up to 50 people and large loads.

In ancient Peru, the separation of handicrafts from agriculture and cattle breeding began. Some members of the agricultural community were engaged in the manufacture of tools, textiles, pottery, etc., and a natural exchange took place between the communities. The Incas chose the best craftsmen and moved them to Cuzco. Here they lived in a special quarter and worked for the Supreme Inca and the nobility's servant, receiving food from the court. What they did in excess of a given monthly lesson, they could exchange. These masters, cut off from the community, actually found themselves enslaved.

In a similar way, girls were selected, who had to study spinning, weaving and other handicrafts for 4 years. The products of their labor were also used by the noble Incas. The labor of these craftsmen was a rudimentary form of craft in ancient Peru.

Exchange and trade were underdeveloped. Taxes were collected in kind. There was no system of measures, with the exception of the most primitive measure of free-flowing bodies - a handful. There were scales with a rocker, to the ends of which bags or nets with weighed loads were suspended. The exchange between the inhabitants of the coast and the highlands received the greatest development. After the harvest, the inhabitants of these two zones met in certain places. Wool, meat, furs, leather, silver, gold and articles made of them were brought from the highlands; from the coast - grain, vegetables and fruits, cotton, as well as bird droppings - guano. In different regions, salt, pepper, furs, wool, ore and metal products played the role of a universal equivalent. There were no bazaars inside the villages, the exchange was accidental.

In the Inca society, in contrast to the Aztec and Chibcha society, there was no separated layer of free artisans; therefore, exchange and trade with other countries were poorly developed, and there were no trade intermediaries. This can be explained, obviously, by the fact that in Peru an early despotic state appropriated the labor of slaves and partly of the community members, leaving them little surplus for exchange.

Social order of the Incas

In the state of the Incas, many remnants of the primitive communal system were preserved.

The Inca tribe consisted of 10 divisions - khatung ailyu, which in turn were divided into 10 ailyu each. Originally, the Ailyu was a patriarchal clan, a tribal community. Isleu had her own village and owned the adjoining fields; members of the Ailyu were considered relatives among themselves and were called generic names, which were passed on through the paternal line.

Islew were exogamous, inside the gens it was impossible to marry. The Ayllu members believed that they were under the protection of the ancestral shrines - the huaca. Ailyu were also designated as pachaka, that is, a hundred. Khatun-ailyu ("big clan") represented a phratry and was identified with a thousand.

In the Inca state, Ailyu became a rural community. This becomes apparent when considering land use norms. All land in the state was considered to belong to the Supreme Inca. In fact, she was at the disposal of the Isle. The very territory that belonged to the community was called the mark (coincidental coincidence with the name of the community among the Germans). The land that belonged to the entire community was called the pacha mark, that is, the land of the community.

The cultivated land was called chakra (fields). It was divided into three parts: the "fields of the Sun" (actually of the priests), the fields of the Incas and, finally, the fields of the community. The land was cultivated jointly by the entire village, although each family had its own share of the harvest that went to that family. The community members worked together under the leadership of one of the elders and, having worked on one section of the field (the fields of the Sun), moved on to the fields of the Incas, then to the fields of the villagers and, finally, to the fields, the harvest from which went to the general fund of the village. This reserve was spent to support needy fellow villagers and various general village needs. In addition to fields, each village also had lands that rested under fallow, and "wild lands" that served as pastures.

Field plots were periodically redistributed between fellow villagers. A separate section of the field remained fallow after three or four harvests were taken from it. Field put on, stupid, given to a man; for every male child, the father received one more such donation, and for the daughter - another half stupid. Tupu was considered a temporary possession, as it was subject to redistribution. But, in addition to tupu, on the territory of each community there were also land plots called muya. Spanish officials in their reports call these plots "inherited land", "own land", "vegetable garden". The muya plot consisted of a yard, a house, a barn or a barn and a vegetable garden and was passed from father to son. There is no doubt that the Muya plots have actually become private property. It was on these plots that the community members could get surplus vegetables or fruits on their farm, they could dry meat, tan leather, spin and weave wool, make pottery vessels, bronze tools - everything that they exchanged as their private property. The combination of communal ownership of fields with private ownership of a personal plot characterizes Ailya as a rural community in which kinship relations have given way to territorial ties.

The land was cultivated only by the communities of the tribes conquered by the Incas. In these communities, a clan nobility also stood out - the kurak. Its representatives supervised the work of the members of the community and made sure that the members of the community paid taxes; their plots were cultivated by the community members. In addition to their share in the communal herd, the kurak had livestock in private ownership, up to several hundred heads. On their farms, dozens of slave concubines spun and weaved wool or cotton. The products of animal husbandry or agriculture were exchanged for kurak for jewelry made of precious metals, etc. But kurak, as belonging to the conquered tribes, were still in a subordinate position, the Incas stood above them as the dominant layer, the higher caste. The Incas did not work, they constituted the military service of the nobility. The rulers endowed them with land plots and workers from the conquered tribes, the Yanakunas, who were resettled in the Inca farms. The lands that the nobility received from the Supreme Inca were their private property.

The nobility was very different from ordinary subjects in their appearance, special hair cutting, clothes and jewelry. The Spaniards called the noble Incas ore-hons (from Spanish word"Nut" - ear) for their huge gold earrings, rings, stretching the earlobes.

The priests also held a privileged position, in favor of whom a part of the harvest was levied. They did not obey the local rulers, but constituted a separate corporation ruled by the high priesthood in Cuzco.

The Incas had a number of Yanacunas, whom the Spanish chroniclers called slaves. Judging by the fact that they were fully owned by the Incas and performed all the black work, they were indeed slaves. Especially important is the message from the chroniclers that the position of the Yanakunas was hereditary. It is known that in 1570, that is, 35 years after the fall of the Inca rule, there were another 47 thousand Yanacunas in Peru.

Most of the productive labor was performed by the community members; they cultivated fields, built canals, roads, fortresses and temples. But the emergence of a large group of hereditarily enslaved workers, exploited by the rulers and the military elite, suggests that the society of Peru was early slave-owning, with the preservation of significant remnants of the tribal system.

The Inca state was called Tahuantinsuyu, which literally means "four regions joined together." Each region was ruled by a governor; in the districts, power was in the hands of local officials. At the head of the state was a ruler who bore the title "Sapa Inca" - "solely ruling Inca." He commanded the army and headed the civil administration. The Incas created centralized system management. Supreme Inca, senior officials from Cuzco watched over the governors, were always ready to repulse the rebellious non-tribe. There was a permanent postal service with fortresses and residences of local rulers. Messages were relayed by runner-runners. On the roads, not far from each other, there were post stations, where messengers were always on duty.

The rulers of ancient Peru created laws that protected the rule of the Incas, aimed at securing the submission of the conquered tribes and preventing uprisings. The peaks split the tribes, settling them piece by piece in foreign areas. The Inca introduced the compulsory language for all - Quechua.

Religion and culture of the Incas

Religion occupied a large place in the life of the ancients in the Andes region. The most ancient origins were the remnants of totemism. The communities were named after animals: Numamarca (puma community), Condormarca (condor community), Huamanmarka (hawk community), etc .; the cult attitude towards some animals has been preserved. Close to totemism was the religious personification of plants, primarily potatoes, as a culture that played a huge role in the life of the Peruvians. Images of the spirits of this plant in sculptural ceramics have come down to us - vessels in the form of tubers. The “eye” with sprouts was perceived as the mouth of a plant awakening to life. The cult of ancestors occupied an important place. When the Ailyu from the clan community turned into a neighboring community, the ancestors began to be revered as patron spirits and guardians of the land of this community and the area in general.

The custom of mummification of the dead was also associated with the cult of the ancestors. Mummies in smart clothes with ornaments and household utensils were preserved in tombs, often carved into the rocks. The cult of mummies of rulers reached a particular development: they were surrounded by ritual veneration in temples, the priests marched with them during major holidays. Supernatural powers were attributed to them, they were taken on campaigns and carried to the battlefield. All the tribes of the Andes region had a cult of the forces of nature. Obviously, along with the development of agriculture and animal husbandry, a cult of mother earth arose, called Pacha-mama (in the Quechua language, more - earth).

The Incas established a state cult with a hierarchy of priests. Obviously, the priests generalized and developed further existing myths and created a cycle of cosmogonic mythology. According to him, the creator god Viracocha created the world and people on the lake (obviously, on Lake Titicaca). After the creation of the world, he disappeared across the sea, leaving his son Pachacamac. The Incas supported and spread among the conquered peoples the idea of ​​the origin of their legendary ancestor Manco Capaca from the sun. The Supreme Inca was considered a living personification of the sun god (Inti), a divine being who therefore possesses unlimited power. The largest cult center was the Temple of the Sun in Cusco, also called the "Golden Compound", since the walls of the central hall of the sanctuary were lined with gold tiles. It housed three idols - Viracocha, Sun and Moon.

Temples possessed enormous wealth, a large number of servants and craftsmen, architects, jewelers and sculptors. These riches were used by the priests of the highest hierarchy. The main content of the Inca cult was a sacrificial ritual. During the numerous holidays timed to coincide with various moments of the agrarian cycle, various sacrifices were made, mainly by animals. In extreme cases - at the festival at the time of the accession to the throne of the new Supreme Inca, during an earthquake, drought, general illness, during a war - people, prisoners of war or children were sacrificed, taken as tribute from the conquered tribes.

The development of positive knowledge among the Incas reached a significant level, as evidenced by their metallurgy and road business. For the measurement of space, there were measures based on the size of parts of the human body. The smallest measure of length was the length of the finger, then a measure equal to the distance from the bent thumb to the index. The most common measure for measuring land was the measure of 162 cases. The counting board and abacus were used for counting. The board was divided into strips, compartments in which counting units moved, round pebbles. The time of day was determined by the position of the sun. In everyday life, the measurement of time was used for the period necessary for potatoes to be boiled (approximately 1 hour).

The Incas deified the heavenly bodies, therefore astronomy was associated with religion. They had a calendar; they had an idea of ​​the solar and lunar years. The position of the sun was monitored to determine the timing of the agricultural cycle. To this end, four towers were built to the east and west of Cusco. Observations were made in Cusco itself, in the city center, on large area where the high platform was built.

The Incas used some scientific methods of treating diseases, although the practice of magical quackery was also widespread. In addition to the use of many medicinal plants, surgical methods were also known, such as, for example, craniotomy.

The Incas had schools for boys from among the nobility - both the Incas and the conquered tribes. The term of study was four years. The first year was devoted to the study of the Quechua language, the second - to the religious complex and the calendar, the third and fourth years were spent on the study of the so-called kipu, signs that served as "nodular writing".

The kipu consisted of woolen or cotton rope, to which rows of cords, sometimes up to 100, hanging in the form of a fringe were tied at right angles. On these cords, knots were tied at different distances from the main rope. The shape of the knots and their number indicated numbers. The single knots farthest from the main rope represented ones, the next row - tens, then hundreds and thousands; the largest values ​​were located closest to the main rope. The color of the cords indicated certain objects: for example, potatoes were symbolized in brown, silver - white, gold - yellow.

The State Warehouse Manager is counted with a "kipu" in front of the Supreme Inca Yupanqui. Drawing from the Chronicle of Poma de Ayala. XVI century

Kipu were used mainly to convey messages about taxes collected by officials, but they also served to record general statistical data, calendar dates and even historical facts... There were specialists who knew how to use the kipu well; at the first request of the supreme Inca and his entourage, they had to report certain information, guided by the correspondingly tied knots. Kipu were a conditional system for transmitting information, but it has nothing to do with writing.

Until the last decade, the idea was widespread in science that the peoples of the Andean region did not create a written language. Indeed, unlike the Maya and Aztecs, the Incas left no written records. However, the study of archaeological, ethnographic and historical sources forces us to raise the question of the writing of the Incas in a new way. Beans with special marks appear in the painting of vessels of the Mochica culture. Some scholars believe that the signs on the beans had a symbolic, conventional meaning, like ideograms. It is possible that these beans with icons were used for fortune telling.

Some chroniclers of the era of the conquest report the existence of a secret writing among the Incas. One of them writes that in a special room in the Temple of the Sun there were painted boards on which the events of the history of the Inca lords were captured. Another chronicler says that when in 1570 the Viceroy of Peru ordered to collect and write down everything known about the history of Peru, it was established that ancient history The Inca was depicted on large boards set in gold frames and kept in a room near the Temple of the Sun. Access to them was forbidden to everyone except the reigning Incas and specially appointed curator-historiographers. Modern researchers of the Inca culture consider it proven that the Incas had a written language. It is possible that it was a picture letter, pictography, but it did not survive due to the fact that the “paintings” framed in gold were immediately destroyed by the Spaniards, who captured them for the sake of frames.

Poetic creativity in ancient Peru developed in several directions. Preserved in excerpts are hymns (for example, the hymn of Viracoche), mythical legends, poems of historical content. The most significant poetic work of ancient Peru was the poem, later reworked into a drama - "Ollantai". It praises the heroic deeds of the leader of one of the tribes, the ruler Antisuyo, who rebelled against the supreme Inca. The poem, obviously, found an artistic reflection of the events and representations of the period of the formation of the Inca state - the struggle of individual tribes against the subordination of their centralized power to the Inca despotism.

End of the Inca state. Portuguese conquests

It is usually believed that with the capture of Cusco by the troops of Pizarro in 1532 and the death of the Inca Atahualpa, the Inca state immediately ceased to exist. But its end did not come instantly. In 1535 an uprising broke out; although it was suppressed in 1537, its members continued to fight for over 35 years.

The uprising was raised by the Inca prince Manco, who at first sided with the Spaniards and was close to Pizarro. But Manco used his proximity to the Spaniards only to study his enemies. Beginning to gather forces from the end of 1535, Manco in April 1536 with a large army approached Cuzco and laid siege to it. He went on to use Spanish firearms, forcing eight Spanish prisoners to serve him as gunsmiths, gunners and gunners. Captured horses were also used. Manco centralized the command of the besieging army, established communications, and a guard service. Manco himself was dressed and armed in Spanish, rode horseback and fought with Spanish weapons. The rebels combined the techniques of the original Indian and European military affairs and at times achieved great success. But the need to feed a large army, and most importantly bribery and betrayal forced Manco after 10 months to lift the siege. The rebels fortified themselves in the mountainous region of Vilcapampa and continued to fight here. After Manco's death, young Tupac Amaru became the leader of the rebels.

America was first a land and then a country that was born in the imagination before it really was, wrote Susan-Mary Grant. Born out of the cruelty of the conquerors and the hopes of ordinary workers, they became one of the most powerful states in the world. America's history of becoming a chain of paradoxes.

The country, created in the name of freedom, was built by the labor of slaves; a country struggling to establish moral superiority, military security and economic stability, does so in the face of financial crises and global conflicts, the cause of which is not least itself.

It all began with colonial America, created by the first Europeans who arrived there, who were attracted by the opportunity to enrich themselves or freely practice their religion. As a result, entire indigenous peoples were pushed out from native land, became impoverished, and some were completely exterminated.

America is a significant part of the modern world, its economy, politics, culture, and its history is an integral part of world history. America is not just Hollywood, the White House and Silicon Valley. This is a country where customs, habits, traditions and peculiarities are combined different nations that formed a new nation. This constant process has created an amazing historical phenomenon of the superstate in an astonishingly short time.

How did it develop and what is it today? What is its impact on the modern world? We will tell you about this now.

America before Columbus

Can you get to America on foot? In general, you can. Just think, less than a hundred kilometers, more precisely ninety-six.

When the Bering Strait freezes over, Eskimos and Chukchi, even in bad weather, cross it in both directions. Otherwise, where would a Soviet reindeer breeder have gotten a brand new Winchester? .. Blizzard? Freezing? Just like a long time ago, a man dressed in reindeer fur burrows into the snow, stuffs his mouth with pemmican and slumbers until the storm dies down ...

Ask the average American when American history begins. Ninety-eight answers out of a hundred in 1776 Americans are extremely vague about the times before European colonization, although the American Indian period is as much an integral part of the country's history as the Mayflower. And still there is a line beyond which one story ends tragically, and the other develops dramatically ...

Europeans landed on the American continent off the East Coast. Future Native Americans came from the northwest. 30 thousand years ago, the north of the continent was bound by mighty ice and deep snow to the Great Lakes and beyond.

Yet most of the First Americans arrived through Alaska, then leaving south of the Yukon. Most likely, there were two main groups of immigrants: the first arrived from Siberia, with its own language and customs; the second several centuries later, when the land isthmus from Siberia to Alaska was submerged under the water of a melted glacier.

They had straight black hair, smooth dark skin, a wide nose with a low bridge, slanting brown eyes with a characteristic fold at the eyelids. Quite recently, in the system of underwater caves Sak-Aktun (Mexico), underwater speleologists discovered an incomplete skeleton of a 16-year-old girl. She was given the name Naya - a water nymph. Radiocarbon and uranium-thorium analyzes showed that the bones had been lying at the bottom of the flooded cave for 12-13 thousand years. Naya's skull is elongated, distinctly closer to the ancient inhabitants of Siberia than to the rounded skulls of modern Indians.

In the tissue of Nighy's molar tooth, geneticists also found a whole mitochondrial DNA... Passing from mother to daughter, she retains the haplotype of the full set of genes of the parents. In Naya, it corresponds to haplotype P1, which is common among modern Indians. The hypothesis that Native Americans descended from early Paleoamericans who migrated across the Bering Bridge from Eastern Siberia has received the strongest possible evidence. The Institute of Cytology and Genetics of the Russian Academy of Sciences believes that the settlers belonged to the Altai tribes.

The first inhabitants of America

Beyond the icy mountains, to the south, lay a magical land with a warm and humid climate. Almost the entire territory of the present United States is located on it. Forests, meadows, diverse fauna. During the last glaciation, several breeds of wild horses crossed Beringia, later either exterminated or extinct. Ancient animals supplied man, in addition to meat, technologically necessary materials: fur, bone, skins, tendons.

An ice-free strip of tundra stretched from the shores of Asia to Alaska, a kind of bridge across the current Bering Strait. But in Alaska, only during short warmings, the passages that opened the road to the south thawed out. The ice pressed those going to the Mackenzie River, to the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, but soon they came out to the dense forests of the present state of Montana. Some went there, others to the west, to the coast of the Pacific Ocean. The rest usually went south through Wyoming and Colorado to New Mexico and Arizona.

The bravest fought their way further south, through Mexico and Central America to the southern American continent; they will reach Chile and Argentina only centuries later.

Perhaps the ancestors of the Native Americans came to the continent through the Aleutian Islands, although this is a difficult and dangerous path. It can be assumed that the Polynesians, excellent sailors, sailed to South America.

In the Marms Cave (Washington state), the remains of three human skulls were discovered, dating from the 11-8th millennia BC, and nearby were a spearhead and a bone instrument, which gave reason to assume the discovery of a unique ancient culture of the indigenous people of America. This means that even then, these lands were inhabited by people who were able to create smooth, sharp, comfortable and beautiful products. But it was there that the US engineering forces needed to build a dam, and now unique exhibits lie under a twelve-meter water column.

Guesses were made about who had been to this part of the world before Columbus. The Vikings were definitely there.

The son of the Viking leader Eric the Red, Leif Eriksson, leaving the Norwegian colony in Greenland, sailed Helluland ("boulder country", now - Baffin's Land), Markland (forest country, Labrador peninsula), Vinland ("grape country", most likely New England). After wintering in Vinland, the Viking ships returned to Greenland.

Leif's brother, Thorvald Eriksson, two years later, nevertheless built a fortification in America with housing. But the Algonquins killed Torvald, and his companions sailed back. The next two attempts were a little more successful: the daughter-in-law of Eric the Red-haired Goodrid settled in America, established at first a profitable trade with scratching, but then returned to Greenland. Eric the Red's daughter, Freydis, was also not lucky enough to attract the Indians to long-term partnerships. Then, in a fight, she hacked to death her companions, and after the strife, the Normans left Vinland, where they lived for quite a long time.

The hypothesis of the discovery of America by the Normans was confirmed only in 1960. The remains of a well-equipped Viking settlement were found in Newfoundland (Canada). In 2010, a burial was found in Iceland with the remains of an Indian woman with the same Paleo-American genes. She came to Iceland around 1000 AD. and stayed there to live ...

There is also an exotic hypothesis about Zhang He, a Chinese commander, who with a huge fleet sailed to America allegedly seventy years earlier than Columbus. However, it has no reliable evidence. In scandalous famous book American Africanist Ivan Van Sertin talked about the huge fleet of the Sultan of Mali who reached America and defined its entire culture, religion, and so on. And then there was little evidence. So external influences were minimized. But in the New World itself, there were many tribes that existed rather separately and spoke different languages. Those of them3 who were united by similarities of beliefs and blood ties formed numerous communities.

They themselves built houses and settlements of high engineering complexity, which have survived to this day, processed metal, created excellent ceramics, learned to provide themselves with food and grow crops, play ball and domesticate wild animals.

Something like this was New world at the moment of a fatal meeting with Europeans - Spanish sailors under the command of a Genoese captain. According to the poet Henry Longfellow, she dreamed of the great Gaia-vata, the cultural hero of all North American tribes, as an inevitable fate.

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Subtitles

History of the discovery of America by Europeans

Pre-Columbian era

Currently there is whole line theories and research, allowing with a high probability to believe that European travelers reached the shores of America long before Columbus's expeditions. However, there is no doubt that these contacts did not lead to the creation of permanent settlements or the establishment of strong ties with the new continent, and thus did not have a significant impact on the historical and political processes in both the Old and New Worlds.

Columbus travels

Colonization of South and Central America in the 17th century

Chronology major events:

• - Christopher Columbus lands on the island.
• - Amerigo Vespucci and Alonso de Ojeda reach the mouth of the Amazon.
• - Vespucci after the second trip finally comes to the conclusion that the open continent is not part of India.
• - After a 100-day jungle trek, Vasco Nunez de Balboa crosses the Isthmus of Panama and reaches the Pacific coast for the first time.
• - Juan Ponce de Leon sets out in search of the legendary fountain of eternal youth. Having failed to reach the target, he nevertheless discovers gold deposits. Names the Florida Peninsula and declares it a Spanish possession.
• - Fernando Cortez enters Tenochtitlan, captures Emperor Montezuma, thus starting the conquest of the Aztec empire. His triumph leads to 300 years of Spanish rule in Mexico and Central America.
• - Pascual de Andogoya discovers Peru.
• - Spain establishes a permanent military base and settlement in Jamaica.
• - Francisco Pizarro invades Peru, destroys thousands of Indians and conquers the Inca Empire, the most powerful state of the South American Indians. A huge number of Incas die from chickenpox brought in by the Spaniards.
• - Spanish settlers found Buenos Aires, but after five years they were forced to leave the city under the onslaught of the Indians.

Colonization of North America (XVII-XVIII centuries)

But at the same time, the balance of power in the Old World began to change: the kings spent the streams of silver and gold flowing from the colonies, and took little interest in the economy of the metropolis, which, under the weight of an ineffective, corrupt administrative apparatus, clerical dominance and lack of incentives for modernization, began to lag more and more behind. from the booming economy of England. Spain was gradually losing its status as the main European superpower and ruler of the seas. The many years of war in the Netherlands, huge funds spent on the fight against the Reformation throughout Europe, the conflict with England hastened the decline of Spain. The last straw was the death of the Invincible Armada in 1588. After the English admirals, and to a greater extent a violent storm, defeated the largest fleet of the time, Spain receded into the shadows, never recovering from this blow again.

Leadership in the "relay" of colonization passed to England, France and Holland.

English colonies

The ideologist of the British colonization of North America was the famous chaplain Gakluyt. In 1587, Sir Walter Raleigh, by order of Queen Elizabeth I of England, made two attempts to establish a permanent settlement in North America. A reconnaissance expedition reached the American coast in 1584 and named the open coast Virginia (English Virginia - "Virgin") in honor of the "virgin queen" Elizabeth I, who never married. Both attempts failed - the first colony, founded on Roanoke Island off the coast of Virginia, was on the verge of death due to Indian attacks and lack of supplies, and was evacuated by Sir Francis Drake in April 1587. In July of the same year, the second expedition of 117 colonists landed on the island. It was planned that in the spring of 1588 ships with equipment and food would arrive at the colony. However, for various reasons, the supply expedition was delayed by almost a year and a half. When she arrived at the site, all the buildings of the colonists were intact, but no traces of people, with the exception of the remains of one person, were found. The exact fate of the colonists has not been established to this day.

At the beginning of the 17th century, private capital entered the business. In 1605, two joint stock companies at once received licenses from King James I to establish colonies in Virginia. It should be borne in mind that at that time the term "Virginia" denoted the entire territory of the North American continent. The first of the companies is the "London Virginia Company" (eng. Virginia Company of London) - received the rights to the southern, the second - "Plymouth Company" (eng. Plymouth Company) - to the northern part of the continent. Despite the fact that both companies officially proclaimed the main goal of spreading Christianity, the license obtained gave them the right to "search and mine by all means gold, silver and copper."

On December 20, 1606, the colonists set sail aboard three ships, and after a hard, almost five-month voyage, during which several dozen people died of hunger and disease, in May 1607 they reached the Chesapeake Bay (eng. Chesapeake bay). Over the next month, they built a wooden fort named after the king Fort James ( English pronunciation named Jacob). The fort was later renamed Jamestown, the first permanent British settlement in America.

Official US historiography considers Jamestown to be the cradle of the country, the history of the settlement and its leader, Captain John Smith (eng. John smith of jamestown) covered in many serious studies and works of art... The latter, as a rule, idealize the history of the city and the pioneers who inhabited it (for example, the popular cartoon Pocahontas). In fact, the first years of the colony were extremely difficult, during the hungry winter of 1609-1610. out of 500 colonists, no more than 60 survived, and, according to some evidence, the survivors were forced to resort to cannibalism to survive the famine.

American stamp issued for the 300th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown

In subsequent years, when the question of physical survival was no longer so acute, the two most important problems were strained relations with the indigenous population and the economic feasibility of the existence of the colony. To the disappointment of the shareholders of the London Virginia Company, neither gold nor silver was found by the colonists, and the main commodity produced for export was ship timber. Despite the fact that this product was in certain demand in the metropolis, which had exhausted its forests by the order, the profit, as well as from other attempts at economic activity, was minimal.

This changed in 1612 when the farmer and landowner John Rolf (eng. John Rolfe) managed to cross a local variety of tobacco grown by Indians with varieties imported from Bermuda. The resulting hybrids were well adapted to the Virginia climate and at the same time suited the tastes of English consumers. The colony acquired a source of reliable income and for many years tobacco became the basis of the economy and exports of Virginia, and the phrases "Virginia tobacco", "Virginia blend" are used as characteristics of tobacco products to this day. Five years later, tobacco exports amounted to 20,000 pounds, a year later it was doubled, and by 1629 reached 500,000 pounds. John Rolf rendered another service to the colony: in 1614 he managed to negotiate peace with the local Indian chief. A peace treaty was sealed by a marriage between Rolf and the chief's daughter, Pocahontas.

In 1619, two events took place that had a significant impact on the entire subsequent history of the United States. This year, Governor George Yardley (eng. George Yeardley) decided to transfer part of the power Council of Burgers(eng. House of burgesses), thereby founding the first elective legislative assembly in the New World. The first meeting of the council took place on July 30, 1619. In the same year, a small group of Angolan Africans were acquired by the colonists. Although formally they were not slaves, but had long-term contracts without the right of termination, it is customary to count the history of slavery in America from this event.

In 1622, almost a quarter of the colony's population was destroyed by the rebellious Indians. In 1624, the license of the London Company, whose business had fallen into disrepair, was revoked, and from that time Virginia became a royal colony. The governor was appointed by the king, but the colony council retained significant powers.

Settling New England

In 1497, several expeditions to the island of Newfoundland associated with the names of the Cabots laid the foundation for England's claims to the territory of modern Canada.

In 1763 by The Paris Treaty New France passed into the possession of Great Britain and became the province of Quebec. Rupert's Land (the area around Hudson Bay) and Prince Edward Island were also British colonies.

Florida

In 1763, Spain ceded Florida to Great Britain in exchange for control of Havana, which the British occupied during the Seven Years' War. The British divided Florida into East and West and began to attract settlers. For this, the settlers were offered land and financial support.

In 1767, the northern border of West Florida was significantly relocated so that West Florida included parts of the present-day territories of the states of Alabama and Mississippi.

During the American Revolutionary War, Britain retained control of East Florida, but Spain was able to capture West Florida thanks to an alliance with France, which was at war with England. According to the Treaty of Versailles in 1783 between Great Britain and Spain, all of Florida went to Spain

Caribbean islands

The first English colonies appeared in Bermuda (1612), St. Kitts (1623) and Barbados (1627) and were then used to colonize other islands. In 1655, Jamaica, taken from the Spanish Empire, was under the control of the British.

Central America

In 1630, English agents founded the Providence Company (Providence Company), whose president was the Earl of Warwick and the secretary - John Pym, occupied two small islands near the Mosquito Coast and established friendly relations with local residents... From 1655 to 1850, England, and then Great Britain, claimed a protectorate over the Miskito Indians, but numerous attempts to establish colonies were unsuccessful, and the protectorate was contested by Spain, the Central American republics and the United States. US objections were prompted by fears that Britain would gain an advantage over the proposed construction of a canal between the two oceans. In 1848, the capture of the city of Greytown (now called San Juan del Norte) by the Miskito Indians with the support of the British caused a great stir in the United States and almost led to war. However, by signing the Clayton Bulwer Treaty of 1850, both powers pledged not to fortify, colonize, or dominate any part of Central America. In 1859 Great Britain ceded the protectorate to Honduras.

The first English colony on the banks of the Belize River was established in 1638. Other English settlements were established in the middle of the 17th century. Later, British settlers began harvesting log wood, from which a substance was extracted that was used in the manufacture of dyes for fabrics and had great importance for the wool spinning industry in Europe (see Belize # History article).

South America

In 1803, Britain seized the Dutch settlements in Guiana, and in 1814, under the Treaty of Vienna, it officially received the lands, which were united in 1831 under the name British Guiana.

In January 1765, British captain John Byron explored Saunders Island at the eastern end of the Falkland Islands and announced its annexation to Great Britain. Captain Byron named the harbor on Saunders Port Egmont. Here in 1766 Captain McBride founded an English settlement. In the same year, Spain acquired French possessions in the Falklands from Bougainville and, consolidating its power here in 1767, appointed a governor. In 1770, the Spanish attacked Port Egmont and drove the British off the island. This led to the fact that the two countries were on the brink of war, but a peace treaty concluded later allowed the British to return to Port Egmont in 1771, while neither Spain nor Great Britain abandoned their claims to the islands. In 1774, in anticipation of the impending American War of Independence, Great Britain unilaterally abandoned many of its overseas possessions, including Port Egmont. Leaving the Falklands in 1776, the British erected a plaque here to confirm their rights to the area. From 1776 to 1811, a Spanish settlement remained on the islands, governed from Buenos Aires as part of the Viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata. In 1811 the Spaniards left the islands, also leaving a plaque here to prove their rights. After independence in 1816, Argentina declared the Falklands its own. In January 1833, the British again landed in the Falklands and notified the Argentine authorities of their intention to restore their authority on the islands.

Chronology of the founding of the English colonies

1. 1607 Virginia (Jamestown)
2. 1620 - Massachusetts (Plymouth and the Massachusetts Harbor Settlement)
3. 1626 - New York
4. 1633 - Maryland
5. 1636 - Rhode Island
6. 1636 - Connecticut
7. 1638 - Delaware
8. 1638 - New Hampshire
9. 1653 - North Carolina
10. 1663 - South Carolina
11. 1664 - New Jersey
12. 1682 - Pennsylvania
13. 1732 - Georgia

French colonies

By 1713, New France was at its largest. It included five provinces:

• Acadia (modern Nova Scotia and New Brunswick).
• Hudson Bay (modern-day Canada)
• Louisiana (the central part of the United States, from the Great Lakes to New Orleans), subdivided into two administrative regions: Lower Louisiana and Illinois (fr. Le Pays des Illinois).

Spanish colonies

The Spanish colonization of the New World dates back to the discovery of America by the Spanish navigator Columbus in 1492, which Columbus himself recognized as the eastern part of Asia, the eastern coast of either China, or Japan, or India, so the name West Indies was stuck with these lands. The search for a new path to India is dictated by the development of society, industry and trade, the need to find large reserves of gold, for which demand has grown sharply. Then it was believed that in the "land of spices" there should be a lot of it. The geopolitical situation in the world changed and the old eastern routes to India for the Europeans, who passed the lands occupied by the Ottoman Empire, became more dangerous and difficult to pass, meanwhile there was a growing need for other trade with this rich land. Then some already had ideas that the earth was round and that one could get to India from the other side of the earth - by sailing westward from the then known world. Columbus made 4 expeditions to the region: the first - 1492 -1493 - the discovery of the Sargasso Sea, the Bahamas, Haiti, Cuba, Tortuga, the foundation of the first village, in which he left 39 of his sailors. He declared all the lands to be the possessions of Spain; second (1493-1496) years - complete conquest of Haiti, opening