Age of Exploration

A Surplus of goods was partially due to the Age of Exploration. The Age of Exploration then led to the Columbian Exchange and the Triangular Trade. Both of the trade routes had positive and negative influences on the people. The surplus changed people’s lives forever and had lasting impact on the world. A surplus of new products and ideas resulted in a dramatic world wide change due to the Columbian Exchange and Triangular Trade.

Scarcity started to slow down significantly when the age of exploration came to be. Two of the most important trading organizations are refereed to as the Columbian Exchange and Triangular Trade. In 1492 Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas (Susan Harrison, 1). This discovery opened up many opportunities for trade and societies to expand. This started an exchange of goods and slaves. The European tradesman brought along many good products and also the bad things such as various diseases. The exchange made for great cultural diffusion. The explorers of the “new world” brought along a quest for God, gold, and glory. These trade routes and European settlers on the Americas resulted in colonization of a new land and the expansion of a new country (Alfred Crosby). The outbreak of trade and the “New World” was evolving.

The Europeans now knew of the “new world” over in the Americas and decided that it could be a great trading country because of its vast natural resources. The Columbian Exchange was a new trade route between the Americas and Western Europe mostly. At first they only exchanged agricultural items, then moved on to raw materials and finished products (Alfred Crosby). Exchange of plants and animals was now a normal part of trade between the Eastern and Western hemispheres. The Columbian Exchange brought positive and negative changes to the new and old world. Some positive changes were food products and new species and organisms were brought to the new world. There were also a lot of negative changes like diseases such as small pox, influenza, and syphilis. These diseases caused a lot of depopulation of both of the countries, but mostly the native Americans were affected the greatest by small pox. Small pox killed was one of the first recorded pandemic diseases because it killed so many Americans (Alfred Crosby). The Columbian Exchange brought many changes and made the America colonies grow with new agriculture and items.