Requerimiento In Colonial America
Rachna Shah
APUSH: Log Entry #2
5.
The requerimiento was only an excuse to treat native people brutally, confiscate their land, and enslave them, because the Europeans believed that that would be the most efficient way. Of course, if the natives weren’t manacled, then they would have fought back, and quite possibly, especially if the natives enslaved by Columbus and his original men, have beaten the Europeans, at least for the time being. The Native American men wouldn’t have given up their rights, their land, their wives and their children, to the Europeans with nothing in return. Therefore, with the use of the requerimiento, the Europeans were also able to alleviate some guilt off of themselves, because according to the document which stated …show more content…
Smallpox is the disease that killed most Natives; second was measles, then influenza, and then lastly the Plague/Black Death. There was no cure for the disease at the time, and the cramped conditions with very little food and improper hygiene when the Natives were enslaved only exacerbated the effects of smallpox, killing virtually all of them. The native people were more vulnerable to this plague than the Spanish because they hadn’t built up any immunity to this disease. Humans who live in close contact with domestic animals, like the Europeans who kept their animals inside of their houses, are at a greater risk to contract diseases (zoonotic diseases). Diseases such as smallpox (which wiped out Native Americans by the millions) were transmitted from human to human, however; the Natives hadn't built up any immunity to these zoonotic diseases because the only domestic animal in the Americas was the llama. There were not as many rats in the Americas either (rats spread the Plague). Also, the smallpox virus and other Old World viruses did not exist in the Americas like they did throughout Europe, Asia, and Africa, therefore they killed not only the weak, the young, and the old, but people in their …show more content…
Despite the fact that words such as genocide and holocaust are most commonly affiliated with Nazi Germany during World War II, they can be accurately applied to what the Spanish did to the native people they encountered.
However, there were no gas chambers. Like in what happened in Nazi Germany, people were taken from their homes because of being Native American, enslaved, separated from the rest of their family, stripped down until they believe that they are worth nothing, and become a labor working force. Unlike Nazi Germany, most of the Native Americans were not killed by Europeans, but instead by the diseases that Europeans unconsciously brought over to the New World during their voyages. On the other hand, only about six million Jews were killed during the Holocaust; anywhere from around 75 to 200 million Native Americans were killed by Europeans and/or European
APUSH: Log Entry #2
5.
The requerimiento was only an excuse to treat native people brutally, confiscate their land, and enslave them, because the Europeans believed that that would be the most efficient way. Of course, if the natives weren’t manacled, then they would have fought back, and quite possibly, especially if the natives enslaved by Columbus and his original men, have beaten the Europeans, at least for the time being. The Native American men wouldn’t have given up their rights, their land, their wives and their children, to the Europeans with nothing in return. Therefore, with the use of the requerimiento, the Europeans were also able to alleviate some guilt off of themselves, because according to the document which stated …show more content…
Smallpox is the disease that killed most Natives; second was measles, then influenza, and then lastly the Plague/Black Death. There was no cure for the disease at the time, and the cramped conditions with very little food and improper hygiene when the Natives were enslaved only exacerbated the effects of smallpox, killing virtually all of them. The native people were more vulnerable to this plague than the Spanish because they hadn’t built up any immunity to this disease. Humans who live in close contact with domestic animals, like the Europeans who kept their animals inside of their houses, are at a greater risk to contract diseases (zoonotic diseases). Diseases such as smallpox (which wiped out Native Americans by the millions) were transmitted from human to human, however; the Natives hadn't built up any immunity to these zoonotic diseases because the only domestic animal in the Americas was the llama. There were not as many rats in the Americas either (rats spread the Plague). Also, the smallpox virus and other Old World viruses did not exist in the Americas like they did throughout Europe, Asia, and Africa, therefore they killed not only the weak, the young, and the old, but people in their …show more content…
Despite the fact that words such as genocide and holocaust are most commonly affiliated with Nazi Germany during World War II, they can be accurately applied to what the Spanish did to the native people they encountered.
However, there were no gas chambers. Like in what happened in Nazi Germany, people were taken from their homes because of being Native American, enslaved, separated from the rest of their family, stripped down until they believe that they are worth nothing, and become a labor working force. Unlike Nazi Germany, most of the Native Americans were not killed by Europeans, but instead by the diseases that Europeans unconsciously brought over to the New World during their voyages. On the other hand, only about six million Jews were killed during the Holocaust; anywhere from around 75 to 200 million Native Americans were killed by Europeans and/or European