Columbus's Description of the Discovery of America (1492)
When Christopher Columbus embarked upon his famous voyage of 1492, he was in search of a faster route to India and China, and instead became one of the first European explorers to have an encounter with the native peoples of the Americas. Columbus regarded these individuals as innately inferior both because of their pagan status and because of what to him seemed like primitive behaviors. Columbus characterized his relations with them in virtuous terms in his first account of his voyage entitled Description of the Discovery of America: "In order to win the friendship and affection of that people, and because I am convinced that their conversion to our Holy Faith would be better promoted through love than through force; I presented some of them with red caps and some strings of glass beads which they placed around their necks, and with other trifles of insignificant worth that delighted them and by which we have got a wonderful hold on their affections."
This description, of course, ignores the fact that Columbus embarked upon his trip for wealth-related reasons. Spices and silks were prestigious commodities during the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella. So was gold. Columbus' account is no doubt influenced by the fact that he was on a voyage in search of these items for the famously Christian king and queen. Subjugation of so-called primitive people was seen as excusable, so long as it was done with the intention of bringing the Gospel to them. If the natives' souls were saved as a result of European imperialism, then the actions of colonization were seen as justified.
It should be noted that Columbus does...
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