Empire Building – Asia vs. Africa vs. Europe

1450-1750
Early Modern Period

1. Empire Building – Asia vs. Africa vs. Europe
   1. Movitation
      1. For all, increase wealth and power
      2. Africans/Europeans – convert nonbelievers to Christianity/Islam
   2. Means
      1. Force
      2. Europeans and Asians – firearms
      3. Africans – advent of Europeans slave trade/guns
   3. Impediments
      1. Europeans – lack of available territory on European continent
         1. Not rich in resources
         2. Needed new markets
         3. Needed markets not ruled by powerful government
      2. Africans and Asians
         1. Distance
         2. ability to set up stable and strong organizations to govern conquered people
         3. Rivals who worked against the rules to gain either local or imperial power
   4. Advantages
      1. Europeans
         1. Navies
         2. Advanced technology
      2. Africans
         1. Access to European weapons
      3. Asia
         1. Chinese dynasties alternating with periods that saw warring states
            1. Being part of an empire appealing to the Chinese at times
2. XIV. Interaction with the West – Russia vs. Ottoman/China/Tokugawa Japan/Mughal India
   1. Varying influences
      1. Russia
         1. Had been mistrust toward Europeans
            1. Europeans doing business in Russia had been kept away from ordinary
         2. Peter embarked on Europeanization effort to modernize nation
      2. Ottoman
         1. Took a military approach
         2. Although they traded with the West
            1. desired to enlarge empire at the expense of European nations
         3. Struck westward in an attempt to enlarge their domain
            1. Captured Constantinople in 1453
               1. Brought down teetering Byzantine Empire
            2. Tried to siege Vienna, but failed
            3. Continued fight against Holy Roman Empire in Mediterranean
               1. Took over eastern portion
      3. China – remained relatively isolated
         1. Under Ming
            1. allowed some missionaries Jesuit – but mostly shut off
               1. Matteo Ricci and Francis Xavier
            2. Portuguese and Spanish arrive – too big to conquer
               1. Set up embassies and trading houses
         2. Under Qing – shut off from west
            1. Europeans arrived, but Beijing declined offers to trade
            2. Shut off from technologies of Scientific Revolution
               1. Xenophobic ideals
         3. Considered themselves superior
         4. Contacts limited to treaty ports
      4. Japan – periods of isolation and acceptance
         1. 1543 - Portuguese sailors shipwrecked and washed ashore on Southern island of Kyushu
         2. Additional visits from European traders and missionaries
            1. Western technology – clocks and firearms
            2. Firearms
               1. Changed Japanese warfare from feudal to modern
               2. Allowed Tokugawa to maintain authority
            3. Christian missionaries
               1. At first, Catholic missionaries protected from Buddhist resistance
               2. Late 1580s Tokugawa shifted protection – saw Catholicism as threat
                  1. Missionaries ordered to leave
                  2. Christians persecuted and executed
                  3. Distrusted new religion
         3. By 1630 – trade only allowed in a few cities
            1. Japanese ships forbidden from traveling long distances
            2. Created seclusion laws – even limited trading with Chinese
         4. By 1640 – only Dutch and Chinese allowed to trade at Nagasaki
            1. Kept Japanese informed of Western developments – Dutch learning
            2. Adopted those Western traditions considered appropriate for Japanese goals
         5. Allowed Japanese merchant class to gain influence
            1. Set stage for pre-industrial development
      5. Mughal India – Europeans try to control areas
         1. Mughal emperor welcomed English East India Company in 1613
            1. By 1800, imperialism the goal
            2. 1857 company deposed final Mughal emperor
            3. Company disbanded – became part of British Empire in 1876
         2. Set up factories and trading ports
            1. British, Portuguese, French, Dutch
            2. French/British took over most
         3. Local princes act as allies to defend against Mughals – push out
         4. Not limited to treaty ports
            1. Started to try to affect local affairs
            2. Won the right to acquire territory
         5. British/French rivalry affected India – eventually Britain takes French land
   2. Varying consequences
   3. Penetrated some regions, but not others

   Examples of What You Need to Know
   Below are examples of the types of information you are expected to know contrasted with examples of those things you are not expected to know for the multiple-choice section.

   • * Neoconfucianism, but not specific Neoconfucianists
   • * Importance of European exploration, but not individual explorers
   • * Characteristics of European absolutism, but not specific rulers
   • * Reformation, but not Anabaptism or Huguenots
   • * Ottoman conquest of Constantinople, but not the Safavid Empire
   • * Siege of Vienna (1688–89), but not the Thirty Years' War
   • * Slave plantation systems, but not Jamaica's specific slave system
   • * Institution of the harem, but not Hurrem Sultan