16th Century European Imperialism

The age of exploration, which began to flourish in the sixteenth century, marked the beginning of an era of European global expansion and cultural discovery. As a result of the new imperialism crafted from the motives of expansion, the European conquerors and those they conquered from the New World similarly endured adjustments of cultural significance and demographic fluctuation; however, the actual ways in which these fields were impacted and the degree to which they were influenced differed greatly between the groups.
The conquering figures from Europe were able to garner cultural enrichment and subsequently a rise in population from their efforts of expansion. The development of the Columbian exchange offered Europe with a new exposure
The natives within the Americas faced destruction as the ancient Aztec political framework had been monopolized by the Spanish party of Hernan Cortes, whose men ravaged the Aztec temples after killing their leader Moctezuma, replacing their buildings with ones for Spanish government and their rulers with Spanish representatives. In Japan, Jesuits threatened the existence of their prior religion by ravaging their fixed temples, idols, and shrines with Christian schools and thought. Religion often took precedence in these New World societies, being a factor of cohesion that supported their political organization, and, thus, the spread of Christianity had taken and broken the backbone of those societies. With the development of the Columbian exchange, disease made its way into the native populations of the New World, specifically in the Americas, killing a third of the Indian population. This promoted Europe’s prominence in the Americas, as Spain took the decimation of the native peoples by small pox as an easy route to conquer areas ruled by the Inca and Aztec. While the conquerors took pride in their minimal advancements of expansion, the native peoples had to endure the pain and suffering of witnessing all of their developments that defined their cultures, specifically the religious aspect of their culture, dwindle away. Europe’s enhancements to culture reassured the conquerors of their dominance within the world and stimulated exploration, but this was relatively insignificant when compared to the drastic elimination of the conquered civilizations. Europe’s presence in the world had never been negated as a result of expansion; it was merely promoted, but due to their selfish pursuit for more wealth and therefore more land,