EDITED: (pp. 610-615) + Chapter 13 (pp. 617-649).

Spanish focused their empire building projects in the Caribbean and then turned to the mainland in the early 16th century. This is when they conquered the Aztecs in 1521 and the Incas. Countries were simply closer to the Americas than were any potential Asian Competitors. These were Portugal, Britain, Spain and France. The wind of the Atlantic Ocean (once understood) finally blew the ships from Europe towards the Americas. So, technically they were bound to find the Americas sooner or later. 

Demographic collapse of the Native Americans societies was the great dying. 90% of people perished when they came in contact with Europeans who brought disease. The carribbevn, Mexico and Americas populations dwindled from these contacts with the Europeans. Small Pox was the disease. Because of the great dying, it created an acute labor shortage and certainly did make room for IMMIGRANT newcomers, both coloring Europeans and enslaved Africans. European and African people largely replaced the many societies in American before 1492. They brought germs, people, plants and animals. The societies that developed within the American colonies drove the process of GLOBALIZATION and reshaped the world economy of the early modern ear.

1. Silver mines of Mexico
2. Peru fueled transatlantic and transpacific commerce
3. Enabled the Europeans to buy Chinese tea, skill
4. Plantation owners of the tropical lower region needed workers so that acquired slaves from Africa

This all created a lasting link among Africa, Europe and America. The enormous network of communication, migration trade, disease, and the transfer of plants and animals, all generated by European colonial empires in the Americas has been dubbed the "Colombian Exchange".

It gave rise to something new in world history: an interacting atlantic world connecting four continents. Long term benefits were unequally distributed. Mountains of information poured into Europe, changing the conventional understanding of the world and contributing to a revolutionary way of thinking known as the Scientific Revolution!

1521- Fall of the Aztec Empire

Large-scale sugar production introduced by the Arabs into the Mediterranean. Brazil dominated the world in the export of sugar and Portugal also. Slaves on these plantations came from Africa, the most slaves came here instead of the Americas. Why? Because the ones in America mated with each other and their children were born into slavery. In the south, when they were born, they were born free. So they needed more slaves.

The Chinese, Mughal and Ottoman empires continued older patterns of historical development. European empires had a far greater impact on the peoples they incorporated than did other empires. Nowhere else did empire building cause a catastrophic population decrease as the Americas. Europe was finally enriched and transformed from their American possessions far more than China and the Ottomans were by their territorial acquisitions.