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Roman Catholics were the first major religious group to immigrate to the New World, as settlers in the Spanish and Portuguese colonies of Portugal and Spain, and later, France in New France. No other religion was tolerated and there was a concerted effort to convert indigenous peoples and black slaves to Catholicism.
At that stage, immigration was dominated by Portuguese and Spaniards, who accounted for 87% of the settlers who left Europe. In the late 15th and early 16th centuries, the decision by Spanish and Portuguese monarchs to take possession of the New World and establish crown-governed colonies required the transfer of large numbers of colonists.
It was not long before the exclusivity of Iberian claims to the Americas was challenged by other European powers, primarily the Netherlands, France and England: the view taken by the rulers of these nations is epitomized by the quotation attributed to Francis I of France demanding to be shown the clause in Adam's will excluding his authority from the New World.
This is the world map from this atlas. European nations outside Iberia did not recognize the Treaty of Tordesillas between Portugal and Castile, nor did they recognize Pope Alexander VI's donation of the Spanish finds in the New World. France, the Netherlands and England each had a long maritime tradition and had been engaging in privateering ...
Africa, Asia, and Europe became collectively called the "Old World" of the Eastern Hemisphere, while the Americas were then referred to as "the fourth part of the world", or the "New World". [ 3 ] Antarctica and Oceania are considered neither Old World nor New World lands, since they were only discovered by Europeans much later.
In 1683 Kino led the first European overland crossing of Baja California. European exploration of western Canada was largely motivated by the fur trade and the search for the elusive Northwest Passage. Hudson's Bay Company explorer Henry Kelsey has the distinction of being the first European to see the northern Great Plains in 1690.
North of Mexico the only settlements were Saint Augustine and the isolated outpost in northern New Mexico. Exploration of the interior was largely abandoned after the 1540s. Around Newfoundland 500 or more boats annually were fishing for cod and some fishermen were trading for furs, especially at Tadoussac on the Saint Lawrence.
The first wave of European expansion involved exploring the world to find new revenue and perpetuating European feudalism. The second wave focused on developing the mercantile capitalism system and the manufacturing industry in Europe. The last wave of European colonialism solidified all capitalistic endeavours by providing new markets and raw ...