In 1543 CE, of course the Spanish depradations in the “New World” continued. Back home in Seville, King Charles V may, the previous year, have signed the “New Laws” that sought to restrain the violence the conquistadores/settlers used against the indigenes. But over there (here) in the Americas, the settlers and their military bosses paid no heed, mocking the “New Laws”.
In the history of the emergence of Western domination of the world order, the Spanish conquista continued to form easily the narrative’s main strand. But in 1543, other European empires and proto-empires were also seeing significant developments:
In my 1541 post, I noted the centennial of Portugal’s introduction of the practice of European slave-raiding into sub-Saharan Africa. This year, 1542 CE, marks the first half-century of Spain/Castile’s massive empire-building project in the Americas. This year also marked some significant stirrings of conscience among a small segment of Spanish Catholics- though not enough to put more than a tiny dent in the continuing and still escalating depradations of the conquistadores in the “New World” they had found.
More on all that, below. Here’s what else was going on in the world:
In 1541 CE, of course Spain’s cruelly swashbuckling conquistadores continued their depradations in the Americas- from the Mississippi River down to southern Chile. Several other world-historically interesting things were happening too:
Probably the most world-historical development of 1540 CE was something that happened in the north of the Indian subcontinent. But elsewhere, many interesting things were happening, too:
These were the main developments in 1539 CE that impacted the development of the “West”’s domination of world affairs:
1538 CE was a huge year for the Ottoman navy- in both the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean. It also saw the usual kinds of things going on, on land, in Europe and the Americas, and some tragic things happening in China:
Lots of things going on in 1537 CE, both in the Americas and in the empire-builders’ European heartland:
There will a lot more to say about this as Project 500 Years goes forward. I should say at the outset that among European-heritage Christian bodies the Catholics were certainly not the only ones to become deeply embroiled in the project of empire. Just about all the other Christian denominations of Europe- including the Church of England in which I grew up, and the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) of which I’m now a member- were also deeply involved. …
The main themes of 1536 CE that had a bearing on the continuing emergence of European-origined empires were as follows:
So 1535 CE was another busy year in the emergence of European-origined empires:
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