The Spaniards came to the New World with a dual mission of seeking wealth and spreading Christianity. To achieve the goal of conversion, missionaries learned native languages and sought to understand the cultures. Using the Roman alphabet, they transcribed languages and created grammars and dictionaries, all to translate and disseminate their Christian message. Out of the commitment to their goal of conversion, missionaries became the first ethnographers. Although much of their work remained unpublished, much of what we know about the Inca, Aztecs, and Maya is found in these manuscripts. However, some missionaries also destroyed many native texts and cultural objects, considering them works of idolatry.

During the centuries of Spanish exploration and colonization, “treasure fleets” made regular trips to the Americas to deliver merchandise and collect treasures and precious metals. As these cargos increased in size and value, so did the risk of capture and theft. Foreign navies, privateers (commissioned agents sent out against the enemies of states), and pirates threatened, attacked, and plundered the ships of the treasure fleets.

• Pirates and Privateers
• Spain’s “La Florida”
• Colonial Florida
• The United States: An Emerging Empire
• Sir Frances Drake’s Voyage Maps

The European world view changed dramatically following the voyages of early explorers. News of the “new worlds” challenged current cosmographic beliefs as well as the information in geographical works by Claudius Ptolemy and other ancient Classical Greek astronomers and geographers. Maps played a major role in the information transfer, providing unmatched representations of newly discovered geographic realities. Johann Gutenberg’s mechanical printing press and the development of woodcut and engraving techniques ensured the preservation and wide distribution of this new information.

• Mapping the world
• Cartographic Treasures
• Natural History