Formation of the Atlantic Trade Network

Name: Formation of the Atlantic Trade Network
Start: 1492
End: 1500

Type Event Region Europe Time 1492–1500

In the 1490s, driven by Iberian maritime expansion and the Treaty of Tordesillas, an Atlantic trade network linking Europe, the West African coast, a…

Timeline

1492Bahamas (around Guanahani) · BahamasChristopher Columbus led a Castilian fleet across the Atlantic to the Caribbean islands, opening regular maritime contact between Europe and the Americas and paving the way for subsequent colonization and trade.
1494Tordesillas · CastileSpain and Portugal signed the Treaty of Tordesillas, dividing colonial and trading rights in the Atlantic and newly discovered lands along a meridian, providing an international legal framework for their subsequent transoceanic expansion.
1496–1500Seville–Hispaniola route · Europe–Caribbean routeBy the late 1490s, the round-trip route from Seville via the Canary Islands to Hispaniola and the Caribbean islands had become regularized, and European goods, colonial supplies, and American gold and produce began to circulate across the ocean.

Sources

The Cambridge World History, Volume 6: The Construction of a Global World, 1400–1800 CE — Jerry H. Bentley et al. (2015)
Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) https://www.britannica.com/event/Treaty-of-Tordesillas