Cortes and Montezuma

There was a man named Cortes, and he wanted to get Tenochtitlan for himself, so he took a fleet of army soldiers down there. The Aztecs thought that the gods were coming, so they brought out gifts of gold. Cortes told his men to keep riding, and they went into the city. The king dreamed that the gods were coming so he finally decided to let them into the city. They had a big party, and they were selling things. Finally Cortes killed several of the Aztecs, and the Aztecs thought, "The gods wouldn't behave this!" So they armed themselves and started fighting. The Spanish quickly his in the castle. Now they were besieged by enemy soldiers, so they waited there for days and days. Finally one of them looked down out of the window, and saw that there were no enemy soldiers. So they went out and found some wood because there was no bridge across the moat. Now the enemy had a plan, but they didn't know it. They built a bridge across and they started filing across. On the way across, they had their pockets so loaded with gold from the city that when the enemy canoes came up, they couldn't get away and some of them were drowned. Only Cortes and some of his best soldiers got away. They got in their ships and sailed away and got more soldiers. They went back and fought and fought and fought. Finally, the enemy was forced to surrender, so the soldiers and Cortes marched into the city. now Cortes was the ruler of the new Spanish kingdom.

The Slave Trade

When Ferdinand and Isabella were paying for explorers to cross the Atlantic to the new World they weren't just doing them a favor. They did it for gold. When Columbus went there he claimed it for Spain. He said that they had to follow Spain's laws, and if anyone found gold there they could take it. They made villages there, and they took land away from the Incas and the Mayas, and the Aztecs. This began a sad time in history because they took people from African villages, and also took Incas, Aztecs, and Mayans when the Muslims didn't have enough slaves to sell. They were put on ships and taken to America. They weren't allowed to go up on deck, and they didn't get enough sunshine, air, water and food. Most of them died on the long and rough journey. When they reached land they were forced to work without pay.

The Incas

I'm going to narrate about the story the Incas told about their gods and how their civilization came to be.

The sun god would rise up and then go down into the sea and then go up again. But one day when he was down, he didn't like what he saw because people were living like wild animals. He told his wife he had a problem because the people were fighting and quarreling, and he wanted there to be peace. So they sent their son and daughter down with a golden staff to teach the people how to be civilized. They told them that wherever the staff leaped out of their hands and sank into the earth, that was where they were to build a city. the gods can only enter the earth through a door of still water, and they found the door in lake Titicaca. They went down and came up again, and taught people how to be civilized. The brother was carrying the golden staff, and suddenly it leaped from his hand, so they knew they had to build a city. That is how they explain how their city came to be and why they think the emperors are sons of the gods.

The Aztecs

The Aztecs wandered from place to place but they had no home, but the priests saw a small island in a lake. A small cactus with an eagle holding a snake in its talons was there. The priest said it was a sign from the sun god that they should go and live there. It was marshy, but they were determined to live there, so they made walls and put mud and dirt and stones inside the walls. The drawbridge was logs.

They ate tomatoes, and chocolate made from cacao seeds. They shot birds and ducks and animals for food. They also ate fish eggs, deer, and other animals. They also made cakes from algae. They kidnapped men women and children for sacrifices. They had canals that let water out from the towns foundation. People brought them vegetables, but they usually grew their own on floating mats, and some people built their houses in their floating gardens.

The Mayans

There were people living in North and South America before Columbus came there. They started living there when the Roman Empire was just crumbling, and they had been there for hundreds of years. The people who came out to meet Columbus had scars, and they told him they were from fighting off their enemies. He wrote about it in his journal. They had other gods other than the one we worship. They thought that the gods were cross-eyed, and they thought that the emperors were descendants of the gods, so when an emperor's baby was born, his mother hung a toy between his eyes so the baby would have to cross his eyes to look at it.

All the Mayan games ended with bloodshed. The person that got the ball through the hoop twenty feet off the ground with his hips, knees, or elbows was declared the winner. The others were taken to the temple and their heads were cut off.

People started going away because they hated their emperors, because they were so mean. Their enemies kept on attacking them, and as they, left their empire began to crumble and the buildings disappeared into the jungle -- temples, houses, and palaces all disappeared.

Christopher Columbus

People wanted to try get to India, but one stopped when he got to the tip of Africa because his sailors were afraid of what might be next.

When Christopher Columbus wanted to reach India, his plan was to go straight into the Atlantic Ocean, because someone said that the earth was round and if he could go around, he would bump into India's east side. He went to the Portuguese because they had tried hardest to get to India, but they laughed at him and told him the ocean was bigger than he thought.

Columbus went to some other kings but no one agreed to his idea. Finally he went to Ferdinand and Isabella. Ferdinand didn't think it was a very good idea, but Isabella thought that it was a great idea, and that Spain could become richer and richer and be the richest kingdom in the world. After the war they were having, she got him the supplies he needed. So he set off and he found a whole bunch of people that were crying because they were Jews and the law said that no Jews were allowed.

Bit by bit the men on ship started complaining, and some started getting sick and dying. Their gums started turning black. So they started planning to kill Christopher Columbus. Finally Columbus agreed that if there was no land in three days, they would go home. On the second day, somebody shouted "Land!" So they got off their ship and they reached some little islands. He brought out some things from Spain, but the people that lived on the island didn't bring him gold and stuff; they brought him reels of cotton, strange foods, bell peppers and parrots. He brought it back to Ferdinand and Isabella. Isabella thought it was worth it to try again. He hadn't found India; he had found North and South America. But Vasco de Gama did eventually manage to sail around Africa to India

Akbar of India

When Babur the Tiger's son Hamayan came home, he slipped on the steps of his library, hit his head, and died. His son Akbar was crowned emperor. He wanted to be a good emperor, so though he was a Muslim he let Hindu worship continue. He was so good that people wrote stories about him. Here is one of those stories:

The emperor was in his palace, and there was a man named Gulshan, and people said he always brought bad luck. Whenever the eggs rotted, the cook shouted, "Gulshan must have been here! He always brings bad luck!" And whenever the bread burned, the baker said, "Gulshan must have been here, because he's bad luck!" And whenever it rained on a feast day, everybody blamed Gulshan.

Akbar said that Gulshan should bring him his breakfast the next day. Gulshan was horrified, but when he got up, he went and got ready and brought the emperor's breakfast. While the emperor was eating breakfast, there was a hair in his bread. He said, "Well, I've gotten hair in my bread before." Then a sand fly bit him, but he said, "I've been bitten by flies before." But the he really started having some bad luck, and he said that Gulshan really was bad luck and that he had to be hanged.

While Gulshan was in prison, Birbal came and said he would speak for him. He told the emperor, "He causes bad luck but you made him get hanged. Which one of you is having worse luck?" The emperor laughed and said that he could go free, but he had to find another house to serve in!

India: Babur the Tiger

There was a kingdom when we first began this book. The Huns attacked India and it began to fall apart. The little kingdoms began fighting each other. they hoped for a strong ruler, and they began getting poorer because of wars and diseases. Finally the emperor they wanted came -- Babur the Tiger. He was driven out of his home by another ruler and was looking for a new home. He conquered Delhi and then the the rest of it. But he was an Ottoman Turk, not an Indian. The Indians were afraid of him. He wanted to be a good ruler so he let people follow their own religon even though he followed Islam. He missed his old home, so he built himself a garden and a bath. he described India as a dusty place with no gardens and no baths.

African kingdoms: Songhay

Ghana was known for its gold and salt. Mali was known for its emperor. And Songhay was known for its size. It had a bunch of mosques, schools, mansions, and palaces with walls around them.

Leo Africanus was a muslim. When he was a kid, Ferdinand and Isabella were conquering the las t muslim kingdoms in Spain. His parents took him to North Africa. When he grew up he decided to leave North Africa and go down through the Sahara desert to Songhay. He wrote a book ut what he saw.

He said that there were houses made of clay bricks and thatched roofs, but the palace was made of stone. the women wore veils over their faces, except for the slave women. The emperor had a lot of gold. he said once he saw a gold bar that weighed a thousand pounds. Books were very valuable. The King usually led his army into battle, but only against those who refused to pay him tribute.

The Moroccans wanted to seize the salt mines and the gold mines, and they came down with an army of 3,000 men armed with guns and cannons. The Songhay people only had spears, shields and swords, and they couldn't resist the stronger weapons. the Moroccans got the salt mines but they couldn't find the gold ones, so they gave up. But the Songhay Empire had fallen apart -- the largest empire in medieval history had come to an end.

African kingdoms: Mali

Ghana started to crumble because of the Muslim attack. Mansa Musa's kingdom of Mali began to be powerful. It took over Ghana. The people always showed too much reverence to their king. When Mansa Musa came to the throne, he ruled and kept on bragging about how big his kingdom had gotten. He wanted to take a trip to Mecca, but it would take over a year to get there. On the way, wherever he stopped, he paid to have a mosque built so he could pray. When he traveled he gave away a lot of gold to the Egyptians. When he got there, he took off his clothes, washed himself, and put on white clothes. After he finished praying, he had to borrow money to get back home because he gave away all his gold.

African kingdoms: Ghana

There was a rich and powerful kingdom in West Africa and its name was Ghana. The people of Ghana lived in houses made of red clay bricks as hard as stone and thatch roofs. They had to work in the army part of the time, so they made shields, swords, bows, arrows, and spears.

The king of Ghana, when he listened to complaints, sat in a tent with gold cloth wrapped around his head. His nobles sat around him with gold braided into their hair. There were horses around him with gold saddles and bridles. Ten pages stood behind him with shields and swords with gold hilts.

The people grew okra and pumpkins and they hunted for birds and deer for meat.

The Arabians had a lot of salt, and gold came from the south. The Arabians and the people of the south traded with each other. They both had to pass through Ghana, and the people of Ghana taxed them. They had to give the people of Ghana gold and salt.

Henry the Navigator

Henry the Navigator was the fourth son of the king of Portugal, and he was away fighting in North Africa. He was thinking about making a fleet of ships. He told the mapwriters to make new maps, and he made the fleet of ships. The sailors had to learn how to use lots tools. One was called a compass, and the other was called and astrolabe. They also had to learn how to tell directions by the North Star. The had to use a tool to tell how fast a boat was going. It was a rope with knots on it. One end had a stick, and one end had a reel. They threw the stick overboard and let the reel unroll. They used a timer that let sand out for one minute, then they would pull the reel up and counted the knots to see how many knots per minute. When the sailors were ready to go, they only sailed short distances because they thought the coast of Africa had sea monsters, and that the sea was so shallow that the boats would bump against the bottom, and that the sun was so hot there that it heated up the water and the water could boil humans. Finally a sailor named Gil Eannes sailed to the coast of Africa and found that it was like the water near home. After his example, sailors started going there and traded for pepper, spices, gold, and slaves.

Ferdinand and Isabella

The brother of Isabella wanted Isabella to marry Pedro Giron, a scoundrel, so he could get men for fighting. She was scared because she didn't want to marry this guy. Everybody was getting ready for the wedding, and he kept on bragging, but then he died of stomach pains before he could reach the castle.

The princess Isabella was relieved of having to marry that guy, but not for long, because then she had to marry the king of Portugal so that could unite kingdoms. She didn't like him either, so she lent a letter to Ferdinand, the prince of Aragon, because he was just about her age, and she asked him whether he would marry her instead. He decided to, but he didn't want anyone to know who he was, so he dressed up and pretended to be a merchant's servant. She got up at night and stole a horse from her brother's stable and rode out to where he was. They talked for hours and decided to get married right away.

After they got married her brother was furious over what they had done, but when he died, Ferdinand became king of Spain. The first thing he decided to do was take back the lands the Muslims had left. One was called Granada, and the king lived in a palace called the Alhambra. When the king won, -- that is, Ferdinand-- the king look back at his lost city and sighed. His mother was angry and said, "Don't weep like a woman over what you couldn't defend like a man!"

They made it a Christian kingdom only, and it was illegal to practice any other religion. They sent the Jews away, and many Jews died on the journey out of Spain. Even though they were good rulers, they were remembered for that unfair act of theirs.

Wars of the Roses

The French were not the only people fighting over the throne; the English were too. One side was called the Lancastrians and the other was called the york. the Yorks had white, and the Lancastrians had red. The wars of the English throne were called the Wars of Roses. The Wars of Roses began during the time of Henry the VI, son of Henry V. When he grew up, he began to rule England. He was a very nice man who spent hours and hours praying and reading. One of his dukes came into the room to tell him about a problem in the kingdom, and he said, "I can hardly find a moment to read holy teachings without disturbance."

Henry sort of became mad and he wouldn't talk to his friends, and he believed he was made of glass. The Duke of York was asked to rule in the king's place. Then he decides to conquer it! He gathered his men and fought, but Henry's side won. The Duke was killed and the Queen said his head should be placed on the wall with a paper crown on it. Then his son Edward collected a big army and marched against them. This time they won the victory and took Henry VI to prison, and Edward crowned himself king.

Edward was a nice man, but he fell in love with a woman, Elizabeth Woodville, who had been married before to a knight that had died in battle. Nobody liked her because she was on the side of Henry VI, so he had to marry her in secret. When they wanted him to get married to a princess that they had picked, he had to admit that he had married her, and he put her in a parade. So some people took sides with Henry VI and let him out of jail. They tried to attack the palace at night time, but Edward jumped out of bed and ran away. Now Henry VI was king again.

But when Edward had collected a big enough army, Henry was put in prison again and killed in prison. Edward reigned for 12 years. When he died, his 12-year-old son Edward V became king. But he was too young, so his uncle, Richard III ruled in his place.

Edward V had been put into that big tower in London. His little brother had been put into the tower with him. Some people said that Richard ought to be king. Some people complained. But when Richard ordered Edward V's governor beheaded, people didn't complain so loudly, because no one wanted to be next. Once when some people were cleaning up some rubble in the tower, they found a box with two skeletons in it. They thought this might be the bodies of the two princes and that they had been killed or something, but no one is sure. And now as you have probably guessed, being heir to the throne in England was dangerous!