Violence, disease, and blame

Lesson plan

3 class periods of about 45 minutes.

1. Day 1 · 45 min

   Wolves and sheep

   1. Before class, read the intensity notes on the unit's sources. Several describe killing, captivity and mass death; each source page lists its intensity at the top, with a note.
   2. 10 minutes: Read A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies (Opening) (Las Casas), passages 1–9. Its words for cruelty are strong but general; no single scene is described.
   3. 15 minutes: In small groups, students make two columns: every word or phrase Las Casas uses for the Indigenous peoples, and every one he uses for the Spaniards. Groups discuss what picture each column builds.
   4. 10 minutes: Read passages 14–17. Students find the two ways Las Casas says the Spaniards destroyed the peoples of the Indies, and the goal he says drove them.
   5. 10 minutes: Read the History tab on his numbers. Each student writes two sentences: one on what the lists tell us about Las Casas, and one on what they cannot tell us about the Taíno.

2. Day 2 · 45 min

   Explaining the sickness

   1. 10 minutes: Read The Sickness That Followed the English (Harriot), passages 2–14, aloud together. The sentences are long and report several layers of belief at once, so pause after each passage.
   2. 15 minutes: Students make a chart of every explanation for the sickness: the work of the English God, invisible beings shooting invisible bullets, the eclipse and the comet, and a special work of God. For each, they note who held it and the words Harriot uses to judge it.
   3. 10 minutes: Read Winter at Stadacona and the Cedar Cure (Cartier), passage 15.1. The French believed the sickness had passed to them from the town. Discuss how each group explained where a sickness came from, and whom each account leaves to blame.
   4. 10 minutes: Reread Harriot's last two passages (13–14). Discuss what he wants his readers to believe, and what the History tab adds about the colony's own violence, which he mentions only briefly in passage 14.

3. Day 3 · 45 min

   Fights and blame

   1. Split the class in two. Half read Bloody Point and the Two Captives (Best), passages 1–3, 6 and 8; half read Champlain Fights beside the Algonquin and Wendat (Champlain), passages 3–7.
   2. 15 minutes: Each group lists what its writer says the Europeans saw and did, and what he guesses about the Native fighters' thoughts, looking for words like "thinking", "supposed" and "as it seemed". Best was not at the fight at Bloody Point; Champlain was.
   3. 10 minutes: Pair a Best student with a Champlain student to answer the Connection question on Champlain's For teachers tab: how does each writer claim to know what the Native fighters thought, and how far do you trust each claim?
   4. For extension, groups may read The Mi'kmaq and the French, and the Sickness among Them (Biard) or The Mexica Embassy and the Smallpox in Michoacán (Relación de Michoacán), both early versions, for a missionary's blame and a Purépecha ruler's.
   5. 15 minutes: Each student answers the unit question, Whom did writers blame for the suffering that followed contact?, in a paragraph that uses evidence from at least two writers and says what each one had to gain from the blame he gave.

Read these sources

The sources the lesson plan uses, in its order. Each opens in Hearth Library with the original beside plain English, and a History tab on who made it and how far to trust it.

1. 1

   A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies (Opening)

   Las Casas, 1542–1552. Moderate.

   Long strings of praise and blame; needs the notes on the encomienda and on his numbers.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   Indies

   the European name for the lands Columbus reached, because he believed they lay off Asia

   league

   an old Spanish measure of long distances, of several miles

   holy fathers in the desert

   early Christian hermits in Egypt and Syria who lived alone, very simply, with little food

   tyranny

   cruel and unjust rule by people who use power only for themselves

   encomienda

   a grant to a Spaniard of the labor and tribute of a group of Indigenous people, who in return were to be protected and taught Christianity

   sacraments

   holy rites of the Catholic Church, such as baptism; the church taught that baptism was needed for salvation

   1. Comprehension According to Las Casas, what were the two main ways the Spaniards destroyed the peoples of the Indies, and what does he say was their final goal?
   2. Analysis Las Casas calls the Indigenous peoples gentle sheep and the Spaniards wolves, tigers, and lions. Why might he describe both groups this way, and what does this picture leave out about the Indigenous peoples themselves?
   3. Analysis (reliability) Las Casas lived on Hispaniola and in Cuba, but he finished this account in Spain in 1542 and dedicated the printed book to Prince Philip. Which parts of this opening could he have seen himself, and which could he not? How should we use his numbers?
   4. Connection In News of the First Voyage, Columbus writes that the islands were filled with more people than anyone could count and that no one opposed him when he took possession of them. Compare how Columbus and Las Casas describe the people of the islands. What did each writer want his reader in Spain to think or do, and how does that shape his description?

   Activity Students make two columns: every word or phrase Las Casas uses for the Indigenous peoples, and every one he uses for the Spaniards. In small groups they discuss what picture each column builds and how a reader at the Spanish court might react to it. Each student then writes two sentences: one on what the lists tell us about Las Casas, and one on what they cannot tell us about the Taíno.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

2. 2

   The Sickness That Followed the English

   Harriot, 1586–1589. Challenging.

   Long, modernized sixteenth-century sentences that report several layers of belief at once.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   Wiroans

   a coastal Algonquian word for a chief, also spelled werowance

   providence

   God's care for the world and plan for what happens in it; a special providence is God acting directly in one event

   immortality

   living forever, never dying

   physician

   a healer or doctor; here, the healers of the coastal towns

   astrologer

   a person who reads the stars, eclipses, and comets as signs of what will happen on earth

   eclipse

   a time when the moon passes in front of the sun and darkens it

   1. Comprehension According to Harriot, in which towns did people die, and what did the people of the coast notice about the English during the sickness?
   2. Analysis Harriot reports several explanations for the sickness. Which ones does he give to the people of the coast, which to the English, and which to astrologers? How does he judge each one?
   3. Analysis (reliability) Harriot wrote to win investors and settlers for Raleigh's colony. Reread the last two paragraphs. What does he want his readers to believe, and what does he say little about? How far can we trust his report of what the people of the coast thought?
   4. Connection In A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, Las Casas writes about great numbers of deaths after the Spaniards arrived. Compare whom or what Las Casas and Harriot hold responsible for the deaths they describe, and what each wants his readers in Europe to believe or do.

   Activity Students make a chart of every explanation for the sickness in the passage: the work of the English God, invisible beings shooting invisible bullets, the eclipse and the comet, and a special work of God. For each one they note who held it, according to Harriot, and the words Harriot uses to judge it. The class then discusses how Harriot's choice of words shapes our view of each explanation.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

3. 3

   Winter at Stadacona and the Cedar Cure

   Cartier, 1536–1545. Moderate.

   A clear story with some period religious terms; the notes explain the prayers and the tree.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   mortality

   a deadly outbreak of disease, in which many people die

   scurvy

   a disease caused by a lack of vitamin C

   contagion

   the spread of disease from person to person

   Mass

   the main act of worship in the Catholic Church

   vow

   a solemn promise, here one made to God

   pilgrim

   a person who travels to a holy place as an act of faith

   calking

   hammering fiber into the seams of a ship to keep the water out

   1. Comprehension What did Domagaya and the two women show the French to do with the branches of the tree called Annedda?
   2. Analysis The writer calls the cure “a true and plain miracle” and thanks God for it, but he also tells how Domagaya and the two women taught it. How does he fit these two explanations together, and why might he tell the story of the cure this way?
   3. Analysis (reliability) The writer was with the French that winter, but his name is not known, he writes in praise of the captain, and the account was printed in 1545. Which parts of the passage could he know firsthand, and which did he learn from the people of Stadacona? How should that shape what we trust?
   4. Connection Read The Sickness That Followed the English (Harriot). Harriot reports that people began to die soon after the English left towns that had plotted against them, while none of the English died, and that some of them thought the English God was killing them. The French at Stadacona believed the sickness had passed to them from the town. Compare how each group explained where a sickness came from, and whom each account leaves to blame.

   Activity Students build a timeline of the winter from the text (the news in December, the count by the middle of February, the Mass and the vow, the captain's pretense, Domagaya's visit, the cure). On each entry they note who acted and what explanation the writer gives. They then write two captions for the cure, one in the writer's terms and one that names only what the text shows Domagaya and the women did, and compare them.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

4. 4

   Bloody Point and the Two Captives

   Best, 1577–1578. Challenging.

   An English text of 1578 with long sentences; the spelling is modernized, but the word order is Best's.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   caliver

   a light firearm, a kind of musket

   sound

   a long, narrow arm of the sea

   sea room

   open water, with space to move a boat freely

   cannibal

   a person who eats human flesh

   salve

   a healing ointment put on the skin

   captive

   a person taken and held by force

   lieutenant

   an officer next in command after the leader

   1. Comprehension What did the Inuit do with their oars as soon as they landed at Bloody Point, and why does Best think they did it?
   2. Analysis Look at the words Best uses for the Inuit during the fight, such as “manfully,” “deadly fury,” and “ignorant of what mercy means.” What picture of the Inuit do these words build? How might that picture affect where his readers placed the blame for the deaths?
   3. Analysis (reliability) Best was not at the fight at Bloody Point, but he did watch the captives meet and the visit of August 6. He wrote soon afterward for readers and investors in England. How should we weigh his account of the fight against his account of the meeting? What reasons might he have had to tell the story as he did?
   4. Connection Read A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies (Las Casas). Las Casas writes that the Indians never harmed the Christians until they or their neighbors had first suffered many wrongs from them. In Best's account, the English chase the Inuit and the Inuit fight back. Compare how the two writers explain violence between Europeans and Native peoples, and whom each one blames.

   Activity Groups each take one of the four scenes (the chase and fight, the woman and child, the captives' meeting, the visit of August 6). In two lists, they note what Best says the English saw and did, and what he guesses about the Inuit's thoughts or feelings, looking for words like “thinking,” “supposed,” “as it seemed,” and “I think.” Groups report in order, and the class discusses how Best's view of the Inuit changes from the first scene to the last.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

5. 5

   Champlain Fights beside the Algonquin and Wendat

   Champlain, 1609–1613. Moderate.

   A clear battle story; the notes sort out the peoples and Champlain's names for them.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   allies

   peoples or persons who join together for a shared purpose, especially in war

   superstitions

   Champlain's word for his allies' rites for learning what lay ahead

   barricade

   a wall built quickly to keep out an enemy

   arquebus

   an early gun with a long barrel, fired from the shoulder or cheek

   plume

   a large feather worn on the head, here as a mark of a chief

   latitude

   how far a place lies north or south of the equator, measured in degrees

   1. Comprehension How could Champlain's allies tell which of the Iroquois were the chiefs, and what did they ask him to do?
   2. Analysis The Iroquois and Champlain's allies agree to wait for daylight, and both sides spend the night singing, dancing and trading insults. What does this suggest about how the two sides expected a battle to go? How did the French guns change what happened the next morning?
   3. Analysis (reliability) Champlain wrote this account four years later, for a book printed in Paris and presented to the king, and he says his allies could not understand him well. Which parts of the story could he see for himself, and which are his guesses about what the Iroquois or his allies thought? Why might he place himself at the center of the story?
   4. Connection Read Bloody Point and the Two Captives (Best). Best says the wounded Inuit threw themselves into the sea because they thought the English were cannibals, a reason he could not check by asking them. Champlain says the Iroquois were astonished that two men were killed so quickly, since their armor stopped arrows. Compare how each writer claims to know what the Native fighters thought or felt, and how far you trust each claim.

   Activity Students study the engraving of the fight beside its key and the written account. For each lettered part of the key, they find the matching moment in the text and note where the picture and the words agree, and anything one shows that the other leaves out. Letters A, F, G and K are missing from the picture, and H is printed on the allies' canoes, so students find those parts from the key's descriptions. The class then discusses what the engraving puts at its center and why Champlain might have wanted it drawn that way.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

6. 6

   The Mi'kmaq and the French, and the Sickness among Them

   Biard, 1614–1616. Moderate.Early version

   Plain and direct; the notes explain the poisons, the trade goods, and the names of peoples.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   dysentery

   a sickness of the gut that causes severe, often bloody diarrhea

   realgar

   a red mineral containing arsenic; a deadly poison that was also used in medicine at the time

   sublimate

   mercury chloride, a deadly poison that was also used in medicine at the time

   adulterated

   made worse by having cheaper or spoiled things mixed in

   brandy

   a strong alcoholic drink made by distilling wine

   constitution

   the general strength and health of a person's body

   lying-in

   the time a mother rests after giving birth

   1. Comprehension What explanations did the Mi'kmaq give for why so many of their people were dying, and which one does Biard call false?
   2. Analysis Biard says the main cause of the deaths "is something to their shame." What cause does he give, and how does it differ from the Mi'kmaq explanations? What in Biard's position might lead him to it?
   3. Analysis (reliability) Biard reports what the Mi'kmaq told him, much of it through interpreters, and his population figures are estimates from what people told him. Which things in this passage did he see for himself, and which did he hear? How far can we trust his numbers and his explanation?
   4. Connection Read Harriot, The Sickness That Followed the English. In both texts, Native people notice that sickness came after Europeans arrived, and they offer their own explanations. Compare the explanations in the two texts, and how each European writer sorts them. Whom does each writer blame?

   Activity Students make a chart of every explanation for the deaths in the passage, with columns for who gives it, what evidence is offered, and what Biard says about it. Each student then picks the explanation the passage gives the most evidence for and writes two or three sentences defending the choice with a quotation.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

7. 7

   The Mexica Embassy and the Smallpox in Michoacán

   Relación de Michoacán, 1539–1541. Challenging.Early version

   Long, repetitive speeches that follow Purépecha speech closely, with a few unclear sentences flagged in the notes.

   Questions, key terms and an activity

   cazonci

   the title the Spaniards used for the Purépecha king

   mantle

   a loose cloak worn over the shoulders

   loincloth

   a strip of cloth worn around the hips and between the legs

   pestilence

   a deadly epidemic that spreads quickly through many people

   smallpox

   a contagious disease that causes fever and a rash of sores over the body; it was unknown in the Americas before Europeans arrived

   bloody flux

   dysentery or severe diarrhea with blood

   high priest

   the leading priest of a temple; the friar called the Purépecha high priests "bishops"

   1. Comprehension What did the Mexica ask the cazonci to do, and how did Zuangua answer them?
   2. Analysis Why, according to Zuangua, have the strangers come, and why are the gods angry? What does he tell his people to do about it?
   3. Analysis (reliability) These words come from Purépecha elders speaking about twenty years after the events, written down in Spanish by a Franciscan friar. Which parts of the chapter could the elders have known well, and which could they not have known? How far can we trust the long speeches as the words actually spoken?
   4. Connection Read The Smallpox in Mexico, 1520, which Nahua elders told to a Franciscan friar decades after the events. It describes the sores and the hunger in detail. The Michoacán account gives the sickness a few sentences and names who died. What does each account choose to record about the epidemic, and why might they differ?

   Activity Students read the chapter aloud as a council scene: two students read the messengers' report, one reads Zuangua's answer, and the rest are the lords who reply. Afterward the lords list every reason Zuangua gives for not sending warriors to Mexico and for bringing more wood to the temples. Then one student reads the last paragraph, and the class discusses how the ending changes the way the council reads.

   For teachers · Worksheet for this source

More sources for this unit

• The Second Voyage Reaches the Islands of the Caribs Chanca, 1494. Moderate.Early version For teachers
• The Images in the Field Pané, 1496–1498. Moderate.Early version For teachers
• Maize and Cassava Bread Oviedo, 1525–1526. Moderate. For teachers
• Maize, Markets and Books in Yucatán Landa, 1566. Moderate. For teachers
• Brought to Ubatuba as a Captive, 1554 Staden, 1555–1557. Moderate.Early version For teachers
• How the Angola Trade Fed Cartagena Sandoval, 1620–1647. Challenging.Early version For teachers
• A Winter of Famine by Lake Superior Radisson, 1668–1669. Challenging.Early version For teachers

To finish

Come back to the question: Whom did writers blame for the suffering that followed contact? Ask students to answer it with evidence from at least two of the sources, and to say which source they trust most and why.

Standards

Students chart the words writers use for each side and the explanations they give for deaths, and judge them against each writer's purpose.

Go further

Other units

First encounters · Food, farming, and Native knowledge

Encyclopedia

Cassava · Maize · Tenochtitlan · The Columbian Exchange · The Taíno · Tisquantum (Squanto)

Play

Lost Settlement

Collection

Every source in Early Americas