In the thirteenth, fourteenth, and early fifteenth centuries, European economic power was concentrated in the Italian city-states. It quickly shifted to Spain and Portugal (the Iberian Peninsula) once the age of colonization began. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, power shifted again to Northern Europe as the influx of precious metals into Europe enriched the French, the English, and the Dutch.

Peter the Great is one of the most famous rulers in Russian history. He westernized and “modernized” Russian society by implementing many features of the societies of Western and Central Europe. He also dramatically expanded Russian territory, gaining for his state a port city on the Baltic and the Black Seas. His port city on the Baltic would come to be called St. Petersburg, and was for a long time the Russian capital.

The innovation in joint-stock companies revolutionized infant capitalism and allowed the Dutch and the British in particular to undertake expensive trading ventures that would otherwise have been impossible or extremely risky to finance for an individual. Joint-stock companies worked much like modern corporations, where individuals could purchase a share of the risk for a share of the profit.

Although it is certainly true that the evangelical feeling of much of Europe and the United States in the nineteenth century played a role in the motivation behind the New Imperialism, it was much less significant of a factor than was the constant need for more raw materials and more markets. The industrial, consumer economies of Europe were growing at an unprecedented rate and burning through raw resources more quickly than they could be supplied. They needed new raw materials and new markets to keep the system growing at the same pace, and so conquered much of the known world. The intellectual arguments of Kipling and others were more like excuses for clearly amoral behavior than they were actual primary motivating factors.

The Seven Years’ War was primarily waged between Britain and France in the middle of the eighteenth century. It was the culmination of more than a century of global competition between the British and the French to acquire more and more colonies. It was fought in Europe, North America, Asia, and on the seas. It ended in victory for the British and the loss of numerous French territories, including some in India and North America.

The British Empire grew much larger than the other European empires in large part because Britain's colonies were permanently settled in much larger numbers. In America, Canada, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, India, and several smaller nations, as well as on several smaller islands, the English arrived and established permanent settlements. The French, for example, were much more likely to establish temporary trading posts.

Mercantilism was the prevailing economic theory of the first age of exploration and colonization. The primary goal of any country under the direction of mercantilism was to ensure a favorable balance of trade with overseas colonies and European trading partners. A country could achieve this by exporting more than it imported. This led to a frantic competition for colonies between the nations of Europe and exacerbated the desire to acquire new territories.

The Russians were defeated by the French and the British in the Crimean War in the middle of the nineteenth century and subsequently underwent a massive project of modernization and industrialization. Likewise, the Japanese were routinely humiliated by the demands of the Western Europeans (and the United States) and developed an industrial economy with a military modeled on the Prussians in order to better be able to resist.

Within two years of having landed Cortés and his force of allied tribes had alienated the Aztecs of Tenochtitlan. Cortés attempted to put king Moctezuma under house arrest, at which point the populace revolted. Cortés was ousted by the popular uprising. Cortes would, however, return with an even larger army and take the capital in 1521. 

Leif Erickson explored what is today known as Newfoundland, a part of Canada, a full 500 years before Christopher Columbus began his journey in 1492.