Identify one way in which the Vikings were effective sailors.
[1]
Name one place raided by Vikings from 793.
[1]
Name one area settled by Vikings who crossed the Atlantic.
[1]
Write a clear and organised summary that analyses Viking settlement in the British Isles after 865.
Support your summary with examples.
[9]
What was the impact of Harald Bluetooth’s reign upon Denmark? Explain your answer.
[10]
4* ‘The success of the Volga Vikings was entirely due to their strengths as traders.’ How far do you
agree with this statement? Give reasons for your answer.
[18]
5* ‘In the period c.750 to c.990 Vikings in Britain and France were aggressive raiders and nothing
more.’ How far do you agree with this view? Give reasons for your answer.
[18]
What can Source A tell us about the extent and nature of Moctezuma’s Aztec empire? Use the
source and your own knowledge to support your answer.
Source A – From Bernal Diaz’s account of Cortes’ conquest of New Spain. Diaz was a soldier in Cortes’ army and wrote his account in 1568. In this extract Diaz describes Cortes’ meeting with the Tlaxcalans in 1519.
The Tlaxcalans said they had come to pray to Cortes to ask for our friendship, and to ask pardon for having taken up arms against us. They said they had done this because they thought that we were allies of their enemy Moctezuma. They said the Aztecs frequently used cunning as a means of entering their country to rob and pillage. The Tlaxcalans said they were poor people who did not possess gold or silver because they had surrendered it to Moctezuma on the many occasions they had been forced to make peace to save themselves from destruction.
They said that Moctezuma had a vast host of warriors and that if he wanted to take a city he could raise an army of a hundred and fifty thousand. They added that Moctezuma also kept strong garrisons of troops in every province of his empire, and that all the provinces paid tribute of gold and silver, feathers and cotton, also men and women for sacrifice and servants. They spoke of the great fortifications of Tenochtitlan, describing the lake and the wooden bridges of the causeways.
[7]
How useful are Sources B and C and Interpretation D for a historian studying the nature of Spanish rule in Mexico? In your answer, refer to the two sources and the interpretation as well as your own
knowledge.
Source B – From a letter sent by the Emperor Charles V to Cortes in June 1523. These instructions were sent in reply to a letter from Cortes to Charles V in which he had claimed that it was necessary to set up encomiendas.
You will not make any encomienda. You are to allow the Indians to live in liberty. If you have given any Indians in encomienda to any Christians before the arrival of this letter you will free them. You will also free them from the vices and abominations in which they have been living. You will tell them we are doing this so that they may have proper friendship with the Spaniards. And thus the Indians will gain a knowledge of the Holy Catholic Faith, which is our main desire and purpose. More will be gained by converting a hundred by these methods than a hundred thousand by any other.
Source C – From A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, by Bartolome De Las Casas, 1542. Las Casas was a Spanish bishop in Mexico and was appointed as Protector of the Indians. He spent much of his life campaigning for the abolition of the encomienda and slavery and for the better treatment of the Indians.
From 1518 until now the outrageous acts of violence and the bloody tyranny of these Christians have steadily increased. The atrocities get worse every day. The Europeans have butchered four million people, young and old alike. And this figure does not include those killed as a direct result of the slavery and the oppressions their victims are forced to suffer on a daily basis. The local people are harshly treated as slaves, put to hard labour and subjected to all manner of abuse and to agonising torments. Their wives and their children all perish.
Interpretation D – An illustration of a scene on an encomienda in Mexico. The illustration comes from a recent book for school children.
[15]
8* ‘The most important reason for the Spanish expansion into the Caribbean and central America
was the desire to spread the Christian faith.’ How far do you agree with this view?
[18]
9* ‘The massacre of Aztec nobles in May 1520 was a disaster for the Spanish.’ How far do you agree
with this view?
[18]
The paper as printed
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