First of all, King Ferdinand of Aragon and Queen Isabella of Castille got married in 1464. The main reason that they got married was to unite their kingdoms into Spain. The king and queen were Roman Catholic, so they gave power to certain people to convert non-Catholics to Catholicism. In 1482, the Roman Catholic monarchs renew the reconquista, the military crusade ordered to conquer the remaining Muslim state in Iberia, Granada. In 1492, the Roman Catholic monarchs ordered all non-converted Jews expelled from Spain. In April, 1492, Spain received reports that the Portuguese succeeded in reaching the Indian Ocean, therefore Spanish monarchs authorized Christopher Columbus to sail to Asia and establish trade and start to convert natives to Christianity. The reasons that the monarchs let Columbus sail were mainly to search for spices and profits, spread Christianity, and to use some of their new technology like the caravel. Columbus would receive one-tenth of all the profits, and governance of the new lands would be shared by the monarchs and by Columbus. There were mainly three different types of natives who lived in the Caribbean. There were the Ciboneys (in Cuba), Caribs (in the lesserAntilles), and Taino-Arawaks (in the Bahamas, Cuba, Jamaica, Hispanola, and Puerto Rico). The population of the Caribbean Islands was probably not too much more than 1,500,000 of which about 1,000,000 lived mainly in Hispanola. Hispanola was the center of Taino culture. Between 1509 and1520, the demand for native labor increased and the native population steeply decreased. Here is a table of how rapidly the population of the Tainos decreased: 1492- 1,000,000 (about) 1514- 28,0001508- 92,000 1518- 16,0001509- 62,000 1540- 2501510- 66,000 1570- 125 1512- 27,000By the 1540"s the native population of the Tainos did not even exceed1,000. In October 1492, Columbus"s ships were bound for Japan, China, and the Indies, but they arrived in the Bahamas.
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