How did the European economy in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries change from what had occurred in previous centuries?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Answers will vary. The major change to the European economy was the advancement of overseas trade and the competition for overseas colonies that made the nation-states of Europe competitors in the common market. The Spanish and Portuguese initially took the lead with colonies in the Americas, which produced silver in particular, although the Portuguese had more extensive trade ventures initially than they had colonies because they had outposts in East Asia and Africa. France and England soon entered the competition and tried to take advantage of colonies in North America and Canada. Establishing colonies and empires took money, however, and Spain and Portugal had long used private investors, who formed joint-stock companies in which the investors reaped benefits proportional to their original investments. England formed the East India Company in 1600, and the Dutch Republic formed the United East India Company in 1602. Spanish and Portuguese colonization and trade earlier yielded many new foodstuffs for trade and importation. The Europeans also brought their own domesticated and wild products to the New World, sometimes accidentally, sometimes deliberately, which resulted in a bilateral Atlantic trade. Trade was also established with Asia for luxury goods, including foods, as well as wood, metals, porcelain, and tea; coffee was also imported by the Dutch. All of these exchanges of goods resulted in a new market economy that transformed Europe from being predominantly agricultural with limited trade status to a vibrant commercial economy that soon became dominant.