Venezuela is a pearl producing area that Columbus, a famous navigator in the late Middle Ages, opened up for Spain. In 1448 , during his third voyage, Columbus accidentally landed on the South American continent and set foot on this fertile land for the first time. This place contains the harvest that the navigators have long coveted, not the friendly natives, but the gold and pearls on them.
At the beginning, the relationship between the outsiders and the indigenous people was relatively "good", and they "bartered" with each other. The Europeans only needed to take out cheap things such as bells, glass beads, needles, and pins to exchange for the gold or pearls of the indigenous people. However, the simple indigenous people had no idea of the greed and violence of those "civilized people". When the best gold or pearls of the indigenous people were exchanged, the plunderers used intimidation, violence, hostage-taking, torture, and other inhumane measures to plunder the remaining pearls and gold in Venezuela. Even if the locals resisted, they could not defeat the technologically advanced Spanish invaders.
Margarita Island, off the coast of Venezuela, is named after the Greek word for "pearl" because of the abundance of pearls on the island.
The Age of Exploration brought Europe new sources of pearls outside the Middle East and Asia, but it also brought unprecedented disasters to Venezuela, plunging the Indians who guarded the land into dire straits.
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