10. 1492 may have been a high point for European explorers, but it was a very dark year for the native peoples of North America.
As most students of history know, 1492 was the year Christopher Columbus set sail to the Americas for the first time. Of course, he wasn’t the first European to make it across the Atlantic Ocean. However, he was to have the greatest impact on history. And, according to some scholars, 1492 was a ‘catastrophic’ year, not least for the indigenous people of what would become the United States. Columbus and his men brought Old World diseases to the New World. The native people were helpless and died by the millions.
It’s believed that 1492 marked the beginning of the end for many indigenous people. Between then and the start of the 16th century, 90% of the indigenous population was wiped out, with many cultures lost for good. As if that’s not bad enough, back home in Europe, Columbus’ sponsors, the Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella, conquered Moorish Granada in 1492. After that, they would kill, enslave or expel some 500,000 Muslims in Spain. It could be argued that the so-called ‘clash of civilizations’ started that year, bringing 2,000 years of relative peaceful cohabitation of religions in Europe to an end.