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16,500 BCE
First settlement
Human inhabitants first settled in the Amazon region at least 11,200 years ago.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_America?scrlybrkr=5e6ea80e#:~:text=The%20earliest%20archaeological%20evidence%20from,at%20least%2011%2C200%20years%20ago. -
1200 BCE
Olmec Empire
The Olmecs lived in hot, humid lowlands along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico in what is now southern Veracruz and Tabasco states in southern Mexico. The first evidence of their remarkable art style appears about 1200 BCE in San Lorenzo, their oldest known building site.
Source: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Olmec -
1492
Christopher Columbus discovers South America
Explorer Christopher Columbus sets foot on the American mainland for the first time, at the Paria Peninsula in present-day Venezuela. Thinking it an island, he christened it Isla Santa and claimed it for Spain.
Source: https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/columbus-lands-in-south-america#:~:text=Explorer%20Christopher%20Columbus%20sets%20foot,Genoa%2C%20Italy%2C%20in%201451. -
Period: to
A War for Land and Resources
Where there is an abundance of natural resources, there is usually a clash over territory. The War of the Pacific, pitted Chile against Peru and Bolivia. With Bolivia losing the war, borders were shifted. It lost more or less all of its territory north of Antofagasta, and most importantly, its access to the sea.
Source: https://www.southernexplorations.com/history-atacama-desert -
Civil war in Honduras
A civil war broke out in Honduras between President General Miguel Davila and former President Bonilla. The civil war lasted two years and ended in 1911, when both sides agreed to abide by the results of an election. The election resulted in a Bonilla victory.
Source: https://www.historycentral.com/Samerica/CivilWarHonduras.html -
Panama Canal
The completion of the Panama Canal by Americans in 1914 marked the end of a remarkable and ambitious feat of engineering. The results have been felt ever since, as the canal has drastically changed worldwide shipping.
Source: https://www.thoughtco.com/important-events-in-latin-american-history-2136471 -
Finding Angel Falls
In 1933, air-borne American gold prospector James Crawford ('Jimmie') Angel discovered Angel Falls accidentally, flying over the mountain in his Flamingo monoplane while in search of a valuable ore bed.
Source: https://www.beautifulworld.com/south-america/venezuela/angel-falls/#:~:text=In%201933%2C%20air%2Dborne%20American,of%20a%20valuable%20ore%20bed. -
Period: to
Migration from South America to the United States
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, many people started leaving to go to Spain, the United States, and Italy.
Source: https://sites.google.com/site/aphumangeographymigration/voluntary-migration/south-america -
Period: to
Deforestation
The most important direct human impact on the Amazon is deforestation: about 7,700 square mi (20,000 square km) of forest, an area almost as large as the New Jersey in the United States, are now cut down each year for timber and to make way for highways, settlements, pasture for cattle, crops, and other purposes.
Source: https://www.encyclopedia.com/environment/energy-government-and-defense-magazines/south-america-climate-change-impacts -
Amazon basin Forest trapping carbon
Scientists have recently estimated that the Amazon basin forest is trapping about 100 million tons of carbon per year. (The carbon comes from carbon dioxide, which plants break up to obtain carbon for their tissues.) Due mostly to deforestation, carbon emissions from Brazil (whose share of the Amazon is more than half the size of the continental United States) rose by up to 50% from 1990 to 2003.
