Between 1492 and 1640 '' by
John Vanderlyn, 1847 Between 1492 and 1640, approximately 446,000 Europeans immigrated to the Americas. At that stage, immigration was dominated by
Portuguese and
Spaniards, who accounted for 87% of the settlers who left Europe. In the late 15th and early 16th centuries, the decision by Spanish and Portuguese monarchs to take possession of the New World and establish crown-governed colonies required the transfer of large numbers of colonists. The plundering of Native American societies and the Spanish discoveries of silver mines in
Potosí, in
Upper Peru, and
Zacatecas, in Mexico, in the 1540s, provided a significant stimulus to immigration. In the long run, however, the most important development that encouraged large-scale immigration of settlers from Europe was the production of consumer goods in high demand in Europe, most notably sugar and, to a lesser extent, tobacco. In the Americas,
Portuguese Brazil (specifically the northeastern captaincies of
Pernambuco and
Bahia) emerged as the epicenter of world sugar production around 1600. Brazil was followed half a century later by a new sugar plantation complex founded by the British and French (supported by Dutch merchants) on the islands of Barbados, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Martinique and
Guadeloupe, in the
West Indies. Meanwhile, in
Chesapeake, the English colonies of
Virginia and
Maryland began to rapidly expand tobacco production during the 1620s and 1630s. At that time, plantation-based colonies absorbed the vast majority of European immigrants (and enslaved Africans).
Between 1640 and 1760 , then Vila Rica, became one of the largest cities in the Americas. Portuguese emigration to Brazil was so intense that the Portuguese government limited emigration in 1720 to avoid the depopulation of Portugal. In the second phase, from 1640 to 1760, European immigration to the Americas tripled and British immigration surpassed the Spanish and Portuguese one. During this period, close to 1.3 million colonists left Europe for the New World. Most of the 350,000 English immigrants who crossed the Atlantic, during the 17th century, went to the
West Indies (180,000) and to the
Chesapeake Colonies, in the southern United States (120,000). Only about 23,000 went to the North American-Central colonies and 21,000 to
New England. Portugal and Spain had no difficulty finding citizens who were willing to emigrate to their colonies in the Americas, so that Iberian emigration to the Americas was predominantly spontaneous. The supply of Portuguese and Spanish people willing to emigrate was so high that the Spanish and Portuguese governments even had to restrict emigration to the Americas However, this was not the case in Great Britain, France and the Netherlands, nations that had difficulties in recruiting settlers and had to resort to forced or semi-voluntary immigration. Therefore, European immigrants of this period can be divided into two groups: those who arrived free and those who were subject to some form of contractual work obligation. Of the latter, the vast majority were
indentured servants (British),
engages (French) and
redemptioners (Germans), who added up to about half a million immigrants, between 1500 and 1800. Convicts and political prisoners contributed another 129,000 immigrants. In addition, there were an undetermined number of men and women who were serfs (e.g. Spanish servants) in the service of a civil servant, priest or gentleman, but who might have been of relatively high social standing. In turn, the Portuguese and Spanish governments did not tolerate the presence of foreigners in their colonies. It was only in 1808, with the Decree Opening Ports to Friendly Nations, that non-Portuguese immigration to Brazil was allowed. The Spanish immigration policy was so strict that the Spanish government prohibited the entry not only of foreigners in its colonies, but also of Spaniards who were descendants, up to the second degree, of Jew and
Muslim converts, as well as of Spaniards who were not subjects of the Kingdom of Castile, and even subjects had to have special authorizations to emigrate to the colonies. There were several factors that led to massive European immigration between 1820 and 1930. Technological advances in the 19th century made travel between Europe and the Americas much faster and safer. The modernization of the set of rules and principles that govern the Stock Exchange and the Banks facilitated the investment of capital in other parts of the world. The internationalization of the market favored the arrival of products from the New World, mainly cereals, at very competitive prices. This caused losses in the European agricultural sector, which at times led to crises, causing the population to emigrate. Furthermore, in the 19th century there was an enormous population growth in the European continent, together with the progressive drop in
mortality (a phenomenon known as "
demographic transition"), which exerted pressure on the agricultural sector. These changes made access to land difficult for peasant populations, as the number of people who had to survive from the production of the same plot of land increased. Many Europeans were literally
starving. Furthermore, in the 19th century, information began to circulate more freely. According to Herbet Klein, "
after 1870 migration flows and economic conditions in America were closely related. Information on conditions of employment, in particular, was now readily available within a few weeks in the main European countries of emigration". There is a consensus among authors that immigrants went to destinations where the amount of resources offered was greater than in their homelands. It was no coincidence that the United States was, by far, the country that received the most immigrants during this period. Between 1815 and 1930, more than 32 million Europeans chose the United States as their destination country. The growth of the
North American economy demonstrated a capacity to absorb
manpower unprecedented in human history. However, the impact of immigration on the host societies of Uruguay and Argentina was particularly significant, given the relatively small size of their populations at the time they experienced the influx of migrants, predominantly from Spain and Italy. By 1908, this figure had declined to 17.4%, with the majority of the population being descendants of immigrants who had settled in earlier decades. Emigration was part of an economic strategy. Through the emigration of one of its members, the family diversified its risks, since it "invested" in several markets at the same time, sharing costs (financing the trip) and benefits (sending remittances to the family). The remittances also served to finance the trip of potential emigrants. Thus, both temporary emigration and sending remittances formed a migratory strategy that presents high knowledge of labor markets and living conditions in the host countries on the part of immigrants. The degree of information that has been achieved in many European regions about labor markets in American countries shows not only all the mechanisms for transmitting information to potential emigrants (immigration chains, family, friends) but also a perfectly integrated international labor market, although segmented in terms of choice of destinations. In turn, Italians diversified their destinations according to their regional origins: emigrants from
Northern Italy chose mainly Latin American countries, while those from the
South emigrated to the United States preferentially. The
Spaniards opted almost exclusively for emigration to Latin American countries and very little to the United States and the
Portuguese opted preferentially for Brazil. From the 19th century onwards, the geographical origins of immigrants changed. In previous centuries, the British had been the most numerous in the United States, but German immigration overtook British after 1820, and, in Latin America, Spanish and Portuguese immigrants, dominant in all previous centuries, were overtaken by the Italians. This mass European immigration was beneficial to the receiving societies as it contributed to their economic development. Most of the immigrants arriving were young people of working age. 76% of the immigrants who entered the United States between 1868 and 1910 were concentrated in the age group between 15 and 40 years old, while this same group made up only 42% of the total population of the United States. According to the 1914 Argentine census, 86% of the foreign population in Argentina was concentrated in the 15–64 age group, while for the native population this same age group represented 45%. Thus, immigrants contributed a high share of the
working age population of the countries that received them. The entry of these young immigrants into the labor market, even when their professional qualifications were low, implied an import of
human capital that brought net benefits, at the same time that the receiving society saved on
costs, such as nurturing and education, due to their age group. Not all immigrants remained permanently in the Americas. Between 1860 and 1930, 20% of
Scandinavian emigrants returned to their country of origin; almost 40% of the English and Welsh who emigrated between 1861 and 1913 returned, and in the first decades of the 20th century between 40 and 50% of Italian immigrants returned to Italy. In many cases, these immigrants made several migratory trips throughout their lives. ==Consequences==