History of colonialism

The history of colonialism goes back thousands of years. In colonialism, one country takes over another and makes it into a colony. Colonialism has existed since ancient times in peoples like the Hittites and the Incas.

Overseas empires

People generally use the word colonialism to mean European overseas empires rather than land-based empires. Many European powers had colonies that they could only reach by ships. For example, the British Empire had colonies in India and today's United States, while the French Empire had a colony in Algeria.

Land-based empires are usually described as imperialism instead of colonialism. Important land-based empires in history include:

• The Mongol Empire, which stretched from the Western Pacific to Eastern Europe
• The Empire of Alexander the Great
• The Umayyad Caliphate
• The Persian Empire
• The Roman Empire
• The Byzantine Empire

The Ottoman Empire was created across Mediterranean, North Africa and into Southern Europe and existed during the time of European colonization of the other parts of the world.

European colonialism

A comparison of the Spanish and British Empires

15th century

European colonialism began in the fifteenth century, when the Spanish and Portuguese began exploring the Americas and the coasts of Africa, the Middle East, India, and East Asia.

16th & 17th centuries

During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, England, France and Holland made their own overseas empires.

18th & 19th centuries

At the end of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, many European colonies in the Americas gained their independence.

A postage stamp from the Belgian Congo in 1942

Spain and Portugal were weakened by the loss of their New World colonies. They never regained the power they once had. But Britain, France and Holland turned their attention to South Africa, India and South East Asia and began expanding.

In the nineteenth century Europe underwent industrialisation. The population grew. Armies became more organised and had better weapons produced in factories. This time became known as the era of New Imperialism. Very quickly European powers were able to take over land. They colonized many African countries during the Scramble for Africa.

20th century

After World War I the European countries who had lost the war had to give up their colonies to the countries that had won the war. For instance, Britain (one of the Allied countries who won the war) took over Tanzania from Germany (one of the Axis countries that lost the war).

After World War II, however, Europe's colonies started to become independent. In 1999 Portugal returned the last of Europe's colonies in Asia, Macau, to China, ending an era that had lasted five hundred years.