| A | B |
|---|
| Magellan | Portuguese explorer who completed the first known voyage around the world |
| conquistador | Spanish word for conqueror |
| Aztecs | empire of ancient Mexico |
| Pizarro | conquered the Inca empire of South America |
| Amerigo Vespucci | the Americas were named for this explorer |
| Coronado | Spanish explorer of the American southwest |
| Incas | empire of ancient Peru |
| Balboa | named the Pacific Ocean |
| De Soto | first Spanish explorer to see the Mississippi River |
| Estevanico | African scout who travelled with Coronado's expedition to find the Seven Cities of Gold |
| New Spain | what the Spanish called their empire in the Americas |
| 16th (1500s) | century in which most Spanish exploration and land claims in the Americas took place |
| Columbus | first Spanish explorer to reach the Americas |
| Maya | people of the Yucatan peninsula who resisted Spanish conquest for 20 years |
| Cortes | explorer who conquered the people of Mexico |
| Columbian Exchange | movement of people, plants, animals and diseases back and forth between Europe and the Americas |
| Ponce de Leon | Spanish explorer who explored and named Florida |
| Mexico City | capital of New Spain that was built on the ruins of Tenochtitlan |
| De Vaca | Spanish explorer of Texas |
| Junipero Serra | Missionary who explored California |
| 1492 | year of Columbus's first voyage |
| corn and potatoes | two important American crops |
| horses, sugar, diseases | "seeds of change" brought to the Americas from Europe |
| Taino | people who met Columbus |
| Tenochtitlan | capital city of the Aztec empire |
