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First Exam
N/A
85
History
Undergraduate 1
09/29/2014
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Term
Bering land bridge
 Definition

Land that connected Asia to North America during last Ice Age. It allowed people and animals to pass between the two continents until the Ice Age ended and water covered the “bridge.”
Term
polytheism
 Definition

This is the belief in more than one god. Most cultures indigenous to the Western Hemisphere subscribed to polytheism while most Europeans subscribed to monotheism (belief in one god). Set the stage for confrontation between belief systems
Term

Monotheism


 Definition

Belief in one god. Most of the European explorers and settlers subscribed to this belief.
Term
development of agriculture
 Definition

Allowed for previously nomadic peoples to settle into permanent (or semi-permanent) villages. Sets the stage for the rise of civilizations.
Term
concept of landholding
 Definition

Most peoples indigenous to the Western Hemisphere did not subscribe to the notion of land being private property; instead, it was held communally. Most European cultures believed that land was held individually and was owned by that person, who could then pass it on to his heirs. These competing views set the stage for conflict between the two groups of peoples.
Term
shamans
 Definition
These were important tribal figures who practiced magic to heal and to reveal secrets of the invisible world.
Term
impact of trade
 Definition
Trade brought cultures into contact with one-another. Efforts to increase trade or to make it more profitable led European navigators to seek a shorter route to China. In doing so, they came into contact with other cultures, including those of the Western Hemisphere.
Term
Henry the Navigator
 Definition
Henry was a Portuguese prince who promoted Portuguese exploration and expansion, primarily into Africa. His efforts, and those of his father, set the stage for the Portuguese empire.
Term
Mariner’s astrolabe
 Definition
This was a device that the Portuguese explorers developed from the land astrolabe. The hybrid instrument allowed navigators to determine, more or less, their latitude and general location. It made exploration safer.
Term
West African cultures
 Definition
There were several West African cultures that varied in political, economic, and social sophistication, just like the variations between cultures on other continents. Some of these cultures and the states or kingdoms associated with them came to trade extensively with European cultures, including trade in slaves.
Term
Atlantic slave trade
 Definition
Slaves became an important source of labor very early in the European colonial experience in the Western Hemisphere. Various European countries monopolized the trade at time—Portugal, Spain, the Dutch, the British—but all held in common the horrendous treatment slaves endured as cargo on the Middle Passage.
Term
Treaty of Tordesillas
 Definition
This treaty, that the governments of Spain and Portugal signed and ratified in 1494, split the newly found lands of the Western Hemisphere between those two countries. This led to conflict with other European nations that sought colonies.
Term
conquistadors
 Definition
This is the Spanish name for the men who followed Colombus and conquered much of the “New World” for Spain. Included among them were Hernan Cortes, conqueror of the Aztecs, and Francisco Pizarro, conqueror of the Incas. Most of these men employed brutal tactics and ruthlessly exploited the peoples with whom they came into contact.
Term
Columbian exchange
 Definition
The exchange of plants and animals between the two hemispheres that had many unintended consequences. One of these consequences was the development of more nutritious diets that contributed to a population explosion over the course of three centuries.
Term
Bartolome de Las Casas
 Definition
Dominican friar and historian who documented the brutal treatment colonizers used to subdue Native Americans. His writings became the basis of the Black Legend.
Term
mercantilism
 Definition
This is an economic philosophy that viewed world resources as finite. Because of that fact, it was a state’s or monarch’s responsibility to acquire as many resources as possible. Under this system, a colony existed for the benefit of the parent country and was to be exploited to that purpose.
Term
Imperial system
 Definition
This was the system the Spanish monarchy first adopted in an effort to exploit its colonies and keep them under royal control.
Term
encomienda
 Definition
This was a legal system in which the Spanish forced Native Americans to work a specific amount of time for the benefit of the colonizers. In practice, it was little different than slavery.
Term
Protestant Reformation
 Definition
Challenged Catholic belief in priestly intercession between believers and God. In England, the Protestant Reformation led to the establishment of the Anglican Church with the monarch as its head. Dissolved the monasteries and carved up their land. Resulted in several denominations that believed the Anglican Church needed purification. One of the several social factors that led to the founding of colonies in New England.
Term
Roanoke
 Definition
Failed attempt by Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter Raleigh to establish a colony off the coast of what is now North Carolina.
Term
Acoma
 Definition
A Pueblo complex where the Spanish massacred hundreds of Indians and amputated the right foot of male survivors over the age of 25 in order to instill fear in the Indians.
Term
Franciscans
 Definition
Catholic Christian missionaries who belonged to the Order of St. Francis. They used brutal methods to convert the Pueblo and other tribes to Christianity.
Term
Joint stock companies
 Definition
Designed to raise greater sums of capital than an individual could in order to diversify risk. Primary goal was to earn a profit.
Term
Virginia Colony
 Definition
The Virginia Company, a joint stock venture, founded this first English colony in North America to find gold and earn a profit.
Term
Powhatan
 Definition
Chief of the confederacy of several dozen tribes that surrounded the Virginia Colony’s first settlement. The first settlers would not have survived without the aid of the Indians.
Term
Jamestown
 Definition
The first successful English settlement in North America. Founded in 1607.
Term
Captain John Smith
 Definition
One of the original group of men sent to establish Jamestown. Smith’s military background and shrewd assessment of what the colonists needed to do to survive, especially his negotiations with Powhatan, paved the way for future success.
Term
House of Burgesses
 Definition
This was the first elective representative body in English North America. The Virginia Company granted this concession to local government in 1619.
Term
Chesapeake
 Definition
The area around the Chesapeake Bay that would include portions of Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia. It was particularly fertile and became a source of profitable agriculture.
Term
indentured servants
 Definition
A source of labor from England. English subjects could indenture themselves to a landowner and labor for him for a specified period of time. Once that time was completed, the servant would be granted freedom and, in some instances, a small amount of land. Principle source of labor in the English colonies until large scale slavery developed in the 1670s.
Term
tobacco boom
 Definition
Associated with the disco very that tobacco grew well in the Chesapeake and brought a significant profit from European demand. Led to increased planting and put pressure on Native Americans from European settlers for more land.
Term
New France
 Definition
The area in North America that France claimed. Included territory along the Ohio, Mississippi, and Missouri Rivers as well as much of Canada.
Term
New Netherlands
 Definition
The area in North America that the Dutch claimed. The duke of York (later James II) took these lands from the Dutch and renamed them New York.
Term
Calvanism
 Definition
The religious teachings of Jean Calvin. Included the doctrine of predestination, the doctrine of grace, the doctrine of the covenant, and the idea that humans were born depraved. The Puritans were Calvinist in their beliefs.
Term
Puritans
 Definition
English Calvinists who sought escape from religious persecution in their home country. This led them to establish colonies in North America.
Term
Plymouth Colony
 Definition
The first of the Puritan/Pilgrim colonies, it was established as a covenanted community, although there were non-Pilgrims among the settlers.
Term
Covenant
 Definition
An act of engaging in an agreement between a congregation and God that provides his favor and protection in exchange for the congregation recognizing no other God and following his rules. It can also be an agreement between the members of a congregation to work toward the common good.
Term
John Winthrop
 Definition
A member of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and its first governor. His speech on board the Arbella in 1630 included the idea that the colonists were creating a “city upon a hill” that the entire world would look to an example of virtue and what can be accomplished through a covenant between God and his chosen people. This is one of the bases of the idea of American Exceptionlaism.
Term
Doctrine of Two Spheres
 Definition
An expression of the idea that the Old World is corrupt and the New World is virtuous. The ways of the Old World were not appropriate for the New World.
Term
Fundamental Orders of Connecticut
 Definition
Adopted in 1639, this was one of the first, if not the first, written constitutions adopted in an English colony.
Term
Roger Williams
 Definition
A Separatist Congregationalist, he came to Massachusetts Bay Colony as a preacher. He believed that church and state should be completely separate and that the English should treat Indians fairly. He was banished from Massachusetts Bay. He established his own colony, Providence Plantation, as a haven of tolerance.
Term
Anne Hutchinson
 Definition
A resident of Massachusetts Bay Colony who challenged expected gender norms. She hosted studies of weekly sermons and the Bible. She was tried for heresy and banished from the colony. She fled to Providence Plantation.
Term
Maryland
 Definition
This colony was founded as a proprietorship when Charles I granted a royal charter to the Second Lord Baltimore in 1632. Maryland was intended to be a haven for English Catholics, who were proscribed from practicing their religion in England.
Term
English Civil War
 Definition
This war, which lasted from 1641-1649, was the result of Charles I’s effort to rule without Parliament and his belief in Divine Right of Kings. It resulted in a Parliamentary victory and the execution of Charles I. Eventually, Parliament invited Charles’ son to take the throne in 1660, but Parliament had established its primacy. Because Puritans dominated Parliament, persecution against them in England virtually ceased. Consequently, the immigration of Puritans to the North American colonies virtually ceased as well.
Term
Navigation Acts
 Definition
These were a series of acts that Parliament passed in an effort to exert greater control of the colonial economy to ensure that their economic activity benefitted the parent country. These acts reflected the general economic theory of mercantilism.
Term
Halfway Covenant
 Definition
This was a response to complaints that any colonists in Massachusetts Bay Colony and other Puritan colonies were unable to fully participate in church and state affairs. It allowed partial church membership for those who had not experienced the gift of grace and for their children to be baptized in the church.
Term
Quakers
 Definition
The Society of Friends. They were pacifists and the first church to call for the end of slavery. Provided a sense of equality amongst the congregation because both men and women could lead sessions if the spirit moved them
Term
Metacom
 Definition
Known to the colonists as King Philip, this Wampanoag chief led a confederation of tribes against the English colonists in New England in King Philip’s War, 1675-1676. It ultimately failed to achieve the Indians’ goals and was the last organized Indian war against colonists in New England.
Term
Bacon's Rebellion
 Definition
This was a rebellion in Virginia that occurred in 1676. Nathaniel Bacon was disappointed in what he perceived to be Governor Berkeley’s sympathetic treatment of Indians. Bacon wanted to eliminate the Indians. We do not know if he would have succeeded in removing either Berkeley or the Indians because he died one month into his rebellion, but by that time he had driven the government from Jamestown. Berkeley was later recalled to England.
Term
Pueblo Revolt
 Definition
This was a successful revolt of the Pueblo Indians against the Spanish in 1680. It is sometimes called Pope’s Revolt after the Indian leader. The Spanish were expelled for a number of years, but upon their return, they treated the Native people with greater respect.
Term
William Penn
 Definition
Penn’s family supported Charles I in his war against Parliament. Charles II rewarded him and paid his debt to him with a royal charter to be proprietor of Pennsylvania Colony. Penn was a Quaker and provided laws and regulations for his colony that reflected Quaker tolerance. He also treated Native Americans more fairly than other colonial proprietors had.
Term
Proprietary colonies
 Definition
These were colonies that the kings awarded to individuals to reward them for support already given or in exchange for support. If the proprietor fell out of favor with the king, he could remove the proprietor and establish a royal colony in its place with a governor the king appointed.
Term
Dominion of New England
 Definition
This was the result of James II’s efforts to consolidate royal control over several largely Puritan colonies. It was very unpopular among the colonists, as was its governor, Sir Edmond Andros.
Term
Glorious Revolution
 Definition
Parliamentary forces invited William of Orange and his wife, Mary Stuart, to take the throne from James II in 1688 after his wife gave birth to a son and they announced he would be raised a Catholic. This was yet another example of Parliament exerting its primacy over a Stuart king who believed he was above the law.
Term
Revolutions of 1689
 Definition
Revolts against royal governors and other crown officials occurred in New York, Maryland, and other colonies as the result of the Glorious Revolution. Most of these revolts were short-lived, as William and Mary were equally determined to benefit from their colonies.
Term
Witchcraft
 Definition
Many colonists believed that witches and warlocks existed amongst the general population doing the Devil’s bidding. This belief fed into the over-reaction to allegations of witchcraft in Salem Village in 1691-1692.
Term
maleficium
 Definition
This was the word used to describe what a witch actually did to harm you. The classic example is the claim that one of the alleged witches had muttered something to a neighbors cow and that cow dropped dead the next day.
Term
War of the League of Augsburg/King William's War
 Definition
A balance of power war that pitted England and its allies against France and its allies. Colonists called in King William’s War, a sign that he possessed the war and that it was not necessarily a war fought in the interests of the colonists.
Term
War of the Spanish Succession/Queen Anne's War
 Definition
A balance of power war that pitted England and its allies against France and its allies. Colonists called in Queen Anne’s War, a sign that she possessed the war and that it was not necessarily a war fought in the interests of the colonists. This practice is evidence of a growing sense of an independent American identity.
Term
Iroquois Confederacy
 Definition
This was a confederation of several tribes that skillfully played the French and British against one-another through alliance or neutrality. The Iroquois remained an important component of balance-of-power politics in North America until the British victory over France in the Seven Years War. Iroquois power declined substantially in the aftermath of that war.
Term
The Slave Trade
 Definition
A profitable international trade in human beings that the Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, and English respectively controlled. It was a partnership between European slavers and African kingdoms that wanted to be rid of political opponents or other people it deemed undesirable. The demand for slave labor in the New World drove the trade. It was outlawed in the U.S. in 1808, although the intrastate slave trade remained legal.
Term
Middle Passage
 Definition
This is a reference to crossing from Africa to the Western Hemisphere that slaves had to endure. On average, 15% of slaves died on the voyage in deplorable conditions.
Term
Slave revolts
 Definition
The fear of slave revolts, underscored by the Stono Rebellion of 1739 in South Carolina, led to the passage of black codes and other laws designed to inhibit slaves from traveling alone, being out after curfew, learning to read and write, and obtaining any other skill or privilege that might aid them in rebelling.
Term
Northern economy
 Definition
This was the economy that developed in New England and the Middle colonies that encouraged trade with other English colonies.
Term
Plantation economy
 Definition
This was the economy that emerged in the Chesapeake and the South where farmers sold their cash crops—tobacco and rice—directly to England.
Term
Board of Trade and Plantations
 Definition
A bureaucracy that was created as part of the effort of the English kings to profit from English colonies. Promoted the transition of all colonies into royal colonies and generally promoted mercantilist theory.
Term
Cotton Mather
 Definition
Influential colonial minister. Promoted the idea of inoculation amongst colonists in the early 18th century. Was also deeply involved in the Salem Witch Trials.
Term
Enlightenment
 Definition
An age associated with the application of reason to understand human problems and to understand natural phenomena.
Term
Locke
 Definition
One of the philosophers Newton’s discoveries inspired. Locke wrote the constitution for the Carolina colony and the ideas he expressed in his Second Treatise of Government greatly influenced Thomas Jefferson statement of universal principles in the Declaration of Independence.
Term
Royal Society
 Definition
Charles II chartered this organization in 1660 to encourage scientific inquiry and the exchange of knowledge.
Term
First Great Awakening
 Definition
A religious revival that began in the 1730s. Preachers noted that their congregations were responding positively to sermons that focused on the basics.
Term
New Lights
/Old Lights
 Definition
New Lights were those people who accepted the preachings of the revivalist ministers during the First Great Awakening. They accepted the idea that anyone could preach the Bible and that it did not require an elite group of college or university trained preachers. This was a threat to the Old Lights, who were members of the established clergy and those people who supported them.
Term
Social leveling
 Definition
This was one of the consequences of the First Great Awakening. Some denominations, like the Baptists, began to eschew practices that differentiated between people on the basis of social status. The called each other “brother” and “sister” instead of “squire” or “my lady.” They adopted a plain style of dress and no longer assigned seating in church according to social status. American society as a whole became less focused on the alleged superiority of the elites.
Term
George Whitefield
 Definition
A Methodist preacher who was among the most influential of the First Great Awakening preachers. Travelled the colonies for 15 months, preaching to large audiences.
Term
Stono Rebellion
 Definition
A rebellion of slaves in South Carolina that spread fear throughout the colonies of the threat of such rebellions. Because the local South Carolina government and the government in Great Britain were deemed incapable of putting down such threats, the colonies began to pass laws, most of which were known collectively as “black codes,” designed to prevent such rebellions from occurring.
Term
Imperial System of Trade
 Definition
A system that emerged through trial and error to make trade between the colonies more efficient. Because hard currency was difficult to come by in large quantities, the colonists developed letters of exchange, barter, and other means through which to conduct trade.
Term
benign neglect
 Definition
A term used to describe the actual practice of the British with regard to their colonies’ economies. Although on paper the British endorsed mercantilist policies, in practice, they did not have the means to enforce such policies consistently. It was only when they began to enforce them after their victory in the Seven Years War that the colonists no longer perceived British policies as “benign.”
Term
War of the Austrian Succession/King George's War
 Definition
A European balance of power war in which a colonial victory in Canada was sacrificed during peace negotiations to meet British needs in their European balance of power relations. Contributed to the colonial sense that their needs were secondary to those of Britain and would continue to be sacrificed in the future.
Term
Seven Years' War
 Definition
One of the most important wars in British and French history. The British eventually defeated the French and drove them from continental North America.
Term
William Pitt
 Definition
Turned things around for the British, who were losing the Seven Years War. He began to alter policies toward the colonies to include paying colonists for requisitioned goods, paying them for the costs of quartering troops, and according the colonial military and political leaders more respect.
Term
Fort Necessity
 Definition
A fort that a young George Washington hastily constructed when a superior force of French and their Indian allies threatened his Virginia militia. Washington was forced to surrender and started the French and Indian War, which in turn led to the Seven Years War.
Term
Treaty of Paris, 1763
 Definition
The treaty that ended the Seven Years War. Drove France from continental North America. The French transferred the Louisiana Territory to the Spanish and gave up all the rest of their possessions along the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys and their Canadian possessions to the British. Left the French desiring revenge and left the British as the sole super power in North America.
Term
Pontiac's War
 Definition
The Ottawa Chief Pontiac realized that the British victory and subsequent elimination of the French from the balance of power factor in North America severely jeopardized the position of Native Americans. He put together a coalition in 1763 and launched a war against the British. Although he experienced initial success, he and his supporters were defeated, leaving the English as the dominant force on the continent.
Term
Enumerated goods
 Definition
Colonial goods that could only be sod directly to England.
Term
Paxton Boys
 Definition
A group of Pennsylvania frontiersmen, largely of Scots-Irish ethnicity, who murdered a group of peaceful, Christian Indians in the wake of Pontiac’s War.
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