1. First Discoverers of America
Chapter 1 Notes
First Discoverers of America
- Nomadic hunters crossed the land bridge connecting Eurasia with North America in the area of the present-day Bering Sea between Siberia and Alaska
-after the glaciers melted, the sea level rose and closed the land bridge – the inhabitants spread out across the Americas
Incas (Peru), Mayans (Central America) and Aztec (Mexico) all created sophisticated civilizations; main food was ____________ (approx. 54 million people on 2 continents)
Corn/maize
These people built elaborate cities and carried on far-flung commerce
They were talented mathematicians
They offered human sacrifices to their gods.

3. North American Native Americans
Pueblo – Rio Grande Valley – constructed irrigation system to water their corn (main crop), but also grew beans and squash – this showed how they adapted to their environment
In North America, there were no dense concentrations of Indian populations and no complex nation-states developed (exception was the Aztecs and Iroquois, led by Hiawatha). This is one of the reasons the Indians were so easily defeated
Indians were defeated because of the 3 Ds:
1. Disease
2. Disorganization
3. Disposability

4. Indian Cultures
Small, scattered, impermanent settlements; nomadic in the Great Basin and the western Great Plains (they were following the buffalo (relied on the game as a source of food, fuel and clothing)
Women tended the crops, men hunted and gathered fuel
Many had matrilinear cultures (power and possessions
passed down the female side of family)
Animism – religion in which nature is worshipped;
everything in nature has a spirit
Three-sister farming—maize, beans and squash all grow together – this rich diet made possible healthy, dense populations (Creek, Choctaw and Cherokee in the Southeast)

6. Christopher Columbus
Italian, but sailed for Spain (country became united with marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella)
3 ships – Nina, Pinta
and the Santa Maria
6 weeks at sea –
landed on
Oct. 12, 1492

7. The Spanish, French, and English in the Americas

8. Why do the Europeans need new trade routes?

9. The Portuguese
Developed the caravel (ship that could sail more closely into the wind)
Set up trading posts along the African shore for gold and slaves
This slave labor and trade becomes the origins of the modern plantation system of slavery practiced in America
1488 Bartholomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope and in 1498, Vasco da Gama reached India

10. The Treaty of Tordesillas, 1494
Spain and Portugal divided the New World between them.
Most of the New World land went to ______________ and Portugal got land if Africa and Asia in return. Therefore, Portugal dropped out of the New World land grab, and Spain became to dominant colonizing power in the 1500s.
Spain

11. Spain
The voyages of Columbus set off the building of a huge Spanish empire in the New World. The Spanish came to find land and gold (main reason). They came to conquer and were therefore called ________________ which means conquerors.
Conquistadors
Initial motive of Spanish exploration: The Spanish needed new sources of wealth to support the growth of the nation

12. The New World gained new animals for food and beasts of burden while the Old World gained staple crops (potato)

13. Hernan Cortes- 1521 Conquered the ________ Empire in Central Mexico.
Aztec

14. Francisco Pizarro- 1532
Conquered the _________ Empire in Peru.
Incan

15. Why were the conquistadors successful?
numbers
They had superior___________ and ___________.
technology
Eventually__________ came to control most of South America, the Caribbean, Central America, Mexico and the Southwest of North America
Spain
enslaved
The natives were ___________ by the Encomienda system. Spanish gov’t gave Indians
to colonists as labor in return the Spanish promised to convert the Indians to _____________
Christianity

16. The encomienda system was created by the Spanish to control and regulate American Indian labor and behavior during the colonization of the Americas. Under the encomienda system, conquistadors and other leaders (encomenderos) received grants of a number of Indians, from whom they could exact “tribute” in the form of gold or labor. The encomenderos were supposed to protect and Christianize the Indians granted to them, but they most often used the system to effectively enslave the Indians and take their lands.
The encomienda system did eventually come to a legal end in 1720, when the crown made a new attempt at eradicating the institution. The encomenderos were then required to pay remaining encomienda laborers for their work. The encomiendas became very corrupt and harsh.

17. Disease killed of _______% of the native population – they had no natural resistance to the European diseases
90%
Goal of Spanish:
Convert and/or destroy natives

18. Mestizos – a new race of mixed Indian and Spanish children was created
Pueblo Revolt (aka Popé’s Rebellion) – 1680 – Pueblo rebels destroyed every Catholic church in the province and killed many priests and hundreds of Spanish settlers – it took the Spanish 50 years to fully reclaim the land – this was a resistance to the heavy-handed insistence of the Spanish on Indian conversion to Spanish culture, including their religion

19. In the Northeast and along the Atlantic Seaboard,
Some societies developed a mixed agricultural
and _________________ economy that favored
the development of permanent villages
For example: the Iroquois and Algonguians
hunter-gatherer
Iroquois
The _____________ also developed an advanced self-government structure and were self-governing (the English were surprised at this!)

20. Sympathy for the Indians
“Concerning the treatment of Native American workers:
When they were allowed to go home, they often found it deserted and had no other recourse than to go out into the woods to find food and to die. When they fell ill, which was very frequently because they are a delicate people unaccustomed to such work, the Spaniards did not believe them and pitilessly called them lazy dogs, and kicked and beat them; and when illness was apparent they sent them home as useless, giving them some cassava for the twenty- to eighty- league journey. They would go then, falling into the first stream and dying there in desperation; others would hold on longer, but very few ever made it home. I sometimes came upon dead bodies on my way, and upon others who were gasping and moaning in their death agony, repeating ‘Hungry, hungry.’”
Bartolome de Las Casas, priest and social reformer, In Defense of the Indian, c. 1550

21. Las Casas criticized the Spanish desire for wealth at the expense of the natives
Las Casas wanted to persuade the Roman Catholic Church to send aid to natives and to encourage humane treatment by Spanish settlers (the church was already doing this to an extent)

22. Justification for Indian Enslavement
“The Spanish have a perfect right to rule these barbarians
of the New World and the adjacent islands, who in
prudence, skill, virtues and humanity are as inferior to the
Spanish as children to adults, or women to men. There
exists between the two as great a difference as between
savage and cruel races, I might even say between apes
and men.”
“If you wish to reduce them to servitude, it will not be difficult for them to change their masters, and instead of the ones they had, who were barbarous and impious and inhuman, to accept the Christians, cultivators of human virtues and the true faith.”
Juan Gines de Sepulveda (a Spainard) describes Native peoples

23. De Las Casas replied, “I call the Spaniards who plunder that unhappy people torturers …. The Indians are our brothers, and Christ has given his life for them. Why, then, do we persecute them with such inhuman savagery when they do not deserve such treatment?”
The native population in Mexico dropped from 20 million to 2 million in less that 100 years

24. France Spice Islands Furs
The French begin to explore the New World in search of the Northwest Passage, a northern route through North America to the Pacific Ocean and on to the ______________.
This led them to claim lands in Canada, along the Mississippi River, and in Louisiana.
The Northwest Passage was never found but the French did discover valuable fishing waters and an opportunity to trade for ______ which brought a high price in Europe.
Spice Islands
Furs

26. Important
The French fur traders came in small numbers and did not need to take land from the natives. Instead, they lived among the Indians and learned their ways and often married their women. As a result the French had better relations with the Indians than the Spanish or the English.

28. Unit 1 – Chapter 2 Powerpoint

29. England
John Cabot arrived in America less than 5 years after Columbus, yet the English did not try to colonize America for the next ________ years. 80

30. What Sparked Their Interest?
The Reformation- Before the Reformation Spain and England had been Catholic allies. When England became a ___________ country under the rule of ____________, Spain became the enemy. Colonies in the Americas offered a way to compete with Spain as well as an outlet for those suffering from religious persecution or those dissatisfied with the organization of the ____________Church.
Protestant
Henry VIII
Anglican

31. England under Queen Elizabeth I
Sea dogs – looted Spanish treasure ships – Sir Frances Drake
Sir Humphrey Gilbert – tried to establish a colony off the coast of Newfoundland – died 1583

32. What Sparked Their Interest?
The Enclosure Movement- Tenant farmers were forced from the land and saw America as a chance for a better life.
English merchants saw colonies in America as a new market for ___________________
Joint-Stock companies- English merchants could trade and colonize without government financing.
Manufactured goods

33. Economic depression – unemployment and surplus population
Primogeniture – the firstborn son inherits everything

34. Sir Walter Raleigh
Raleigh scouted the American coastline and name the land _____________ in honor of Queen Elizabeth, “the Virgin Queen”. In 1587, he sent 118 people to colonize _______________ (North Carolina). The governor went back to England for supplies but because of the war with __________, he was unable to return until When he returned the colony was abandoned. It became known as the ________________
Virginia
Roanoke Island
Spain
Lost Colony

35. Jamestown: The First Permanent English Colony in America

36. Charter
In 1606 King James granted a __________ , or written contract from the crown, to the ____________________________, a joint-stock company, to start a colony on the southern coast of North America. In 1607 they established the colony of _____________.
Virginia Company of London
Jamestown

37. Early Troubles
Of __________ colonist, most were
townspeople. They did not know how to live in the woods or farm.
Gentlemen did not believe in ____________ so they refused to work.
Governing council was ineffective.
104
manual labor

38. John Smith
____________________ emerged as Jamestown’s only strong leader. He explored the area around the colony and began to trade with the local Indians.
He made a valuable rule for the colony:
If you don’t work you don’t eat!

39. In late 1609, ________________ had to return to England
In late 1609, ________________ had to return to England. At about the same time 400 new settlers arrived from England. This combination caused a crisis.
Not enough food
No strong leadership
Colonists stole from Indians Indians attacked
John Smith
“Starving Time”

40. Englishman Richard Hakluyt wrote, “There is under our noses the great and ample country of Virginia; the inland whereof is found of late to be so sweet and wholesome a climate, so rich and abundant in silver mines, a better and richer country than Mexico itself. If it shall please the Almighty to stir up Her Majesty’s heart to continue with transporting one or two thousand of her people, she shall be God’s assistance, in short space, increase her dominions, enrich her coffers and reduce many pagans to the faith of Christ.”
Easy for him to say – he never came to America! But George Percy did and he wrote, “Our men were destroyed with cruel diseases as swellings, burning fevers, and by wars, ans some departed suddenly, but for the most part they died of mere famine. There were never Englishmen left in a foreign country in such misery as we were in this new discovered Virginia.”

41. “Starving Time”
Winter : only 60 settlers of 504 were left. They set off in the spring to go back to England, but were met by a supply ship in the Chesapeake Bay and returned.

42. John Rolfe-
Experimented with tobacco
,600 lbs. exported
,000 lbs. Exported
Married Pocahontas- made peace with the Indians

43. Headright-
VA Company gave 50 acres of land to anyone who came or paid passage for someone to come to Jamestown. They were given 50 more for each family member over 15 years old and for each servant they transported to Virginia.
This led to large numbers of indentured servants in VA
Cavaliers – later on, Virginia “gentlemen” who are given a gift of land from the crown – think Thomas Jefferson and UVA

44. In 1619, three important things took place in Jamestown:
1st single women came to Jamestown
1st Africans came as indentured servants against their will
House of Burgesses met for the 1st time- This was the first elected assembly in the U.S.

45. Maryland A haven for Catholics
Established in 1634 by Lord Baltimore – plantation colony that thrived on tobacco
A haven for Catholics
Act of Toleration 1649 – toleration for all Christians who accept the Trinity, but death penalty to atheists and Jews who denied Christ’s divinity

46. The West Indies
Sugar – the rich man’s crop – the elaborate refining process requires lots of slave labor – relied on North American mainland for food
The Barbados Slave Code of 1661 provided a legal base for slavery in the Caribbean island of Barbados. It required that slave owners dress their slaves. However, it also denied slaves even basic rights, such as the right to life. It allowed the slaves' owners to do entirely as they wished to their slaves, including mutilating them and burning them alive, without fear of reprisal.
This code was adopted by South Carolina in 1696, and formed the basic outline for slavery in the British North American colonies.

47. Barbados slave code:
“If any Negro or slave whatsoever shall offer any violence to any Christian by striking or the like, such Negro or slave shall for his or her first offence be severely whipped by the Constable. For his second offence of that nature he shall be severely whipped, his nose slit, and be burned in some part of his face with a hot iron. And being brutish slaves, they deserve not, for the baseness of their condition, to be tried by the legal trial of twelve men of their peers, as the subjects of England are.
And it is further enacted and ordained that if any Negro or other slave under punishment by his master unfortunately shall suffer in life or member, which seldom happens, no person whatsoever shall be liable to any fine therefore.”

48. The Carolinas:
Charles II restored to throne in 1660 – granted charters to 8 aristocrats to found colonies in North America – established close ties to the West Indies; Charles Town (busiest port in South)
Indian slaves became the main export; the Savannah Indians were essentially wiped out
Started producing rice (main export crop); needed slaves from West Africa who knew how to grow rice and were immune to European diseases; by 1710 they outnumbered whites in the Carolinas

49. Emergence of North Carolina
Made up of poverty-stricken outcasts and religious dissenters from VA
Officially separated from South Carolina in 1712
North Carolina and Rhode Island share 2 traits:
Most democratic and open-minded colonies
Least aristocratic colonies

50. Georgia: The Buffer Colony
Founded in 1733 by James Oglethorpe as a penal colony – Savannah becomes major port
Buffer to protect the Carolinas from Spanish Florida and French Louisiana
Haven for “wretched souls imprisoned for debt” - also called the “Charity Colony”