AP US History: Early Americas, Colonization, and Conflict (1000-1750)

Vocabulary flashcards covering Native American societies, European exploration, plantation and neo-European colonies, religious movements, and colonial conflicts based on lecture notes.

Cahokia

A Native American center that emerged around 1000 near the fertile bottom of the Mississippi River, using mounds as bases for rulers' homes before suddenly declining prior to European arrival.

Hiawatha

A Mohawk man who, according to legend, lost his family in tribal wars and returned preaching a gospel of peace and power, leading to the formation of the Iroquois Confederacy.

Animism

A belief system shared by most Native Americans and early Europeans asserting that spiritual power resides within the natural world.

Patriarchy

A social system in 1491 Western Europe in which kings ruled society and men governed families.

Republics

States without a monarch governed by representatives of the people, such as the city-states ruled by Italian elites in the 1400s.

Timbuktu

A commercial center on the Niger River that became a key center of Islamic learning in West Africa.

Prince Henry of Portugal

A 1400s Portuguese leader who founded a center for oceanic navigation to pioneer a maritime trade route for West African gold and slaves.

Hernan Cortes

The Spanish conquistador who led an army and Native allies to Tenochtitlan in 1519, capturing Moctezuma and conquering the Aztec capital.

Francisco Pizarro

The Spanish conquistador who set out for Peru in 1524, killed Atahualpa (the last Inca emperor), and seized the Inca Empire's wealth.

Chattel Slavery

The legal ownership of human beings as property, defined by legislators in Virginia and Maryland in the 1660s.

Neo-Europes

Colonies where European settlers sought to replicate the economies and social structures of their home countries.

Columbian Exchange

The global ecological transformation brought about by the intercontinental movement of plants, animals, and diseases following Spanish conquest.

Encomiendas

Grants given by the Spanish crown to conquistadors allowing them to claim tribute in labor and goods from Native American communities.

Mita System

A labor system adapted by Spanish officials to force laborers into mines for the benefit of the state, originally used in the Inca Empire.

Casta System

A hierarchical system of racial classification developed in Spanish America over time.

Mercantilism

A system of state-assisted manufacturing and trade designed to create a favorable balance of trade by reducing imports and increasing exports.

Joint-Stock Corporation

A financial organization devised by English merchants around 1550 that pooled capital to facilitate overseas colonization.

House of Burgesses

A representative government system created by the Virginia Company in 1619 that could make laws and levy taxes, subject to vetoes from England.

Opechancanough

Powhatan's brother who led Native resistance against English settlers in Virginia, including a coordinated 1622 attack that killed 347 colonists.

Toleration Act

An enactment by Lord Baltimore in Maryland that granted all Christians the right to follow their religious beliefs.

Headright System

A system in Virginia that guaranteed 50 acres of land to anyone who paid the passage fee for a migrant worker or servant.

Indentured Servitude

A labor system in which workers signed contracts to work for a specified period without wages in exchange for passage across the Atlantic and free status upon completion.

Samuel de Champlain

The French explorer who founded the fur-trading post of Quebec in 1608.

Puritans

Protestants who did not separate from the Church of England but sought to purify it, migrating in large numbers to Massachusetts Bay.

John Winthrop

The Puritan leader who governed the Massachusetts Bay Colony and envisioned it as an exemplary 'City upon a Hill'.

Roger Williams

A Puritan minister exiled to Rhode Island for advocating religious toleration, praising separation of church and state, and opposing official state religions.

Anne Hutchinson

A dissenter exiled to Rhode Island who denied that salvation could be earned through good deeds and held weekly prayer meetings challenging Puritan orthodox leadership.

Covenant of Works

The religious idea rejected by Anne Hutchinson that individuals could perform good deeds to earn salvation.

Covenant of Grace

The Puritan belief that God saves individuals solely through divine grace rather than good works or individual actions.

Town Meeting

The main institution of local government in Puritan New England communities, where most adult men had a vote.

Metacom's War (King Philip's War)

A 1675-1676 conflict in which Wampanoag leader Metacom led attacks that destroyed one-fifth of English towns in Massachusetts and Rhode Island before Native forces were defeated.

Pueblo Revolt (Popé's Rebellion)

An 1680 uprising organized by the religious leader Popé that killed 400 Spaniards and captured Santa Fe, expelling Spanish rule for over a decade.

Bacon's Rebellion

A 1675-1676 armed rebellion of landless men and frontier settlers led by Nathaniel Bacon against Virginia Governor William Berkeley over Native policy and political corruption.

Covenant Chain

An alliance system formed between British colonies and Native American groups (such as the Haudenosaunee) to extend diplomatic power and resolve conflicts.

Restoration Colonies

Proprietorships such as New York, Carolina, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania created through land grants from restored English monarchs.