England's Colonies and Colonial Life - Key Terms

Vocabulary flashcards covering major terms and concepts from the notes on England's colonies and colonial life.

Joint-stock company

A business where investors pool capital to fund settlements in the Americas, sharing profits and risks.

Parliament

England's legislature, with the House of Lords and House of Commons, that limited royal power and helped define rule of law.

Magna Carta

A 1215 charter establishing that everyone, including the king, is subject to the law.

Puritans

English Protestants seeking to purify the Church of England and establish their own communities.

Separatists

Puritans who broke away from the Church of England and often formed independent congregations.

Jamestown

First permanent English settlement in North America, founded in 1607 by the Virginia Company.

Virginia Company

Joint-stock company that financed Jamestown and hoped for profits from the colony.

Tobacco (cash crop)

A highly profitable crop central to the Virginia economy, driving labor demand.

Indentured servant

A person who agrees to work for a set number of years in exchange for passage to America.

Enslaved Africans

Africans forcibly brought to the Americas to provide lifelong, hereditary labor.

Middle Passage

The brutal sea voyage that transported enslaved Africans to the Americas.

Maryland

1634 colony founded by Lord Baltimore as a Catholic refuge and later granted religious tolerance.

Toleration Act of 1649

Maryland law granting freedom of worship to all Christians.

Rhode Island

Colony founded by Roger Williams; promoted religious freedom and separation of church and state.

Powhatan Confederacy

A powerful Native American alliance in the Chesapeake Bay region.

Pequot War

1637 conflict in New England leading to the destruction of the Pequot Nation.

King Philip's War

1675–1676 major conflict between New England colonists and Native tribes led by Metacomet.

Iroquois League

Strong Native American confederation that traded with Europeans and fought rivals.

House of Burgesses

Virginia’s first representative assembly, established in 1619.

Plymouth

1620 settlement founded by Separatists who signed the Mayflower Compact.

Mayflower Compact

Early social contract agreeing to govern Plymouth for the colony’s good.

Massachusetts Bay Colony

1630 Puritan colony founded to be a model community; later known for intolerance of dissent.

John Winthrop

Leader of Massachusetts Bay Colony who envisioned a 'city upon a hill'.

Congregationalists

Puritans who governed churches without bishops and often tolerated limited dissent.

Anne Hutchinson

Puritan banished for challenging male ministers and religious authority.

New England economy

Diversified economy of small farms, fishing, trade, shipbuilding, and manufacturing.

Triangular Trade

Trade network connecting New England, the West Indies, Africa, and Europe.

New Netherland / New York

Dutch colony (New Netherland) taken by the English in 1664 and renamed New York; diverse and tolerant.

William Penn

Quaker founder of Pennsylvania; promoted religious tolerance and peaceful relations with Native Americans.

Quakers

Religious group advocating pacifism and equality; settled prominently in Pennsylvania.

Philadelphia

Major port city in Pennsylvania; center of William Penn’s plans for a liberal colony.

Slavery codification / Slave Codes

Laws that defined enslaved people as property and regulated their lives.

Stono Rebellion

1739 slave rebellion in South Carolina highlighting enslaved resistance.

Enslaved population by 1750

Approximately 250,000 enslaved Africans in British North America, concentrated mostly in the South.

The Enlightenment

18th-century movement emphasizing reason, science, and individual rights.

Deism

Belief that God created the world and then did not intervene in daily affairs; natural laws govern.

Benjamin Franklin

Key Enlightenment figure; inventor and statesman who embodied scientific inquiry.

John Peter Zenger trial

1735 case that established the principle of freedom of the press through truthful reporting.

Great Awakening

Religious revival in the 1730s–1740s emphasizing personal faith and emotion.

Jonathan Edwards

Puritan preacher famed for sermons like 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God'.

George Whitefield

Evangelist who drew large crowds to open-air revivals and helped spread revivalism.

Harvard, William & Mary, Yale, Princeton

Colonial colleges founded primarily to train ministers for the colonies.

Salem Witch Trials

1692 episodes in Massachusetts leading to 19 executions for alleged witchcraft.

Covenant with God

Puritan belief in a divine covenant guiding communal life and moral conduct.

City upon a hill

Winthrop’s vision of Massachusetts Bay as a model Christian community.

Anglicanism

 used in VA, MD, DE, SC, & NC

Puritanism

New england

Quakers

Pennsylvania

Anglicanism & dutch reformed church

NY

No official religion

NJ & RI