CIS US History Chapter 1

Beringia

A vast, unglaciated region that included the bridge that the early humans used to migrate out of Africa to North America. It had hundreds of miles from Siberia to Yukon.

Paleo-Indians

The earliest indigenous Americans. They migrated throughout North America, and their descendants adapted to varying local climates and ecologies.

Mesoamerica

The region compromising central Mexico and Central America prior to European settlement. When the Paleo-Indians ventured farther south in the hemisphere, they formed indigenous groups and cultures here.

Maize

Indian corn that supported much larger and denser settlements than in the north. It was first grown in Mexico (warmer climate) around 5000 BCE and became the foundation of agricultural societies.

Poverty Point

Fond in northeastern Louisiana, it is the site of one of the Americas' first cities. It had a massive earthwork mound that people used for religious exhibitions and gatherings.

Moundbuilding

A project that creates the massive earthwork mound found in Poverty Point. It requires a large and well-organized workforce, and shows the cultural and political power that could've been developed in ancient North America.

North Atlantic Warm Period

From around 900 to 1300, significantly higher average temperatures increased the number of frost-free days on the continent. It allowed for growing seasons to become longer and dependable, which in turn led to the breeding of new variants of food crops that could only be grown in Mesoamerica.

Agricultural Revolution

The drastic shift of dependence on agriculture as a source of food. It led to denser living patterns, since raising crops required less territory than hunting and gathering.

Chaco Canyon

The largest city built by the Southwestern Native Americans (Anasazi; Ancestral Puebloans), due to the Agricultural Revolution. It became a metropolitan center, with people inckuding political supporters and religious pilgrims.

Pueblo Bonito

A house found in the Chaco Canyon that contained seven hundred rooms, totaling to over 40 tons of sandstone.

Role of Women with the Agricultural Revolution

The rising importance of agriculture gave more power to the women, since growing, gathering, and preparing food was traditionally women's work.

Mississippian Civilization

The culture of people found in the flood pains of the Mississippi River Valley, along the Ohio and Arkansas Rivers. They exploited the climate change, growing maize, squashes, and beans.

Cahokia

The metropolitan center at the core of the Mississippian civilization (near present day East St. Louis). It had rich soil for growing crops, and dense woods for hnting. It also was near the Mississippi Rivers and Missouri Rivers, allowing for a vast water transportation network.

End of The Chaco Canyon

The population began to decline and disperse around the middle of the twelfth century. The large droughts forced people to form smaller communities so it would be more economically and ecologically sustainable. Some retained the culture through religious rites, but scholars believe many rejected the hierarchy and violence.

Chunkey

A Cahokian version of a hoop-and pole game, that became a prominent feature of the Mississippian culture. It reflected the cultural dominance of the Cahokian capital.

Fall of Mississippian Civilization

The fall of Cahokia was characterized by drought, an earthquake and warfare, which caused the leadership to weaken and damaged the economy. One by one, Mississippian cities were being abandoned in the 14th century.

Little Ice Age

A long cooling period that lasted from the end of the Mississippian cities to the 19th century. It forced the cities to split into decentralized villages. The farming practices and diets survived, but the urban centers did not.

Prosper of the Pacific Coast

Marine life replaced the need for Agriculture. Salmon was the backbone of the economy rather than maize. They developed techniques for collecting seeds, roots and nuts.

Effect of North Atlantic Warm Period on North Western Europe

The growing season was extended, allowing new varieties of crops to be bred, such as the nutrient rich legumes. Western Europe relied on agriculture already so there was less change, more impact. Productivity and nutrition soared.

Effect of the Little Ice Age on North Western Europe

Colder temperatures destroyed crops and bred famine, which was followed by devastating diseases. It was a time of suffering and instability.

Bubonic Plague/Black Death

The most dramatic disease that spread across the Americas and Europe. Combined with increased warfare and famine, there was a demographic catastrophe. The traditional social order was loosened.

Nation-states

Europe began to consolidate into these, under the control of more powerful monarchs, unlike in North America, where the instability led to decentralized villages.

Latin Christendom

A religious community unified under the authority of the pope in Rome. It saw itself as a universal faith, and had a Catholic Church.

Crusades

Latin Christendom's series of waves against non-believers (Muslims, Jews, and Heretics). Men would enlist in the wars for assurances that their sins would be forgiven.

Reconquista

European monarchs sought to reconquer the Iberian peninsula from Muslims, and were more successful than the crusades in Southwest Asia.

Adelantados

Authorized conquerors appointed by King Enrique III of the Spanish Kingdom of Castile to organize and fund raids on the Canary Islands.

The Guanches

The native people of the Canary Islands. They were divided among small chiefdoms, which invaders exploited (animosities among rival chiefdoms). Around 30,000 were killed, and many were enslaved.

Ceuta

The Muslim port city that Portugal captured on the African side of the Strait of Gibraltar, which opened up the Atlantic coast of Africa to Christian ships.

Prince Henry

Portugal's navigator that used his political power to set a school of navigation and sponsored expeditions. Many of his backers were Italians, who were interested in Asian goods, but he saw it as an opportunity to spread Christendom, and give the Catholic Church a new line of attack against Islam.

Mali

A powerful kingdom that Portugal had come in contact with, introducing Christianity to West Africa.

São Tomé and Príncipe

Two islands in the Gulf of Guinea that the Portuguese had claimed. Here, enslaved Africans worked on sugar plantations.

Portugal's Colonialism in Asia

Bartholomeu Dias sailed around the Cape of Good Hope, at Africa's southern tip, allowing for travel to Asia. They would establish commercial empires in South Asia, Indonesia, and China, attempting to spread Christianity.

The Kingdom of Ghana

A powerful empire in West Africa (Sub-Saharan) that controlled several hundreds of miles. It used its gold deposits to establish far-flung trade routes. Its downfall was the attacks from Muslim Berbers, and the kingdom of Mali was its successor.

Timbuktu

A city in the empire of Mali that became a center of Islamic learning once Mali's rulers had adopted Islam.

African Slave Trade

The demand for enslaved labor in Muslim states in North Africa and Southwest ASia soared. The spread of Islam throughout Africa had a huge impact, as religious outsiders (Non-Islamics) were valued as slaves.

Muslim Slaves

They were mostly domestic servants or concubines, with two thirds being women. Unlike in the Americas, they were not agricultural fieldworkers.

The Fall of the Mali Empire

Timbuktu fell to nomadic invaders, and much of the territory fell to the hands of Songhay, a rival state to the east.

Elmina Castle

A trading center in the Kingdom of Congo, that the Portuguese used to trade for gold, triggering competition in African societies.

Christopher Colombus

An adelantado for Spain that believed Japan lay close to Europe, and that the Earth was round. He understood the Atlantic winds well and headed south from the Canaries, where he would Northern Cuba (present day Bahamas).

Tainos

Arawak-speaking inhabitants of Northern Cuba that Christopher Columbus had come into contact with. They got the name "Indians," believing he had reached Asia, and they kept the name, even after he found out.

Christopher Columbus' Second Voyage

After presenting gold, parrots, and colorful masks, the Spanish monarchy supplied Christopher with seventeen ships, carrying over 1,200 men. This was a colonization party, rather than an exploration party.

Colonization in Hispaniola

Spain put a heavy tax on the Tianos, and extracted gold from the island. When the island couldn't support their demand, Spain declared war. 100,000 were killed, with the rest becoming slaves.

Cristopher Colombus' Third Expedition

Columbus sailed south the Caribbean islands and sailed along the rivers of South America, which he thought was China.

Portugal Discovery of South America

In 1500, Portuguese ships under Pedro Ýlvars Cabral, stumbled upon what he though was a large island. They had landed on Venezuela and had seen northern Brazil, discovering the large continent.

America

An enormous continent that lay between Europe and Asia. It had been named after Amerigo Vespucci (feminized), a observer on the Portugal discovery of South America. It had been clear that it was a continent after Ferdinand Magellan sailed around the southern tip of South America.

Spain's Invasion on the Aztec Empire

Hernán Cortés invaded the Aztec Empire in Mexico with the help of natives who resented them. He destroyed their capital Tenochtitlán, and built Spain's American empire.

Spain's Invasion on the Incan Empire

Spain's conquistador, Francisco Pizarro, invaded the land of the Inca, and captured the emperor, Atahualpa, and held him for a huge ransom in precious metals. The empire had already been declining from civil wars and diseases. The city of Lima was established.

Encomienda

A labor regime where the Spanish allowed for native people to remain on their land, but they had to become laborers for individual conquerors. Under this system, they were forced to export goods, and work in mines, sugar mills, and public construction projects.

Potosí

A silver mining town in present-day Bolivia. It produced over 45,000 tons of silver over the next two centuries.

Colombian Exchange

The new flows of people, information, goods, flora, fauna, and microbes (diseases), between the two sides of the Atlantic ocean, which was facilitated by Christopher Columbus.

Mestizos

The majority of Spaniards that had immigrated to the Americas were male, and married indigenous women. Their children were Spanish-Indians.

Mass Death in the Americas

Spanish conquerers brought guns , which they used to get the natives under their control. They also brought disease, where the Europeans had already experienced smallpox, measles, and typhoid fever, building immunity. The natives, however, had not, which devastated their population.

Tobacco and Cacoa

American goods that built cultural bridges across the Atlantic. They both were special objects within the social and religious aspect of the Aztec. In Europe, they became known for their healing properties and ability to form social relationships and mark class distinction.

Plants and Animals in the Colombian Exchange

Horses (used for conquest), cattle, rats, European weeds, sheep, and goats were all introduced to the Americas. Maize, potatoes, and red tomatoes were introduced to Europe.

First Contact between the Americas and Europe

Northern Europeans (Norse settlers from Scandinavia), colonized the island of Greenland, and tried to settle in Newfoundland.

Struggles of Northern Europe

Northern countries were weaker than Spain and Portugal since they lacked financial resources and the technology. The Atlantic that they were connected to was less inviting.

Protestant Reformation

A religious dispute in Northern Europe. Martin Luther began calling for reforms in the governance of the Catholic Church (95 Theses), critiquing the Church's pardon of sin. Due to the new printing techniques, it became widespread. It widened the split between northern and southern countries

Protestants

Reformers believed that only God can grant salvation and that human beings can only hope to achieve salvation only through faith.

English Reformation

England's King Henry VII broke off Rome, and began confiscating and redistributing the land that had belonged to the Catholic Church. Henry wanted to break up with Catherine of Aragon (past her childbearing age) to have a kid. Both his and his daughter's (Elizabeth) claim to legitimacy relied on the rejection of the pope.

Sea Dogs

English sea captains authorized to raid Spanish ships and towns, defending their piracy as an assault against Catholicism.

England's Conquest on Ireland

Queen Elizabeth's government had a policy that all of Ireland was under English rule. The Irish Catholic were seen as enemies, while the Gaelic Irish were seen like indigenous people, who hadn't adapted to the agricultural revolution.

Huguenots

French Protestants that were first to build colonies in the lands that would later become the United States. They were seeking refuge from persecution in Europe.

La Caroline

A colony established by French Huguenots near the mouth of the St. John's River in present-day Jacksonville. It was the creation of New France.

St. Augustine

The oldest city still in existence in the United States, it was built by Menéndez, a Spanish leader sent out with the task to destroy La Caroline, since they saw it as a Protestant fortress that could attack Spanish colonies. Menéndez captured the fort and executed all the survivors.

Roanoke Island

Walter Raleigh attempted to colonize this land on the Outer Banks of present day North Carolina, after being sent by Elizabeth I. Mishaps and diversions occurred as Europeans migrated to the new colony, and local Roanokes had issues brewing with them. All of England's naval resources was sent to this colony, but when they arrived, the only trace of English settlement was the word Croatoan carved onto a tree. The Protestant colony failed.

New Mexico

Spain sent an expedition to the upper Rio Grande valley, and created a new colony there.

Impact of Columbian Exchange on North America

North American valued ax heads, brass kettles and glass beads. Wherever native populations came into contact with the Europeans, disease and death followed, with many native populations losing more than half of their population.