Unit 1 review/prep - pre columbian history + colonizations

The Success Myth

America is the land of opportunity, meritocratic system

the City on a Hill Myth

America is exceptional (American exceptionalism), duty/obligation to spread Christianity/democracy/capitalism to rest of world

The Agrarian Myth

the American dream, homeownership

The Frontier Myth

manifest destiny, imperialism, space as the "Final Frontier"

Pre-Columbian Era

Lack of Written records/history force historians to look at artifacts such as language and art.

leading theories on Pre-Columbian Native Americans

1) Pre-Columbian Native American civilizations were as big, powerful, populous, and advanced as European civilizations, shaped the land on which they lived.

2) exponentially smaller population/size than European societies, with little to no impact on the world around them.

Tenochtitlan

Capital of Aztec Empire built on lake, featuring waterways, irrigation, gold decoration, and sacrificial alters. now modern day Mexico City.

Cuzco

Capital of Incan Empire - located in modern day Peru, featuring roadways, grid structures, perfectly cut rocks, all built without beast of burden.

Noble Savage

Native Americans romanticized as they disappeared, stereotypical imagery (headdresses, red-skin, few clothes, etc.)

Push factors for settlements

Things pushing people out of the Mother Country (ex. lack of food, famine, lack of land/opportunity, persecution, disease).

Pull factors

Things pulling people to the New World. Usually economic opportunity, land, wealth (ex. tobacco, gold, liberties, religion, spices, furs).

French/Spanish exploration strategy

literally build on top of Native Societies, intermarry with Natives - pull factors Spanish → gold, French → beaver fur.

British exploration strategy

Conquer Native Society Push factors land (not enough at home) pull factors - search for gold.

matrilineal

based on or tracing descent through the female line, property passed though mothers line/family name.

Jamestown Colony

founded + funded by Virginia Company (Joint Stock Company), disaster built on infertile land, disease, 90% mortality rate.

tobacco

Cash Crop → grows well in Virginia, addictive (creates on demand), requires cheap labor to produce.

monoculture

the cultivation of a single crop, agriculture + economy based on on factor.

Indentured Servant

People indebted to a company, usually for transportation to the New World, that must work for a period of time before having freedom and buying property.

Bacons Rebellion

Little land left for free servants and slaves → Gov. Berkeley tells them to get land from Natives, which is impossible → settlers squatting on Native land -- Nathaniel Bacon confronts Gov. and really wants land, so he rounds up yeoman/servants/slaves to rebel and torch the capital while chasing off Natives.

significance of Bacons Rebellion

Class unity dangerous for small group of plantation owners → class + race separation enforced by law, Yeomen Farmers given more rights (superior to Indent. Servants and Slaves) → slavery becomes hereditary condition.

Chattel Slavery

Slaves are property that can be bought/sold, have no rights and are considered subhuman.

Puritans + Mass. Colony

Puritans upset about Anglican Church, receive charter to leave England and found Mass. Bay Colony. religious stance against materialism/vanity.

calvinism

Belief system defined by John Calvin and adopted by Puritans with elements of predestination (God is omniscient and omnipotent, so he already knows if you’re going to heaven/hell) and the concept of “the Elect” (strict living = surely going to heaven).

Metacom

The leader of the Wampanoag Confederacy (aka. King Philip) who realizes Puritans are squatting on Native land and that settlers’ pigs are destroying Native settlements. Wages wars against Puritan settlement through violent raids.

racism

Prejudice against a people for perceived inferiority associated with inherent traits.

mercantilism

Economic system in which colonies are established to enrich the mother country, especially with raw materials.

Triangular Trade

Trade network that connected 3 continents (North America, Europe, and Africa).

Columbian Exchange

Movement of people, goods, plants, animals, diseases, ideas, traditions, etc. between the New and Old Worlds, causing interdependence of societies. Globalism beginnings.

Middle Ground

physical + metaphorical space of exchange where there is a balance of power between Europeans and Natives.

Richard Frethorne

indentured Servant who writes about disease + death + quality of life in the new world. speaks about, stealing, little food, scurvy, dysentery, and other diseases.

Mary Rowlandson

Puritan Woman captured by Wampanoag Native Americans during Raid on village. wrote about her captivity and servitude to Chief Metacom (aka. King Phillip)

Sir Walter Raleigh

founded Roanoke colony, left for 5 years returned and colony was completely gone

Nathaniel Bacon

started a rebellion whose aim was to take land from the wealthy plantation owners as well as the Native Americans around Jamestown colony, Cousin of Gov. Berkeley.