Period 2 Flashcards

Global market economy

An increasingly interconnected 18th-century economy in which European prosperity depended on long-distance trade networks, colonies, and overseas commodity flows.

Colonialism

The policy and practice of acquiring and maintaining overseas territories to extract raw materials and secure markets, tying European growth to imperial expansion and exploitation.

Atlantic slave trade

A major forced migration (16th–19th centuries) in which European traders transported millions of Africans to the Americas for coerced labor, fueling Atlantic plantation economies.

Triangular trade

Atlantic trading system linking Europe, Africa, and the Americas through exchanges of manufactured goods, enslaved labor, and plantation commodities.

Middle Passage

The notoriously inhumane transatlantic voyage that carried enslaved Africans to the Americas; marked by overcrowding, disease, starvation, and high mortality.

Steam engine

A key technology that increased productivity and efficiency in manufacturing and helped push parts of Europe (especially Britain) toward early industrialization.

Spinning jenny

An invention that dramatically increased spinning capacity in textile production, raising manufacturing output and supporting early industrialization.

Industrial Revolution

The transformation in production beginning in Britain in the mid-1700s (later spreading), driven by new technologies and factory-based manufacturing growth.

Capitalism

An economic system whose rise accelerated in the 18th century, emphasizing private property, market exchange, investment, and profit, alongside expanding middle and working classes.

Commercial Revolution

(16th–18th centuries) A long period of European economic expansion marked by growing international trade, colonialism, mercantilism, new financial institutions, and the rise of capitalism.

Seven Years’ War (1756–1763)

A major global conflict fought in Europe, North America, the Caribbean, and India; a turning point that expanded debts, sharpened imperial rivalry, and boosted British naval/colonial dominance.

Treaty of Paris (1763)

The treaty ending the Seven Years’ War that confirmed major British gains and strengthened Britain’s imperial position while intensifying debate over managing and paying for empire.

Partitions of Poland (1772, 1793, 1795)

The division of Poland-Lithuania by Russia, Prussia, and Austria until it disappeared as an independent state, illustrating aggressive great-power politics and the limits of “enlightened” restraint.

Conservatism

Early 19th-century ideology prioritizing stability and tradition, arguing that social order depends on institutions like monarchy, church, and hierarchy and warning that rapid reform can lead to violence.

Constitutional monarchy

A political system in which a monarch’s power is limited by laws/constitution and representative institutions; in England this was strengthened after 1688–1689.

British East India Company

A company founded in 1600 to trade with Asia that became the dominant power in India by the mid-1700s, central to Britain’s imperial and commercial influence.

Declaration of Independence (1776)

The Continental Congress’s formal statement asserting the American colonies’ independence from Britain and articulating a rights-based justification for separation.

Enlightenment

An 18th-century intellectual movement emphasizing reason, skepticism toward inherited authority, and reform ideas (rights, toleration, constitutional limits) that became politically explosive in crises.

Rationalism

The Enlightenment belief that reason is the primary source of knowledge and should guide public life more than tradition or inherited authority.

Empiricism

The Enlightenment emphasis on knowledge derived from observation and experience, associated with confidence in the scientific method.

Secularism

The view that religion should not dominate government, including criticism of organized religion and support for separating church and state.

Deism

Belief in a distant, non-interventionist God; popular among some Enlightenment-era intellectuals and part of broader religious contestation.

Liberalism

Late 18th-century ideology emphasizing individual rights, limited government, and free markets; associated with thinkers such as John Locke and Adam Smith.

Romanticism

Late 18th- to mid-19th-century cultural movement reacting against Enlightenment rationalism and industrial disruption, emphasizing emotion, imagination, nature, and individual experience (with political themes of freedom/rights).

Haitian Revolution (1791–1804)

Uprising in Saint-Domingue that became the first successful large-scale slave revolt, creating the first black-led republic and challenging Atlantic slavery and “universal rights” claims.

Three Estates

The traditional division of French society: First Estate (clergy), Second Estate (nobility), and Third Estate (everyone else), with privilege and taxation organized unevenly across them.

Aristocratic revolt

Elite resistance to reform in late 18th-century France—privileged groups defending exemptions and blocking tax changes—contributing to political deadlock and crisis.

Estates-General (1789)

Estate-based representative body called by Louis XVI (not convened since 1614); its procedural disputes (voting by order vs. by head) triggered a sovereignty crisis.

National Assembly

The body formed when Third Estate representatives declared themselves the representatives of the nation (June 17, 1789), shifting sovereignty from king to nation.

Tennis Court Oath

(June 20, 1789) Pledge by the National Assembly not to disband until France had a constitution, symbolizing open defiance of royal authority.

Storming of the Bastille

(July 14, 1789) Paris crowd seized a royal fortress-prison; militarily limited but symbolically powerful as a strike against royal authority and fear of repression.

Great Fear

(Summer 1789) Rural panic over rumored aristocratic plots; peasants attacked manors and destroyed feudal records, pushing the Assembly toward ending feudal privileges.

Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

(August 1789) Revolutionary statement of legal equality, popular sovereignty, and natural rights (liberty, property, security, resistance to oppression) that also raised questions about exclusion.

Civil Constitution of the Clergy

(1790) Reorganization of the French Catholic Church requiring clergy loyalty oaths; intensified conflict by dividing communities and fueling counterrevolution.

Flight to Varennes

(1791) Louis XVI’s failed attempt to escape France, which shattered confidence in the king’s loyalty to the constitutional order.

Reign of Terror

(1793–1794) Period of state-directed violence against suspected enemies of the revolution, justified as necessary for survival amid war, rebellion, and political crisis.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Military leader who seized power in the 1799 coup (18 Brumaire) as First Consul and later emperor (1804), combining revolutionary language with authoritarian rule to stabilize France.

Napoleonic Code

(1804) Comprehensive civil law code standardizing laws and emphasizing equality before the law and property rights, while also reinforcing patriarchal family authority and limiting some rights.

Congress of Vienna (1814–1815)

Diplomatic settlement after Napoleon aiming to restore legitimate monarchies, contain France, and rebuild a durable balance of power under leaders such as Metternich, Castlereagh, Alexander I, and Talleyrand.

Absolutism

A political system in which a monarch claims (and often expands) central authority over law, taxation, administration, and the military, with limited accountability to representative institutions, though still facing practical constraints.

Constitutionalism

The principle that government is bound by established rules and that a ruler’s power is constrained by law, representative institutions, and/or entrenched rights (often for elites rather than a full democracy).

Fiscal-military state

A state whose institutions and politics are heavily shaped by the need to finance war through taxation, borrowing, and expanded administration.

Sovereignty

Ultimate political authority; in this era it was debated and redefined (dynastic, territorial, and popular forms).

Peace of Westphalia (1648)

Treaties that ended the Thirty Years’ War and reinforced a more state-centered Europe by strengthening territorial political authority and treaty-based diplomacy without instantly “creating modern sovereignty.”

Bureaucracy

A professional administrative system (offices, councils, ministries) used to enforce policy more consistently across a territory than dispersed feudal structures.

Divine right monarchy

The belief that a ruler’s authority comes from God, making obedience a religious duty and rebellion both a political and spiritual crime.

Edict of Nantes (1598)

Henry IV’s decree granting limited toleration to French Huguenots, used to stabilize France after the Wars of Religion.

Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685)

Louis XIV’s cancellation of toleration for Huguenots to pursue religious uniformity, prompting migration and potential economic loss of skilled workers and merchants.

Huguenots

French Protestants whose limited toleration under the Edict of Nantes was later revoked, leading many to flee France.

Henry IV of France

First Bourbon king (r. 1589–1610) who strengthened the monarchy after religious wars and issued the Edict of Nantes to stabilize the realm.

Cardinal Richelieu

Chief minister under Louis XIII who advanced French centralization, including expanding the use of intendants and weakening independent noble power.

Intendants

Royal officials in France who extended central oversight in provinces (taxation, justice, administration), strengthening the monarchy’s reach.

The Fronde

Uprisings during Louis XIV’s youth that helped convince the monarchy that stability required stronger central authority.

Palace of Versailles

Louis XIV’s palace-court used as political technology to discipline the nobility through ritual, patronage competition, and constant visibility.

Jean-Baptiste Colbert

Louis XIV’s finance minister associated with mercantilist policies to promote manufacturing, regulate the economy, and increase state revenue.

Mercantilism

An economic doctrine in which the state manages trade and production to increase national wealth and power (e.g., encouraging exports, limiting imports, using tariffs and monopolies).

English Civil War (1642–1651)

Armed conflict between Royalists (supporting Charles I) and Parliamentarians (led militarily by Cromwell), driven by disputes over religion, taxation, and sovereignty.

Oliver Cromwell

Parliamentarian military leader who became Lord Protector during the Commonwealth/Protectorate, illustrating how republican experiments could become military-backed regimes.

Glorious Revolution (1688)

A largely bloodless transfer of power in England where William of Orange replaced James II amid fears of a Catholic dynasty, strengthening parliamentary power.

English Bill of Rights (1689)

A document that reinforced parliamentary supremacy and limited royal power (no suspending laws or levying taxes without Parliament), associated with constitutional monarchy.

Thomas Hobbes

Author of Leviathan (1651) who argued strong sovereignty was necessary to prevent chaos and disorder after civil war.

John Locke

Political thinker who argued government rests on consent and exists to protect rights; if it fails, people may resist or replace it.

Dutch Republic

A federation of provinces with strong urban merchant influence; a major commercial and financial power showing state strength could come from trade and naval capacity without a king.

Composite monarchy

A state made up of multiple territories with different laws, elites, and languages (e.g., the Habsburg monarchy), making centralization uneven.

Habsburg dynasty

A long-running European ruling family that expanded influence through strategic marriages and ruled diverse territories, presenting themselves as Catholic defenders.

Russian autocracy

A form of absolutism in which the Tsar concentrated authority over government, military, and church with limited institutional checks, reinforced by divine-right ideology.

Serfdom

A coercive labor system tying peasants to the land with restricted rights; especially strong in much of Central and Eastern Europe and closely linked to state and noble power.

Peter the Great

Russian ruler (r. 1682–1725) who modernized the military, reorganized administration, compelled noble service, and promoted elite westernization to make Russia competitive.

Balance of power

The diplomatic assumption that peace and independence require preventing any single state from dominating; it often encouraged shifting alliances and wars to contain rivals.

Grand Alliance

Coalition formed against France in the Nine Years’ War (including England, the Dutch Republic, the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, Savoy) to limit Louis XIV’s power.

Treaty of Utrecht (1713)

Treaty ending the War of the Spanish Succession that rearranged territories and trade advantages to prevent a destabilizing France-Spain dynastic union (balance-of-power logic).

Military Revolution

Early modern changes in tactics, weaponry, and army organization that increased the scale and cost of war, pushing states toward stronger taxation and administration.

Humanism

A Renaissance-rooted mode of thought emphasizing human value and agency, reason, and critical reading; often encouraged natural (not purely supernatural) explanations.

Individualism

A focus on personal autonomy, self-reliance, achievement, and self-expression; pushed back against conformity and groupthink.

Intellectualism

A habit of mind that prizes education, rational inquiry, and critical thinking, while rejecting dogma and superstition.

Scientific Revolution

A long, uneven (16th–18th c.) transformation in explaining nature, emphasizing observation, measurement, experimentation, and mathematical description over inherited authority.

Enlightenment

A 17th–18th c. intellectual movement applying confidence in reason and critique to religion, politics, economics, and society, often challenging traditional authority and proposing reforms.

Scholasticism

Traditional university reasoning that used careful logic built on accepted authoritative texts; challenged by Scientific Revolution methods.

Empiricism

The view that knowledge begins with sense experience—observation and evidence collection.

Francis Bacon

Major advocate of empiricism who promoted organized, cooperative inquiry and building general conclusions from many observations (induction).

Rationalism

An approach emphasizing reason and logical (often mathematical) thinking as key sources of reliable knowledge.

René Descartes

Central rationalist who argued that starting from clear first principles and applying rigorous logic could produce reliable knowledge; encouraged mechanical, law-governed views of nature.

Scientific method

A blended approach using observation, hypotheses, experimentation, and conclusions that other investigators can replicate.

Nicolaus Copernicus

Proposed heliocentrism; his model challenged inherited cosmology but faced serious objections given the physics of the time.

Johannes Kepler

Strengthened heliocentrism by arguing planets move in elliptical orbits, improving the fit between theory and observation.

Galileo Galilei

Used the telescope to observe evidence supporting heliocentrism; his conflict with Church authorities centered on authority and interpretation, not a simple “science vs. religion” story.

Isaac Newton

Synthesized the scientific revolution by showing the same mathematical laws explain both terrestrial and celestial motion.

Laws of motion

Newton’s principles describing how objects move; helped unify explanations of motion on Earth and in the heavens.

Salons

Elite gatherings (often hosted by women) that brought together writers and educated society for conversation and debate, helping spread Enlightenment ideas.

William Harvey

Physiologist who argued blood circulates in a closed system driven by the heart.

Voltaire

Enlightenment writer who attacked religious intolerance and arbitrary authority, championed free speech and toleration, and admired aspects of English constitutionalism.

Denis Diderot

Editor of the Encyclopédie, a major project to collect and disseminate knowledge that spread critical ideas and provoked controversy.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Enlightenment thinker who argued civilization can corrupt natural human goodness and emphasized popular sovereignty through the general will.

Adam Smith

Author of The Wealth of Nations (1776) who argued wealth comes from productive labor, division of labor, and markets; criticized mercantilist restrictions and monopolies.

Louis XIV

Sun king, longest reigning monarch of France, sign of European Absolutism

Catherine The Great of Russia

Queen who transformed Russia into a major European power, and Russia thrived under a golden age during the Enlightenment.

Louis XVI

Last king of France before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution, weak leader

Robespierre

Radical French revolutionary leader best known as a key figure of the Reign of Terror, a violent period (1793–1794)

Toussaint L’ Ouverture

Led an uprising of enslaved Africans in Saint-Domingue, was a Haitian general and the most prominent leader of the Haitian Revolution.

Metternich

Austrian diplomat and statesman best known for his role during and after the Napoleonic Wars, recognized for his leadership during the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815),