AP Studs - Period 2 Terms

Master APUSH Period 2 (1607–1754) with this comprehensive review deck. Covers everything from the founding of Jamestown and Plymouth to the First Great Awakening and the rise of transatlantic slavery.

Virginia Company

A joint-stock company that established the first permanent English settlement in North America, Jamestown, in 1607, focusing on profit through the extraction of resources and trade.

Jamestown

The first permanent English settlement in North America, established by the Virginia Company in 1607, aimed at profit through resource extraction.

Tobacco

A cash crop cultivated in Virginia, which became a major export and played a crucial role in the colony's economy.

Headright System

A land allocation system initiated by the Virginia Company in the 17th century, granting settlers land for each indentured servant they brought to the colonies, incentivizing settlement.

Pilgrims/Separatists

A group of English Protestants who sought religious freedom and settled in Plymouth, Massachusetts, in 1620.

Plymouth

A colony started by the Pilgrims in 1620 who wanted to completely split from the Church of England.

Mayflower Compact

An agreement signed on the ship that set up self-government and majority rule for the Plymouth colony.

Puritans

A religious group that wanted to "purify" or fix the Church of England, not leave it entirely.

Massachusetts Bay Company

The joint-stock company created by the Puritans to build a massive colony in New England.

John Winthrop

The strict, long-time governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Jonathan Edwards

Great Awakening preacher who used hellfire-and-brimstone terror (Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God) to scare people into salvation.

George Whitefield

Great Awakening theatrical superstar who traveled the colonies, preaching to massive outdoor crowds using raw emotion.

Half-Way Covenant

A rule letting Puritans get partial church membership without a full conversion, showing that Puritan religious zeal was dying out.

Benjamin Franklin

The ultimate American Enlightenment scientist and writer who championed reason, logic, and civic improvement over strict religion.

Poor Richard's Almanack

Franklin’s bestselling yearly booklet full of witty, practical advice on hard work that shaped a shared colonial culture.

City on a Hill

John Winthrop’s famous phrase meaning the Puritan colony must be a perfect Christian model for the rest of the world to look up to.

William Bradford

The long-time governor of Plymouth Colony who helped the Pilgrims survive.

Roger Williams

A religious rebel kicked out of Massachusetts who started Rhode Island based on religious freedom and separating church from government.

Anne Hutchinson

A woman kicked out of Massachusetts for challenging Puritan leaders and preaching that people could speak directly to God without a minister.

First Great Awakening

A massive wave of Protestant religious revivals that swept through all thirteen colonies, changing how people viewed religious authority and acting as the first shared national experience in American history.

Salem Witch Trials

A massive moral panic in 1692 Massachusetts where false accusations led to the execution of 20 people for witchcraft.

Quebec and Montreal

The first permanent French settlements in Canada, built as trading hubs rather than crowded towns.

The Fur Trade

The main economic focus of the French, who partnered with Native Americans to trap beaver and export their pelts.

Beaver Wars

A series of brutal 17th-century conflicts where the Iroquois tribe (backed by Dutch/English guns) fought French-backed tribes to control the fur trade.

New Orleans

A French port city established in 1718 to control the mouth of the Mississippi River.

San Antonio

A Spanish military outpost and mission established in 1718 to protect Spain's claim over Texas.

Maryland Toleration Act of 1649

A law that guaranteed freedom of worship to all Christians (especially Catholics) to stop religious fighting.

The Carolinas

Southern colonies that grew wealthy by farming cash crops using heavy slave labor.

Bacon’s Rebellion

Armed uprising of poor white backcountry settlers and indentured servants led by Nathaniel Bacon against Virginia Governor William Berkeley, marking a massive turning point that accelerated the shift from indentured servitude to African chattel slavery.

Rice and Indigo

The two major cash crops that made South Carolina rich.

Barbados Sugar

A Caribbean island with a brutal, highly profitable slave system focused entirely on growing sugar. Planters from Barbados later moved to Carolina and brought their strict slave codes with them.

William Penn and the Holy Experiment

A Quaker who started Pennsylvania as a "holy experiment" featuring complete religious freedom, fair treatment of Native Americans, and peaceful living.

Mercantilism

An economic system where the mother country (England) exploits its colonies to get raw materials, sell manufactured goods, and hoard gold.

Navigation Acts

English laws that forced the colonies to trade only with England using English ships.

Salutary Neglect

A long period where England ignored its own trade laws and let the colonies govern and trade freely because England was distracted by wars.

Triangle Trade

A three-stop trading route: New England made rum → traded rum in Africa for slaves → traded slaves in the West Indies for sugar/molasses → brought sugar back to New England to make rum.

King Philip's War

A devastating 1675 war between New England colonists and a Native alliance led by Metacom (King Philip) that ended native resistance in New England.

Indentured Servants vs. Slavery

Servants were poor white Europeans who worked for 4 to 7 years in exchange for passage to America and then went free; slaves were Africans captured and forced to work for life with zero freedom.

Atlantic Slave Trade and Middle Passage

The global business of capturing and shipping Africans; the Middle Passage was the brutal, forced ocean voyage across the Atlantic where millions died.

Stono Rebellion

A 1739 slave uprising in South Carolina where enslaved people tried to escape to Spanish Florida, leading to much stricter slave laws.

New York City Slave Revolt (1712/1741)

Uprisings and suspected plots by enslaved people in a major Northern city, which resulted in executions and harsher restrictions.

Glorious Revolution

A bloodless coup in England (1688) that overthrew the king, limited royal power, and ended the Dominion of New England, giving colonies their local governments back.

The Enlightenment

A European intellectual movement emphasizing reason, science, and individualism over blind religious faith.

John Locke

An Enlightenment philosopher who argued that governments exist to protect people's rights, and if a government fails, citizens can overthrow it.

Divine Right vs. Natural Rights

Divine Right claims a king gets his absolute power directly from God; Natural Rights (Life, Liberty, Property) claims all humans are born with unalienable rights that no king can take away.

Pequot War

The first major armed conflict between New England colonists and Native Americans, resulting in the near-destruction of the Pequot tribe and securing English dominance in the region.