Exploration and Colonial Beginnings Flashcards

Vocabulary flashcards covering key terms, historical figures, colonial regions, and major events from the Unit 1 Exploration and Colonial Beginnings material.

Cash Crops of the Southern Colonies

Agricultural products grown for profit in the Southern Colonies, including cotton, indigo, and tobacco.

Bacon's Rebellion

A colonial conflict that exemplified the growing power of former indentured servants.

Puritans

A religious group seeking freedom from religious persecution in Europe who settled New England and founded the Massachusetts colony.

1619

The year the first Africans were brought against their will to Jamestown.

Virginia Company of London

An English enterprise that created a profitable settlement in Jamestown.

Disease

The single greatest factor that caused the widespread death of Native Americans after contact with Europeans.

House of Burgesses

The first representative government in the Jamestown colony and the first elected assembly in the New World.

Jonathan Edwards

A preacher during the Great Awakening who gave the 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God' sermon and traveled the 13 Colonies giving fire & brimstone sermons.

Quakers

A religious group that settled mostly in the Middle region.

Triangular Trade

A trade route system that led directly to the increased importation of enslaved Africans to the Western Hemisphere.

New England Colonies

A colonial region characterized by a cold climate, rocky soil, covenant communities focused on one religion, least tolerance, social structure based on religious standing, and an economy based on shipbuilding, fishing, and lumbering.

Middle Colonies

A colonial region featuring a moderate climate suitable for grain crops, a flexible social structure, the most diverse population, and a middle class made up of artisans, business owners, and small farmers.

Southern Colonies

A colonial region where Jamestown was located, featuring an economy based on large plantations and slave labor, with a social structure based on family standing and land ownership.

Columbian Exchange

The sharing and exchange of items such as pumpkin and tobacco between the New World and Europe.

Benjamin Franklin

A leading figure in the Enlightenment.

Jamestown

The first permanent English settlement in the New World, established in 1607.

Great Awakening

A religious movement that helped lay the social foundations for the American Revolution.

Mayflower Compact

The first written form of government in the New World.

Massachusetts

An early English settlement colony founded by the Puritans.

New Netherland

A colony founded by the Dutch to expand the fur trade, which was later taken over by the English and run by the Duke of York.