APUSH Time Period 1 (1492–1607) & Time Period 2 (1607–1754) Vocabulary

Vocabulary-style flashcards generated directly from APUSH Period 1 and Period 2 lecture notes covering European exploration, colonial regional traits, Native American relations, and major historical events.

Marbury v. Madison (1803)

First Supreme Court decision to declare a federal law—the Judiciary Act of 1789—unconstitutional. It established the legitimacy of the Supreme Court and set a precedent of SCOTUS checking other branches of government through 'Judicial Review'.

Great Plains Native Americans (9500 BCE)

Native groups who were either nomadic hunters or sedentary people who farmed and traded. They survived on hunting buffalo, lived in tepees and earthen lodges, and acquired horses by stealing them from Spanish settlers.

Atlantic Seaboard Native Americans (9500 BCE)

People of the coastal plains living from New Jersey south to Florida. Many were descendants of woodland mound builders who built lodgings along rivers, using rivers and the ocean as a major food source.

Southwest Native Americans (9500 BCE - 1492)

Groups in dry regions who evolved multifaceted societies supported by farming with irrigation systems and living in cliff caves. Extreme drought and hostile ranks took a toll on them before European arrival.

European Exploration (1492)

Exploration initiated by Christopher Columbus, who spent 8 years begging for funding before sailing on 3 ships to the Bahamas to find a faster, cheaper water route to the Indies, ultimately connecting global regions.

Columbian Exchange (1492 / 1500)

Transatlantic trade of animals, plants, germs, and cultures touched off by contact between Europeans and Native Americans following Columbus's arrival.

Disease Epidemics

Outbreaks of European smallpox, malaria, and other dangerous germs that devastated Native populations lacking antibodies, cutting the Taino Native population from one million down to 200.

Encomienda System (1503)

A system allowing the Spanish government to commend or give certain Native Americans to colonists under the promise to Christianize them, functioning essentially as slavery.

Catholic Missionaries (17th–18th century)

Spanish Conquistadors lacking Spanish women had children with Native Americans and raised them as Catholic, forming a cultural bridge across generations.

De Las Casas / Sepúlveda debate (1550)

A 1550 debate on Christianizing Native Americans: Sepúlveda argued enslavement saved Natives who could not self-govern, while De Las Casas defended Natives and questioned gruesome methods of subjugation.

Spanish Colonization (1492)

Spanish exploration efforts that killed, enslaved, and infected countless Natives while establishing a colossal empire that mingled Spanish culture with indigenous populations.

French Colonization (1534)

Colonization focused on commercial relationships and the fur trade around the Great Lakes and Quebec (1534), relying on alliances and intermarriage with Native Americans.

Dutch Colonization (1609)

Establishment of New Netherland motivated by trade in lumber and furs. Dutch settlers intermarried with Natives and provided military help, creating Native allies and enemies.

English Colonization (1607)

Colonization efforts delayed by European conflicts and civil war. English settlers arrived in family groups, did not intermarry with Natives, and generally excluded Native populations.

Middle Passage (1525)

The horrific middle leg of the triangular trade route transporting enslaved Africans to the Americas under high death rates, where 10-20% of passengers died before reaching their destination.

Anglicization (1690)

The gradual process by which 18th-century British colonies adapted English cultural, urban, and social models through intercolonial trade, transatlantic print culture, and Protestant evangelicalism.

Enlightenment (17th–18th century)

European intellectual movement emphasizing reason, natural rights, and skepticism of authority, providing American colonists with political vocabulary to justify resistance and revolution.

Stono Rebellion (1739)

The largest slave insurrection in North America, occurring in the Southern colonies when a group of enslaved Africans attempted to escape and killed 20-30 whites.

Mercantilism (1500)

Economic theory holding that national power depends on accumulating wealth (gold and silver) by exporting more than importing within a fixed global amount of wealth.

Navigation Acts (1651)

English laws mandating colonial trade be carried on English ships through England, binding colonies to a mercantile system benefiting Britain and fueling colonial resentment.

Great Awakening (1730s)

A religious revival movement opposing strict Puritanism, spreading evangelical Protestantism, increasing religious pluralism, and fostering a shared American identity.

Jonathan Edwards & George Whitefield (1730s)

Key emotional preachers of the Great Awakening; Edwards represented homegrown intellectual revivalism, while Whitefield conducted colony-to-colony preaching tours.

Salutary Neglect (1690s)

Unofficial British policy of loosely enforcing trade regulations like the Navigation Acts, allowing colonies to form self-governing assemblies and independent trade habits.

Chattel Slavery (1619)

System treating human beings as personal property and mortgage assets, gradually codified into law to supply labor for colonial tobacco surpluses.

Jamestown (1607)

First successful English settlement, saved from initial harsh conditions when John Smith established strict discipline, eventually achieving economic stability through tobacco farming.

Indentured Servitude (1608)

A labor system where colonists paid passage for individuals from England to work for 4-7 years in exchange for eventual freedom to start a new life.

Headright System (1608)

A land grant program offering 50-acre tracts of land ('headrights') to settlers to attract tobacco farming labor to Jamestown.

Plymouth Colony (1620)

New England settlement founded by Puritans seeking religious freedom, featuring family settlement structures and a mixed economy of agriculture, fishing, whaling, shipbuilding, and iron-making.

Puritans & Pilgrims (1620 / 1621)

Pilgrims were Separatists who viewed the Church of England as irreformable, whereas Puritans were non-separatists who sought to purify the Church from within Massachusetts Bay.

Pequot War (1636)

A 1636–1638 conflict between English settlers and the dominant Pequot tribe driven by competition over Connecticut farmland, political control, and wampum trade.

Roger Williams (1635)

Puritan minister banished from Massachusetts Bay in 1635 who established Providence, Rhode Island on principles of religious toleration, separation of church and state, and fair land purchases from Natives.

Anne Hutchinson (1638)

Puritan dissenter banished for speaking out against church leadership and the lack of women's rights within the Puritan establishment.

Southern Colonies (1607)

Colonial region featuring cash crop agriculture: rice and indigo in South Carolina, tobacco in North Carolina, and Georgia (founded in 1732 by James Oglethorpe).

New England Colonies (1620)

Colonies composed primarily of middle-class Puritan and Pilgrim family groups centered around church community with low religious tolerance and little reliance on slave labor.

Middle Colonies (1609)

Diverse economic and cultural region characterized by fertile land, grain production, large trade cities, and religious tolerance associated with Quakers.

King Philip's War (1675)

Conflict that halted English westward expansion in New England for decades and inflicted a decisive defeat on local Native American tribes.

Bacon's Rebellion (1676)

Uprising of frontier settlers and former indentured servants led by Nathaniel Bacon in Virginia, exposing class tensions and accelerating the shift toward African chattel slavery.

Pueblo Revolt (1680)

Successful Native American uprising driving Spanish colonizers out of New Mexico for over a decade (until 1692) in response to forced Christianization.

Quakers (1656)

Protestant denomination rejecting formal clergy and church hierarchies, grounded in the core belief of the 'inner light'—that God speaks directly to every individual.