AP US History Period 2 Test Review (1607-1754)

Flashcards covering key terms, historical figures, events, and concepts for AP US History Period 2 (1607–1754).

What was the Atlantic Slave Trade?

The forced transportation of millions of Africans across the Atlantic Ocean to labor in the Americas. It connected Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and North America through trade and slavery.

What was the Middle Passage?

The brutal transatlantic voyage enslaved Africans were forced to endure from Africa to the Americas. Captives faced overcrowding, disease, starvation, violence, and high death rates.

How is Chattel Slavery defined in colonial history?

A system of slavery in which enslaved people were legally treated as property for life. Enslaved status was generally inherited through the mother, making slavery permanent and hereditary.

What were Slave Laws / Slave Codes?

Laws that restricted the movement, education, legal rights, assembly, and behavior of enslaved people while protecting slaveholders' control and property rights.

What was the Stono Rebellion of 1739?

A 1739 uprising of enslaved Africans in South Carolina. Rebels attempted to escape to Spanish Florida, where Spain sometimes offered freedom to escaped enslaved people. The rebellion was suppressed and led to stricter slave laws.

What was Indentured Servitude?

A labor system in which people agreed to work for a specified number of years in exchange for transportation, food, shelter, or the opportunity to receive land or other benefits after completing their contracts.

What is a Labor System?

The way a society organizes work. Colonial labor systems included family labor, indentured servitude, wage labor, and African chattel slavery.

What are Cash Crops, and which were prominent in the Southern colonies?

Crops grown primarily for sale and profit rather than for the farmer's direct consumption. Tobacco, rice, and indigo were important Southern colonial cash crops.

What role did Tobacco play in the Chesapeake colonies?

A profitable cash crop that became the economic foundation of Virginia and much of the Chesapeake. Its cultivation increased the demand for land and labor.

Who were the Gentry in colonial Virginia?

The wealthy elite landowners who dominated the social, political, and economic life of colonies such as Virginia.

How are Elite Landowners defined in colonial society?

Wealthy colonists who owned large plantations or estates, controlled substantial labor forces, and often held political offices.

What was Mercantilism?

An economic system in which colonies were expected to enrich the mother country by supplying raw materials, purchasing manufactured goods, and participating in trade controlled by the imperial government.

What were the Navigation Acts?

British laws regulating colonial trade. They required certain goods to be transported on English or colonial ships and directed valuable colonial exports through England.

What was the Triangular Trade?

A general term for Atlantic trade routes connecting Europe, Africa, and the Americas. Manufactured goods, enslaved Africans, and colonial products moved along different routes in this system.

How is Imperialism defined?

The policy of extending a nation's power through territorial expansion, colonization, political control, or economic influence.

What was the Atlantic World?

The interconnected economic, political, cultural, and demographic system linking Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and the Americas.

What were the economic characteristics of colonial Virginia?

England's first major permanent colonial region in North America. Its economy became centered on tobacco, plantation agriculture, and eventually African chattel slavery.

What was Jamestown and when was it founded?

The first permanent English settlement in North America, founded in Virginia in 1607 by the Virginia Company.

What was the House of Burgesses?

Virginia's representative legislative assembly, established in 1619. It was the first elected representative assembly in English North America.

How did the Head-Right System operate?

A land-grant system that gave land to settlers who paid for their own passage or paid to transport laborers to the colonies. It encouraged immigration and helped wealthy planters acquire large estates.

What was Bacon's Rebellion?

A 1676 uprising in Virginia led by Nathaniel Bacon against Governor William Berkeley's government. The rebellion reflected conflicts over land, Native policy, taxation, political power, and class inequality.

Who was Nathaniel Bacon?

A Virginia planter who led Bacon's Rebellion against Governor Berkeley in 1676. He represented frontier settlers who wanted more aggressive action against Native peoples and greater political influence.

Who was Governor William Berkeley and why was he opposed during Bacon's Rebellion?

Virginia's governor during Bacon's Rebellion. Rebels accused him of favoring wealthy landowners and failing to protect frontier settlers from Native resistance.

What defined the Chesapeake region?

The colonial region surrounding the Chesapeake Bay, especially Virginia and Maryland. Its economy was heavily influenced by tobacco, plantation agriculture, and labor exploitation.

What was the Virginia Company?

An English joint-stock company that founded Jamestown in 1607 in order to establish a profitable colony.

What is a Plantation?

A large agricultural estate that produced cash crops, often with the labor of enslaved people or indentured servants.

When was Georgia founded and what purpose did it initially serve?

The last of the original 13 English colonies, founded in 1732. It initially served as a military buffer between South Carolina and Spanish Florida.

Who was James Oglethorpe?

Founder of Georgia and a member of the group that received a charter to establish the colony. He envisioned Georgia partly as a place for debtors and poor settlers.

What is a Buffer Colony, and which colony served this role?

A colony established to protect another colony or imperial territory from attacks or rival European powers. Georgia served as a buffer between South Carolina and Spanish Florida.

Who founded Maryland and for what purpose?

An English colony founded by the Calvert family. It was established partly as a refuge for English Catholics but became religiously and politically diverse.

What was the Refuge for Catholics in colonial America?

A place where Catholics could escape religious discrimination. Maryland was founded partly to provide this opportunity for English Catholics.

What was the Act of Religious Toleration passed in Maryland in 1649?

A Maryland law passed in 1649 that protected Trinitarian Christians, including Catholics and most Protestants, from religious persecution. It did not create complete religious freedom for everyone.

Who were the Pilgrims?

English Separatists who wanted to leave the Church of England completely. They founded Plymouth Colony in 1620.

When was Plymouth Colony founded and for what reason?

The colony founded by the Pilgrims in present-day Massachusetts in 1620. It was established primarily for religious reasons.

Who was William Bradford?

A leader and longtime governor of Plymouth Colony. He helped guide the colony through its early difficulties and wrote about its history.

What was the Mayflower Compact?

An agreement signed by the Pilgrims and other settlers in 1620. It established a basic form of self-government based on cooperation and consent.

Who was Squanto?

A Patuxet man who helped the Plymouth settlers by teaching them agricultural techniques and assisting communication with nearby Native communities.

Who were the Puritans?

English Protestants who wanted to reform or "purify" the Church of England. Many migrated to New England to create a godly society.

What was the Massachusetts Bay Colony?

A major Puritan colony founded in 1630. It developed around towns, churches, communal institutions, and a strong religious mission.

Who was John Winthrop?

A Puritan leader and governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony. He promoted the idea that Massachusetts should become a model Christian society.

What did John Winthrop mean by "City Upon a Hill"?

John Winthrop's description of Massachusetts Bay as a community whose religious success or failure would be observed by the world.

When was Harvard University founded, and what was its original purpose?

An institution founded in Massachusetts in 1636. Its original purpose was largely to train ministers and clergy for Puritan churches.

Who was Roger Williams?

A Puritan dissenter who argued for religious freedom, separation of church and state, and fair dealings with Native peoples. After being banished from Massachusetts, he founded Rhode Island.

Who was Anne Hutchinson?

A religious dissenter who challenged Massachusetts Puritan leaders by emphasizing an individual's direct relationship with God. She was banished from Massachusetts and later helped settle Rhode Island.

What was the Half-Way Covenant?

A 1662 agreement that allowed the children of baptized but unconverted Puritans to receive partial church membership. It was created in response to declining church participation.

What were the Salem Witch Trials?

A series of witchcraft accusations, trials, and executions in Massachusetts in 1692. The crisis reflected religious fears, social tensions, local rivalries, and political instability.

What was the Pequot War?

A 1637 conflict between English colonists and the Pequot people in New England. The war severely weakened the Pequot and helped expand English control in the region.

What was King Philip's War?

A war from 1675 to 1676 between New England colonists and a coalition of Native peoples led by Metacomet. It resulted in major Native losses and expanded English control over New England.

Who was Metacomet?

A Wampanoag leader also known as King Philip. He organized resistance against English settlement during King Philip's War.

What strategies did Native Resistance include against European colonial expansion?

Efforts by Native peoples to defend their land, political independence, cultures, and communities against European colonial expansion. Resistance included warfare, diplomacy, migration, trade, and alliances.

What interactions constituted Native-Colonial Relations?

The interactions between Native peoples and European colonists, including trade, diplomacy, cultural exchange, warfare, treaty-making, and land conflicts.

What were the 13 Colonies?

The 13 British colonies along the Atlantic coast of North America that later declared independence and became the United States.

What were Religious Motivations for Colonization?

Reasons for colonization connected to religious goals, such as seeking religious freedom, creating a godly community, converting Native peoples, or escaping persecution.

What were Economic Motivations for Colonization?

Reasons for colonization connected to profit, land ownership, trade, cash crops, natural resources, and mercantilist competition.

Which colonies were part of the New England Colonies, and what characterized them?

Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. These colonies were shaped by Puritan influence, town-based settlement, small farms, fishing, shipbuilding, and trade.

Which colonies were part of the Middle Colonies, and what characterized them?

New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware. They were known for fertile farmland, trade, commercial ports, ethnic diversity, and religious pluralism.

Which colonies were part of the Southern Colonies, and what characterized them?

Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. Their economies depended heavily on cash crops, plantations, land expansion, and enslaved labor.

What is meant by Regional Differences in the American colonies?

The distinct economic, political, social, religious, and geographic characteristics that developed among the New England, Middle, and Southern Colonies.

Where was Ethnic and Religious Diversity most characteristic in colonial America?

The presence of many cultural, ethnic, and religious groups within colonial society. This was especially characteristic of the Middle Colonies.

Who was Jacob Leisler?

A merchant and militia leader who led Leisler's Rebellion in New York from 1689 to 1691. His rebellion reflected class, ethnic, and political divisions within the colony.

What was Leisler's Rebellion?

A political uprising in New York following England's Glorious Revolution. Jacob Leisler and his supporters challenged the authority of colonial elites.

Who were the Quakers?

Members of the Society of Friends, a Christian group that emphasized the "Inner Light," equality, pacifism, simplicity, and religious toleration.

Who was William Penn?

A Quaker who founded Pennsylvania in 1681 as a colony based on religious toleration, representative government, and economic opportunity.

What was Pennsylvania known for in the Middle Colonies?

A Middle Colony founded by William Penn. It attracted diverse settlers because of its fertile land, religious toleration, and economic opportunities.

What is Religious Pluralism?

The coexistence of multiple religious groups within the same society. It was especially characteristic of the Middle Colonies.

What was the Great Awakening?

A Protestant religious revival that spread through the colonies during the 1730s and 1740s. It emphasized emotional religious experiences, personal conversion, and a direct relationship with God.

Who was George Whitefield?

An English evangelical preacher whose dramatic sermons attracted large crowds and helped spread the Great Awakening throughout the colonies.

Who was Jonathan Edwards?

A New England minister and theologian associated with the Great Awakening. He emphasized human sinfulness, divine judgment, and the need for personal conversion.

What was "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"?

A famous sermon delivered by Jonathan Edwards in 1741. It warned listeners about the consequences of sin and urged them to seek salvation.

Who were the New Lights?

Religious supporters of the Great Awakening who favored emotional preaching, revival meetings, and personal conversion experiences.

Who were the Old Lights?

Religious leaders and congregations who opposed or criticized the Great Awakening. They favored traditional churches, educated clergy, and more formal worship.

How is a Religious Revival defined?

A period of renewed religious enthusiasm and participation, often involving emotional preaching, mass conversions, and challenges to established religious authority.