Fall 2026 Colonial History Vocabulary

This set of vocabulary flashcards covers key historical terms, figures, and events from the colonial period of American history as listed in the Fall 2026 lecture transcript.

Indentured Servants

Individuals who bound themselves to a colonial employer for a fixed term of service, typically four to seven years, in exchange for passage across the Atlantic.

Headright System

A system used to encourage the importation of servant workers by granting fifty acres of land to whoever paid the passage of a laborer.

Bacon's Rebelion

A 1676 uprising of Virginia frontiersmen and indentured servants led by Nathaniel Bacon against Governor William Berkeley's policies.

Royal African Company

An English joint-stock company that maintained a monopoly on the colonial slave trade from 1672 until 1698.

Middle Passage

The grueling transatlantic sea voyage that enslaved Africans endured between Africa and the colonies, known for high mortality rates.

Slave Codes

A set of laws, beginning in the late 17th century, that defined the status of slaves and the rights of their masters, making bondage a hereditary condition.

Congregational Church

Self-governing Puritan churches in New England that lacked the hierarchical structure of the Anglican Church.

Jeremiad

Fiery sermons delivered by Puritan preachers lamenting the waning religious zeal of their parishioners in the mid-seventeenth century.

Half-Way Covenant

A 1662 agreement that allowed unconverted offspring of church members to baptize their own children, bridging the gap between the elect and the general population.

Salem Witch Trials

A series of witchcraft prosecutions in 1692 Massachusetts triggered by adolescent girls' accusations, leading to the execution of twenty individuals.

Leisler's Rebellion

An armed conflict between elite landholders and aspiring merchants in New York that took place from 1689 to 1691.

William Berkeley

The royal governor of Virginia who crushed Bacon's Rebelion after his frontier policies sparked an uprising among displaced settlers.

Nathaniel Bacon

A twenty-nine-year-old planter who led a 1676 rebellion of frontiersmen against the government of William Berkeley in Virginia.