APUSH Period 2 - WIP

Virginia Company

A joint-stock enterprise that King James I chartered in 1606. The company was to spread Christianity in the New World as well as find ways to make a profit in it.

Anglican Church

The established state church of England, formed by Henry VIII after the pope refused to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon.

Roanoke colony

English expedition of 117 settlers, including Virginia Dare, the first English child born in the New World; the colony disappeared from Roanoke Island in the Outer Banks sometime between 1587 and 1590.

enclosure movement

A legal process that divided large farm fields in England that were previously collectively owned by groups of peasants into smaller, individually owned plots. The enclosure movement took place over several centuries, and resulted in eviction for many peasants.

John Smith

A swashbuckling soldier of fortune with rare powers of leadership and self-promotion who was appointed to the resident council to manage Jamestown.

headright system

A land-grant policy that promised fifty acres to any colonist who could afford passage to Virginia, as well as fifty more for any accompanying servants. The headright policy was eventually expanded to include any colonists-and was also adopted in other colonies.

House of Burgesses

The first elected assembly in colonial America, established in 1619 in Virginia. Only wealthy landowners could vote in its elections.

Uprising of 1622

Unsuccessful uprising of Virginia Native Americans that wiped out one-quarter of the settler population, but ultimately led to the settlers' gaining supremacy.

dower rights

In colonial America, the right of a widowed woman to inherit one-third of her deceased husband's property.

Puritans

English religious group that sought to purify the Church of England; founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony under John Winthrop in 1630.

John Winthrop

Puritan leader and governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony who resolved to use the colony as a refuge for persecuted Puritans and as an instrument of building a "wilderness Zion" in America.

Pilgrims

Puritan separatists who broke completely with the Church of England and sailed to the New World aboard the Mayflower, founding Plymouth Colony on Cape Cod in 1620.

Mayflower Compact

Document signed in 1620 aboard the Mayflower before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth; the document committed the group to majority-rule government.

Great Migration

Large-scale migration of southern blacks during and after World War I to the North, where jobs had become available during the labor shortage of the war years.

Dissenters

Protestants who belonged to denominations outside of the established Anglican Church.

captivity narratives

Accounts written by colonists after their time in Indian captivity, often stressing the captive's religious convictions.

Pequot War

An armed conflict in 1637 that led to the destruction of one of New England's most powerful Indian groups.

Half-way Covenant

A 1662 religious compromise that allowed baptism and partial church membership to colonial New Englanders whose parents were not among the Puritan elect.

English liberty

The idea that English people were entitled to certain liberties, including trial by jury, habeas corpus, and the right to face one's accuser in court. These rights meant that even the English king was subject to the rule of law.

Act Concerning Religion (or Maryland

Toleration Act)

1649 law that granted free exercise of religion to all Christian denominations in colonial Maryland.