Period 1

Key Concept 1.1 — As native populations migrated and settled across the vast expanse of North America over time, they developed distinct and increasingly complex societies by adapting to and transforming their diverse environments.

I. Different native societies adapted to and transformed their environments through innovations in agriculture, resource use, and social structure.

1491 - 1607

Cultures of Central & South America 

• Mayan, Incan, Aztec empires had highly organized societies, carried on extensive trade, and created calendars that were based on scientific observations

• Stable food supply 

  • Mayans and Aztecs - corn

  • Incas - potatoes

Cultures of North America

• Native societies were smaller and less sophisticated than those in Mexico and South America

  • Slower spread of cultivation of corn northward from Mexico

• Complex and populous societies had disappeared by the 15th century

• Most people in North America lived in semi permanent settlements in small groups

  • Men made tools and hunted, women gathered plants and nuts or grew crops such as corn, beans, and tobacco

Language

• 20 language families, 400 distinct languages

Southwest Settlements

• Present day New Mexico and Arizona - Hokokam, Anasanzi, and Pueblos developed supported by farming using irrigation

• Lived in large numbers in caves, under cliffs, and in multistoried buildings

• Extreme drought and conflict with hostile natives weakened these groups by the time Europeans arrived

Northwest Settlements

• Pacific Coast - people lived in permanent longhouses or plank houses

• Rich diet based on hunting, fishing, and gathering nets, barries, and roots

• Saved stories using totem poles

• Mountain ranges created barriers to development and isolated tribes

Great Plains

• Nomadic hunters or sedentary people who farmed and traded lived in this region

• Survived on hunting the buffalo (used as food, decorations, crafting tools, knives, and clothing)

• Lived in tepees (easy to disassemble and transport)

• Farming tribes hunted buffalo, lived permanently in earthen lodges alongside rivers

• Raised corn, beans, squash - traded with other tribes

• After trading for horses in the 17th century, tribes such as the Lakota Sioux moved away from farming to hunting and could follow the buffalo easily

• The plains tribes would merge or split apart as conditions changed - Apaches gradually migrated southward from Canada to Texas

Midwest Settlements

• Woodland American Indians prospered with a rich food supply supported by hunting, fishing, and agriculture

• Permanent settlements developed in the Mississippi and Ohio River valleys

• Adena-Hopewell culture famously known for the large earthen mounds

• Cahokia (largest settlement in the Midwest) - near present-day St. Louis, Illinois

Northeast Settlements

• Hunting and farming techniques from Adena-Hopewell culture exhausted the soil - people had to move to fresh land

• Iroquois Confederation - political union of five independent tribes who lived in Mohawk Valley, New York

• 16th century through the American Revolution - the Iroquois were a powerful force

Atlantic Seaboard Settlements

• Southern New Jersey to Florida 

• Descendants of the Woodland mound builders - built timber and bark lodgings along rivers

• River and the Atlantic Ocean provided a rich source of food

Key Concept 1.2 — Contact among Europeans, Native Americans, and Africans resulted in the Columbian Exchange and significant social, cultural, and political changes on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

I. European expansion into the Western Hemisphere generated intense social, religious, political, and economic competition and changes within European societies.

1491 - 1607

European Exploration

Technology Improvements

• Artistic and scientific activity in the 15th and 16th centuries - rebirth of classical learning

• Use of gunpowder and the sailing compass

• Improvements to shipbuilding and mapmaking

• Printing press led to the spread of knowledge across Europe

Religious Conflict

• United of Isabella and Ferdinand and the voyage of Columbus signaled new leadership, hope, and power for Europeans who followed Roman Catholic faith

• In the early 1500s, certain Christians revolted against the authority of the Roman pope - Protestant Reformation

• Catholics of Spain and Portugal and the Protestants of England and Holland wanted to spread their own versions of Christianity to people in Africa, Asia, and the Americas

Expanding Trade

Slave Trading

• In the 15th century, Portugal began trading for slaves from West Africa - used for sugar plantations

Developing Nation-States

• Multiethnic empires in Europe were broken up into nation-states where the majority of the people shared a common culture

• Monarchs depended on trade to bring in revenues and the church to justify their rule

II. The Columbian Exchange and development of the Spanish Empire in the Western Hemisphere resulted in extensive demographic, economic, and social changes.

1491 - 1607

Exchanges

• Europeans learned about beans, corn, sweet and white potatoes, tomatoes, and tobacco

• Contracted syphilis disease

• Americas were introduced to sugarcane, bluegrass, pigs, and horses / wheel, iron implements, and guns / smallpox and measles - 90 percent of the native population died

Dividing the Americas

• Catholic monarchs of Spain and Portugal turned to the pope to solve their disputes

• In 1493, the pope created the line of demarcation - Treaty of Tordesillas - established Portugal’s claim to Brazil - Spain claimed the rest of the Americas

Spanish Exploration and Conquest

• Conquest of the Aztecs and Incas by Hernan Cortes and Francisco Pizzaro secured Spain's initial supremacy in the Americas

• Export of gold and silver back to Spain increased the gold supply by 500 percent - made Spain the most rich and powerful European nation

• Implemented the encomienda system - the king of Spain grants land and natives to individual Spaniards

• Brought enslaved people from West Africa under the asiento system - required Spanish to pay a tax to their king on each slave they imported to the Americas

French Claims

• Slow to develop in the Americas - internal conflicts between Roman Catholics and Protestants

• First permanent French settlement in America was established by Samuel de Champlain - led to exploration of the Mississippi River Valley

Dutch Claims

• Claimed surrounding areas of the Hudson River

• Dutch government granted Dutch West India Company the right to control this area for economic gain

Spanish settlements

• St. Augustine - Florida - 1565

• Santa Fe - New Mexico - harsh effort to Christianize led to the Pueblo Revolt in 1680

• Settlements in Texas grew in the 1700s

• San Diego - California - permanent settlements in 1784

III. In their interactions, Europeans and Native Americans asserted divergent worldviews regarding issues such as religion, gender roles, family, land use, and power.

1491 - 1607

European Treatment of Native Americans

Spanish Policy

• Many natives died from forced Spanish labor

• Rigid class system developed dominated by pure-blooded Spaniards

• Bartolomé de Las Casas became an advocate for better treatment of Native Americans

  • Persuaded the king to institute the New Laws of 1542 which ended Indian slavery, halted forced labor, and began the encomienda system

• Valladolid Debate - debate over the role for Indians in the Spanish colonies 1550-1551

  • Juan Gines de Sepulveda argued against Las Casas that Native Americans were less than human

• Las Casas established basic arguments on behalf of justice for Native Americans

English Policy

• Initially - Massachusetts - English and Native Americans coexisted, traded, and shared ideas (how to grow corn, hunt in the forests, traded furs, iron tools, and weapons)

• Native Americans saw their way of life threatened as the English began to take more land and forced tribes to move away from the coast

French Policy

• Viewed Native Americans as potential economic and military allies - looking for furs and converts to Catholicism

• Maintained good relations

• Built trading posts throughout the St. Lawrence Valley, the Great Lakes region, and along the Mississippi River

  • Exchanged french goods for furs to control the fur trade

• Posed as less of a threat to the native population than other Europeans

Native American Reaction

• Tribes saw themselves as groups distinct from each other - Europeans did not have to be worried about a unified response

• Initial interactions and trades motivated the natives to interact with Europeans - after decimation, violence, and disease, Native Americans adopted new ways to survive

• Some tribes allied with one Europeans power or migrated to get away from settlers

CAUSE

EFFECT

SOCIAL

• Spreading Christianity and Catholicism

• Discrimination of Native Americans

• Atlantic slave trade

• Converting Native Americans to European religions

• Conquering or discriminating against Native Americans because of cultural differences and their disparities in language, writing, etc.

• Use of Native Americans as indentured servants, slaves, or serfs on sugar plantations (hacienda and encomienda systems)

• New Laws of 1542 - ends Native American slavery

• Social hierarchies related to race

• Slaves on sugar plantations

POLITICAL

• English expansion

• Spanish expansion

• Native Americans were pushed to interior regions

• Gained knowledge and traded with Native Americans

• Smallpox and measles spread and wiped out 90% of the Native American population

• Incas and Aztecs were wiped out - remaining were used as indentured servants

• English excused their expansion as - helping prevent brutality of the Spanish rule

• Establishment of social hierarchies - pure-blooded Spaniards at the top

• Treaty of Tordesillas split Spanish and Portugal’s land

• Smallpox and measles spread and wiped out 90% of the Native American population

ECONOMIC

• French expansion

• Spanish colonies and mining

• Dutch colonies

• Controlled fur trade by developing civil relationships with Native Americans

• Owned trading ports along the Mississippi

• Need for more indentured servants and slaves after Native populations died

• Silver and gold sent back to Spain led to a 500% increased of gold and made Spain the most rich and powerful European country

  • Motivation for more European countries to explore the Americas

• Dutch West India Trading Company controlled colonies for economic gains