Colombian exchange test

Questions 1–30

1. What was exchanged during the Columbian Exchange and Triangular Trade?
   The Columbian Exchange moved plants, animals, diseases, people, and technology between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres. Europe brought horses, cattle, wheat, and diseases to the Americas, while the Americas supplied crops such as corn, potatoes, tomatoes, and tobacco. Triangular Trade moved manufactured goods, enslaved Africans, and colonial products among Europe, Africa, and the Americas.

2. Why did Native American populations decline after European contact?
   Europeans introduced diseases such as smallpox, measles, and influenza. Native Americans had little immunity to them. Warfare, forced labor, displacement, and food shortages also caused population decline.

3. What did “God, Gold, and Glory” represent?
   These were major reasons for European exploration:

   • God: Spread Christianity.

   • Gold: Gain wealth and resources.

   • Glory: Increase national power and personal fame.

4. What was the encomienda system, and why did Las Casas criticize it?
   The Spanish government gave colonists control over Native American labor in exchange for supposedly protecting and converting them. Bartolomé de las Casas criticized it because Native people were being exploited, abused, and killed.

5. What was the Black Legend?
   The Black Legend was the belief that Spain was unusually cruel and intolerant toward Native Americans. Spain’s European rivals used accounts of Spanish mistreatment to criticize Spain and justify their own colonization.

6. How did Spanish and French colonization differ?
   Spain created large settlements, searched for gold, converted Native people, and used forced labor. France established fewer settlements and focused mainly on fishing and the fur trade, creating trading relationships and alliances with Native nations.

7. How did joint-stock companies finance English colonies?
   Investors combined their money to pay for colonial ventures. They shared both the risks and potential profits. The Virginia Company financed Jamestown using this method.

8. What did John Winthrop mean by a “City upon a Hill”?
   Winthrop believed Massachusetts Bay should become a model Christian community that the rest of the world would observe and imitate.

9. Why was Anne Hutchinson expelled from Massachusetts?
   She challenged Puritan leaders, held religious meetings in her home, and argued that people could communicate directly with God. Officials believed her ideas threatened religious and political authority.

10. What caused conflict between Native Americans and New England colonists?
    Colonial expansion onto Native land, competition for resources, unfair trade, cultural differences, and attempts to control or convert Native people caused conflict.

11. What was Metacom?
    Metacom, also called King Philip by the English, was a Wampanoag leader who organized Native resistance against New England expansion during King Philip’s War.

12. Why was 1619 important in Virginia?
    Two major events occurred:

    • The House of Burgesses, the first representative assembly in English America, met.

    • The first recorded Africans arrived in English Virginia, marking an important step toward the development of race-based slavery.

13. What was indentured servitude?
    Indentured servants agreed to work for a certain number of years in exchange for transportation to America, food, housing, and sometimes land or money after completing their contracts.

14. What caused Bacon’s Rebellion?
    Poor farmers and former indentured servants were angry about limited land, high taxes, lack of political power, and Governor William Berkeley’s refusal to support attacks against nearby Native communities.

15. How did Bacon’s Rebellion change Virginia’s labor system?
    Wealthy planters became concerned about relying on frustrated indentured servants. They increasingly used enslaved African labor, whose enslavement was permanent and inherited by their children.

16. What was the Middle Passage?
    The Middle Passage was the forced voyage that transported enslaved Africans across the Atlantic to the Americas under brutal and deadly conditions.

17. How did the colonial economies differ?

    • New England: Fishing, shipbuilding, trade, lumber, and small farms.

    • Middle Colonies: Grain farming, trade, and manufacturing.

    • Southern Colonies: Plantation agriculture and cash crops produced largely through bound and enslaved labor.

18. What were South Carolina’s major staple products?
    Rice and indigo were its major cash crops. Enslaved Africans contributed essential agricultural knowledge, especially to rice cultivation.

19. What beliefs were associated with these groups?

    • Quakers: Equality, religious toleration, pacifism, and the belief that everyone had an “Inner Light.”

    • Separatists: Wanted to leave the Church of England completely; they founded Plymouth.

    • Puritans: Wanted to reform or “purify” the Church of England; many established Massachusetts Bay.

20. What was mercantilism? ‘
    Mercantilism was the economic belief that colonies existed to benefit the mother country by supplying raw materials and purchasing its manufactured goods.

21. How did the Navigation Acts support mercantilism?
    They required many colonial products to be transported on English ships and traded through England. This allowed England to control colonial commerce and collect revenue.

22. What was salutary neglect, and why did smuggling become common?
    Salutary neglect was Britain’s loose enforcement of colonial trade laws. Because enforcement was weak and colonists wanted cheaper goods and greater profits, smuggling became common.

23. Why did James II create the Dominion of New England, and why did colonists oppose it?
    James II combined several colonies to strengthen royal control and enforce trade laws. Colonists opposed it because it restricted representative government, challenged land rights, and limited local authority.

24. Why was the Mayflower Compact important?
    The settlers agreed to create laws and follow decisions made for the common good. It established an early example of self-government and rule by consent.

25. What did a colonial governor’s council do?
    The council advised the governor and often served as the upper house of the colonial legislature and as a court. Governors or the Crown usually selected wealthy council members.

26. What was the First Great Awakening, and how did it challenge authority?
    It was a religious revival during the 1730s and 1740s that emphasized emotion, personal faith, and individual conversion. It encouraged ordinary people to question traditional ministers and established churches.

27. Who were Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield?

    • Jonathan Edwards: A Massachusetts preacher who emphasized personal conversion and w arned about the consequences ofsin.

    • George Whitefield: A traveling preacher whose emotional sermons attracted enormous crowds throughout the colonies.

28. What was the difference between New Lights and Old Lights?

    • New Lights: Supported the Great Awakening and emotional preaching.

    • Old Lights: Opposed revivalism and preferred traditional worship and educated ministers.

29. How were the Pequot War and King Philip’s War similar?
    Both resulted from colonial expansion, competition over land, and tension between Native people and New England settlers. Both ended with colonial victories, major Native losses, and expanded English control over Native lands.

30. What was the significance of Stono’s Rebellion?
    Stono’s Rebellion was a major uprising by enslaved people in South Carolina in 1739. Afterward, South Carolina passed the Negro Act of 1740, which imposed stricter controls on enslaved people.