AP US History - Unit 1 Review

Native American Societies Before European Contact

• The big picture is understanding the diverse societal makeup of the Americas before European arrival and the effects of European contact.
• Native societies were diverse and adapted to their environments.
• They were not a monolithic group; cultures varied widely.
  • Coastal regions: Fishing villages.
  • Hunter-gatherer nomadic lifestyles.
  • Magnificent cities and empires.

Pueblo People

• Located in present-day Utah and Colorado.
• Farmers with settled populations.
• Cultivated crops like beans, squash, and maize.
• Advanced irrigation systems diverted river water to crops.
• Built small urban centers out of hardened bricks.
• Famous for cliff dwellings.

Great Basin and Great Plains Region

• Present-day Colorado to Canada.
• Nomadic hunter-gatherers.
• Hunted buffalo and gathered food.
• Organized into small egalitarian kinship bands.
• Example: Ute people.

Northwest and Pacific Coast

• Permanent settlements due to abundant fish, small game, and plant life.
• Chumash people (present-day California):
  • Villages sustained nearly a thousand people.
  • Participated in regional trade networks.
• Chinook peoples (Pacific Northwest):
  • Similar lifestyles to the Chumash.
  • Built extensive plank houses for kinship groups.

Iroquois People

• Located in the Northeast.
• Farmers who planted crops.
• Lived communally in longhouses constructed from timber.

Mississippi River Valley

• Farmers due to the rich soil.
• Participated in trade along waterways.
• Cahokia civilization:
  • Population around 40,000.
  • Centralized government led by powerful chieftains.

Key Takeaway

• Natives developed distinct, complex societies shaped by their environment.
• Vast trading networks stretched from South to North America.

European Arrival

• European kingdoms underwent political unification from the 1300s to 1400s.
• Stronger centralized states governed by monarchs emerged.
• Wealthy upper class developed a taste for luxury goods from Asia.
• Muslims controlled land-based trade routes, hindering European trade.
• Europeans sought sea-based routes for trade.

Portuguese Exploration

• Portugal established a trading post empire around Africa.
• Gained a foothold in the Indian Ocean trade network.
• Used new maritime technology:
  • Updated astronomical charts.
  • Astrolabe.
  • Smaller, faster ships devoted to trade.
  • Borrowed technology like the Latine sail and stern-post rudder.
  • Maritime is defined as having to do with the sea.

Spanish Exploration

• Spain finished the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula from the Moors.
• Motivated to spread Catholic Christianity.
• Sought new economic opportunities.
• Christopher Columbus sought sponsorship to sail west to find wealth in Asian markets.
• Ferdinand and Isabella sponsored Columbus, leading to his voyage in 1492.
• Columbus landed in the Caribbean, discovering the New World.
• Tales of wealth led to competition among European nations.

The Columbian Exchange

• Columbus's landing marked a major turning point, causing massive ecological changes.
• The Columbian Exchange is defined as the transfer of people, animals, plants, and diseases between the East and West.

Specific Transfers

• From The Americas to Europe:
  • Food: Potatoes, tomatoes, maize.
• From Europe to The Americas:
  • Food: Wheat, rice, soybeans.
  • Animals: Cattle, pigs, horses.
• The Americas sent over turkeys.
• Gold and silver from The Americas to Europe.
• People: Europeans migrated to The Americas, and Africans were brought as enslaved laborers.
• Diseases: Smallpox from Europe decimated Native American populations.

Impact of Wealth on Europe

• Wealth from The Americas caused a societal and economic shift in Europe.
• Feudalism shifted to a more capitalistic system.
• Capitalism is defined as an economic system based on private ownership and free exchange.
• Rise of joint stock companies to fund exploration.
  • Joint stock company: Limited liability organization where investors pooled money.
  • Shared profits if successful, limited consequences if it failed.

Spanish Colonization

• Spain dominated Central and South America.
• Realized agricultural potential.

The Encomienda System

• Economic system forcing natives to work on plantations and extract gold/silver.
• Problems:
  • Difficulty keeping natives subservient (due to escapes).
  • Native deaths from smallpox.
• Solution: Importation of African enslaved laborers.
  • Africans were less likely to escape.
  • Greater immunity to European diseases.

Casta System

• A new system of social classes categorized people based on racial ancestry.
  • Peninsulares: Spaniards born in Spain (Iberian Peninsula).
  • Criollos (Creoles): Spaniards born in The Americas.
  • Castas:
    • Mestizos: Spanish and Native American blood.
    • Mulatos: Spanish and African blood.
  • Africans.
  • Native Americans.

European and Native American Relations

• Europeans largely looked down on natives, exploiting them for labor and conversion.
• Each group adopted useful customs from the other.
  • Natives taught the English how to hunt and cultivate maize.
  • Natives adopted iron tools and weapons.
• The relationship was largely difficult and brutal.
• Europeans developed belief systems to justify treatment of natives.
  • Some believed Native Americans were less than human.
  • Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda argued that harsh labor benefited natives.
  • Bartolomé de las Casas defended the humanity of natives and persuaded the king to pass laws ending slavery, but these were later repealed.
• Europeans justified the exploitation of African laborers from the Bible.
  • They misinterpreted Noah's curse on Ham's son Canaan to justify the enslavement of Africans due to skin color.