APUSH Unit 1 Notes

Native Societies Before European Arrival

• Native American societies were diverse, with varying cultures based on their environments.
• Not a monolithic group; diversity existed in lifestyles and societal structures.
• Examples include:
  • Coastal regions: Fishing villages.
  • Hunter-gatherer nomadic groups.
  • Advanced cities and empires.

Pueblo People

• Located in present-day Utah and Colorado.
• Farmers with a settled population.
• Crops: beans, squash, and maize (corn).
• Advanced irrigation systems to divert river water to crops.
• Built urban centers made of hardened clay bricks.
• Famous for cliff dwellings.

Great Basin and Great Plains Region

• Nomadic hunter-gatherers in areas from present-day Colorado to Canada.
• 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.
• Example: Chumash people in California.
  • Villages capable of sustaining nearly 1,000 people.
  • Participated in regional trade networks.
• Chinook peoples in the Pacific Northwest.
  • Similar lifestyles to the Chumash.
  • Built plank houses housing whole families.

Northeast Region

• Iroquois people were farmers.
• 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 chieftains.

• Native societies developed distinct, complex systems shaped by their environment.

• Vast trading networks existed across North and South America.

European Arrival

• European kingdoms underwent political unification in the 1300s-1400s.
• Stronger, centralized states governed by monarchs emerged.
• Growing wealthy upper class desired luxury goods from Asia.
• Muslims controlled land-based trade routes, limiting European access.
• Europeans sought sea-based routes for trade.

Portuguese Exploration

• Portugal established a trading-post empire around Africa.
• Gained foothold in the Indian Ocean trade network.
• Utilized new maritime technology and adapted older technologies.

Maritime Technologies

• Updated astronomical charts for navigation.
• Astrolabe use.
• New ship designs: smaller, faster, and nimble for trade.
• Borrowed technology: Latine sail and stern-post rudder for accurate navigation.

Spanish Exploration

• Spain completed the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula.
  • Motivated to spread Catholic Christianity.
  • Sought new economic opportunities.
• Christopher Columbus sought sponsorship from Ferdinand and Isabella to sail west to find wealth in Asian markets.
• Columbus sailed west across the Atlantic Ocean in 1492.
• Landed in the Caribbean, discovering wealth.
• Tales of wealth in the New World led to competition among European nations.

Columbian Exchange

• Columbus' landing was a turning point in world history, causing massive ecological changes.
• Columbian Exchange: The transfer of people, animals, plants, and diseases from the East to the West and vice versa.

Specific Transfers

• From the Americas to Europe: potatoes, tomatoes, and maize.
• From Europe to the Americas: wheat, rice, and soybeans.
• From the Americas to Europe: turkeys.
• From Europe to the Americas: cattle, pigs, and horses.
• Gold and silver from the Americas to Europe.
• People: Europeans to the Americas, enslaved Africans to the Americas.
• Disease: Europeans brought smallpox to the Americas, decimating native populations. Europeans contracted syphilis, supposedly from the natives.

Economic Shifts in Europe

• Influx of wealth from the Americas caused a shift from feudalism to capitalism.
• Feudalism: Peasants worked on a noble's land in exchange for protection.
• Capitalism: An economic system based on private ownership and free exchange.
• Rise of joint-stock companies to fund exploration.
  • Limited liability organizations where investors pool money.
  • Shared profits and limited risk.
  • Different from state-sponsored exploration (e.g., Spain).

Spanish Colonization

• Spain realized agriculture was more profitable than extracting precious metals.
• Encomienda system: Spaniards forced natives to work on plantations and in mines.
• Problems with the Encomienda System:
  • Difficulty keeping natives enslaved due to escapes.
  • Native populations decimated by smallpox.
• Solution: Importation of African enslaved laborers.
  • Africans were less likely to escape due to unfamiliarity with the geography.
  • Africans had more immunity to European diseases.

Casta System

• Spain reorganized society based on racial ancestry.
• Peninsulares: Spaniards born in Spain.
• Criollos (Creoles): Spaniards born in the Americas.
• Castas:
  • Mestizos: Spanish and Native American descent.
  • Mulatos: Spanish and African descent.
  • Africans.
  • Native Americans.

European and Native American Relations

• Europeans largely viewed Native Americans as good for exploitation, military alliances, forced labor, and Christian conversion.
• Each group adopted practices and customs from the other.
  • Natives taught the English how to hunt and cultivate maize.
  • Natives adopted iron tools and weapons.
• Relationships were difficult and brutal.
• Europeans developed belief systems to justify their treatment of natives.
• Some Spaniards believed Native Americans were less than human.
• Priests like Juan Guines de Sepulveda argued Native Americans benefited from harsh labor conditions.
• Bartolome de las Casas defended Native Americans' humanity and persuaded the king to pass laws ending their slavery, but wealthy nobles got the laws repealed.

Justifications for Enslavement

• Europeans used the Bible to justify the exploitation of African laborers.
• They misinterpreted the curse of Ham in Genesis to mean black skin was a mark of destined slaves.
• Black skin was associated with the mark of Ham.