“Pre-Columbian Native American culture and society”

Social, political, and economic characteristics of pre-Columbian Native American Indians: where they lived, how they supported themselves, population, and changes taking place among them in the century before the Europeans arrived

• Before Columbus arrived in the Americas, Native Americans lived and thrived throughout the lands. They lived in all parts of North America as well as South America.

  • The Clovis People: believed to be one of the earliest settlers in the Americas. They were relatively small at first and were the ones that began hunting, gathering, and farming in North America.

  • South and Central America: New civilizations - Incas in Western South America, Mayans in Mexico. These civilizations created a lot during this time and were very advanced. They were fairly large civilizations and continued to grow until the Columbian Exchange.

  • North America: Divided by region, each tribe was unique and different from the rest. They supported themselves through growth in agriculture and learned to settle. Most of the tribes were pretty small at the time.

“Spanish colonization of the Americas”

Reasons for European exploration and conquest (esp. the Spanish)

• In Europe at the time, people were dependent on the Church, but this was lost during the plague, and people began losing faith in the monarchy and the Church. To fix this, the monarchs needed money and began expanding resources and discoveries to grow commercial power. When Portugal began to explore the world, other countries and explorers wanted to join.

• When Columbus first came up with his idea to follow the line of latitude to get to Japan, King Ferdinand of Spain funded the project. Spain was ambitious during this time and wanted to grow.

• The Roman Catholic Church also had a part in the growth of exploration. After the plague, people began turning to scientific universities and studies, and more and more people were turning away from the Church. To help this, the Catholic Church wanted to explore new lands, find new people, and convert them to Catholicism.

Characteristics of early Spanish explorers, particularly the conquistadors (ex. key figures, goals, methods, and impact)

• Spanish exploration was split into 3 time periods

  1. Explorers - Explorers, such as Christopher Columbus, sailed to new lands to find new resources and lands to settle on. They went out to claim land and find new lands. Although they saw the natives as primitive and barbaric, there was not too much conflict during this time.

  2. Conquistadors - The Spanish military sent explorers called Conquistadors, who had the goal of establishing their dominion over the lands once ruled by natives. They were conquering lands. One important figure during this time was Hernan Cortes, who took over the Aztecs and was extremely harsh. But it wasn’t just the conquistadors that wiped out the civilization. The Europeans had brought over smallpox and other diseases, that spread so quickly and decimated the populations of the natives. The conquistadors had a very large impact on the natives and destroyed many advanced civilizations.

  3. Colonization - Now that the conquistadors had taken over so much new land, they began to colonize. People from Europe began to settle in the Americas. As a result, they brought many slaves from Africa, creating the African Slave Trade. New Spanish laws were created, which banned the most brutal military conquests.

The impact Spanish colonization had on native society and the relationship between the Spanish and the native peoples

• The Encomienda System - The Encomienda System was used in the Spanish colonial empire in the Americas during the sixteenth, seventeenth, and early eighteenth centuries. The system is based on the forced labor of the native population. In theory, the Spanish colonial rulers were meant to provide for the protection and conversion to Christianity of the native population in exchange for their labor, however, this caused the native population to suffer immensely at the hands of the Spanish rulers.

• Intermarriage - When the Spanish began colonizing the Americas, many did not have wives or left them in Europe. So, intermarriage became more frequent, with European men and Native women. People of mixed race, called Mestizos, soon dominated the colonies. A racial hierarchy began, with the Spanish on top, natives at the bottom, and mixed races in the middle.

• Catholic Missions - As the Reformation grew rapidly in Europe, many followers of the Catholic Church began to believe in other philosophies and joined a different branch of Christianity. The primary purpose of catholic missions was the convert natives to Catholicism. There were usually military groups that came with the missions, the “protect” Europeans from hostile natives.

• Abuse/Mistreatment - Although disease and sickness rampaged during this time, the conquistadors and colonizers had a policy for subjugation and extermination of the Natives. Their brutality was part of the reflection of their ruthlessness and sent a message around the world. Natives received horrible treatment when people began to colonize as they did not have many weapons to fight back and were treated as savages. For a while, Natives were also the main source of labor, and many became slaves. according to countless grievances, encomenderos would murder Native laborers by overwipping them or selling them to turn a profit. Indigenous communities regularly submitted official complaints about the maltreatment they were experiencing. Not much was done about this, even though it was illegal.

The causes and consequences of the Pueblo Revolt

• In the 1660s to 1670s, the Spanish priests and government launched efforts to suppress tribal rituals that Europeans considered to not align with Christianity. Furthermore, in 1680, there was a large drought and a series of raids in the neighboring tribes. The instability of these events produced an uprising. Thousands of Natives joined together, realizing that they could be powerful together. The Revolt was successful and stopped colonization in the Pueblo region for 12 years.

The biological and cultural exchanges that resulted from Spanish colonization (i.e., the Columbian Exchange): the impact of disease and also what the Europeans gained from the natives that was more important than their initial objective (which was gold)

• The Natives, in both North and South America, were affected by the Columbian Exchange, but not necessarily in a good way. When Columbus and other Europeans arrived in the Americas, diseases hit the Natives, and the result was catastrophic. The way that this worked was that the Natives were exposed to smallpox, which they had never seen before, and their bodies were not adapted to it, unlike the Europeans who had brought it over. The disease spread like wildfire, and millions died. Whole civilizations were almost completely wiped out, allowing the Europeans to quickly triumph.

• The Europeans benefited largely from the Columbian Exchange, especially with the amount of sickness that spread among the Natives. They believed that the disease spread was a divine message from God. Furthermore, the Europeans benefited from all of the land that they were able to gain during this time. From this land, the Europeans gained new resources and were able to have a large boost in the economy. Europeans also learned new agricultural techniques and discovered new crops, like maize (corn), which turned out to be more valuable than even gold.

“French, Dutch, and English efforts to colonize the Americas”

How the African slave trade originated and evolved

• When Europe realized that the native population could not meet all the labor needs of the colonists, they began importing slaves from Africa. The African slave trade began very early, in the eighth century CE, when West Africans began selling slaves to the Mediterranean. They also began trading to areas of Europe and North Africa.

• When Portuguese sailors began exploring Africa, they also got slaves and brought them back. In the sixteenth century, the market for slaves grew rapidly as a result of the rising European demand for sugar cane. At first, the slave traders were mostly Portuguese, but eventually became Spanish. In the seventeenth century, the Dutch had the most control over the slave market. In the eighteenth century, the English dominated it.

The commercial/economic and religious factors that motivated England’s colonization efforts

• Commercial Factors - In England, exploration was done by businesses called Charter Companies aka “Joint-Stock companies.” These charter companies needed permission first from the Queen or King before starting. The Virginia Company was one of the most famous of the charter companies and started the colony of Virginia (Jamestown)

• Economic Factors - Mercantilism also played a large role in the economic factors that motivated England’s colonization. Mercantilism is the theory that the more money that you have, the more power you can have. For this, countries strived to have more exports than imports, which was called a balance of trade. England wanted to grow economically, especially after having such instability in the country.

• Religious Factors - When John Calvin and Martin Luther began creating new branches of Christianity, many people followed and became what was known as Protestants. Although this caused many people to stray away from the Church, there was also another factor.

  • The English Reformation was more of a conflict between the King and the Pope. When King Henry VIII wanted to divorce his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, the Pope refused. He then broke England’s ties with the Church and established himself as the head of the Christian faith. This was called the Anglican Church, or the church of England.

  • When Henry died, his Catholic daughter, Mary, ascended the throne, and she persecuted and executed any protestants in England, receiving her nickname of Bloody Mary. Then Queen Elizabeth came to the throne and restored the Chruch of England.

The goals of the Puritans, why they clashed with James I, and why this was significant regarding England’s colonization efforts in North America

• This time was very confusing for the people of England and some believed that the system must change. Some wanted to purify the Church, who were protestant and became called the Puritans. Some Puritans became Separatists, who wanted to separate from the Church as a whole.

• James the I, a Scotsman and the first of the Stuarts, believed that kings ruled by divine right, and he felt no obligation to compromise with his opponents. He antagonized the Puritans greatly during this time.

• Due to this, many English, such as the Puritans, turned to new lands, and the Pilgrims were Puritans.

How the English colonization of Ireland influenced the way in which the English colonized America

• When England finally began colonizing, they began with Ireland (a prototype of colonization).

  • First, England begins calling the Irish barbaric, primitive, savages (Does this in North America)

  • England believed that the Irish should be “Anglicized” (convert culture/religion) (Does this in North America)

  • England sets up plantations in Ireland (real estate the English controls, the land must be anglicized, and anyone living there must be anglicized) (Does this in North America)

• All of the tactics used in Ireland by the English happened again when they colonized North America.

Where the French and Dutch established colonies in North America, and how their efforts differed from those of the Spanish and the English

• France: When Louis XIV began to spend the citizens’ money, he began to need cash. He sent people to North America, especially in Canada, where they established Canada. In Quebec, they got fur and new resources. (Coureurs de bois). What they did differently than the Natives was that they traded fur for guns. They had a mutually beneficial relationship with the Natives, which allowed them to greatly develop. This land became “New France”

• Dutch: At this time, the Dutch were living in their golden age. The Dutch West India Company had total economic control, they had the highest standard of living out of any European nation, and they had a good government with religious tolerance. Due to this, the Dutch had a good system of trade and had a small and successful colonization in the Americas. The Dutch also financed Henry Hudson, who created New Amsterdam, which is now known as New York.

England’s early colonization efforts: What inspired the English to get into the race for the colonies in earnest, the colonization efforts of Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter Raleigh, and how James I settled the rivalry between London and Plymouth merchants over the exploration of North America

• Sir Humphrey Gilbert: He was a governor of an Irish district and suppressed native rebellions with extreme viciousness. He believed that natives were less than human and were not entitled to whatever decency civilized people reserved for their treatment of one another. He managed to justify, such atrocities as beheading Irish soldiers that were killed in battle. He later tried to colonize Newfoundland, but eventually failed when a storm sank his ship and he was lost at sea.

• Sir Walter Raleigh: A friend of Gilbert, he gained a grant that sent a small group of men on an expedition to explore the North American Coast. They found the Roanoke colony, but all of his attempts to colonize the land failed, and all of the people that were there had either died or deserted, and it was known as the “Lost Colony.” Raleigh’s real journey ended there.

• In the first years of the 17th century, a group of London merchants decided to renew the attempt at colonization in Virginia. A rival group of merchants, from Plymouth and other west Country towns, were also interested in this. In 1606, James I issued a new charter, which divided America between the two groups. The Longdon group got the exclusive right to colonize in the south and the Plymouth merchants received the same right in the north. Through their efforts, the first enduring English colonies were planted in America.