HIST 207A - Midterm 1
Collision of the Mexica and Spanish Worlds What is significant about the following names and terms? •Aztlán •Tenochtitlán •Quetzalcóatl •Tezcatlipoca •Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin
-Approximately 400 years before the arrival of the Europeans in the Western hemisphere, the Mexica migrated to a great valley in central Mexico. The Mexica migrated from the north, from their ancestral homeland called Aztlán—which means "Place of the White Herons," or "Place of Whiteness." -By the time the Spaniards arrived in 1519, the island capital of Tenochtitlán had become an impressive city. Some historians, anthropologists, and archaeologists claim that there were about 80,000 souls living in the city in 1519. But,other scholars argue that the Mexica capital and its environs were home to over 100,000 residents in the early sixteenth century. Even with the conservative estimate of 80,000, Tenochtitlán was one of the most populous cities in the world in the early sixteenth century. Tenochtitlán was a city built on an island in the middle of a lake---with three flat, stone causeways leading to the city on the island.There were artificial islands in the lake. (The Mexica placed mud on rafts, and stabilized them with stakes until the roots took hold on the lake bottom.) - One of the most important Mexica gods was Quetzalcóatl(Ket-sal-qwat-al), whose name means the Feathered Snake, or the Plumed Serpent. He was depicted as light-skinned and bearded. He was the giver of life, as in some of the sacred books, Quetzalcóatl is represented as the creator of the first man, since, it was believed, he had shed his blood on bones to create humans. Quetzalcóatl was also the god of light and spirituality; he was the inventor of time and writing (in picture glyphs.) He created arts, crafts, and music. As the revealer of all learning, Quetzalcóatl was a most esteemed and adored god.-Quetzalcóatl's bitter arch-enemy was Tezcatlipoca [Tehs-cah-tlee-poh' cah], the god of night and material things. Tezcatlipoca's name means "Smoking Mirror." Tezcatlipoca carried a mirror which emitted dense, suffocating smoke that vanquished his enemies. His smoking mirror also gave him a window on the entire world. As a result, the god was all-knowing and all-seeing. The deity was always present in the lives of the people. The dark-skinned Tezcatlipoca was well-versed in sorcery and impish; he was more than willing to use his skills as a sorcerer to mischievous ends. He was a tempter, urging people to to commit sins. -In 1502, Moctecuhzoma Xocoyotzin was enthroned as the ninth Mexica king. The name Moctecuhzoma means "A Ruthless Prince,"or, literally, "Angry Like a Lord."Xocoyotzin means "The Younger."He was designated the Younger because he was the great-grandson of Moctecuhzoma I (Moctecuhzoma Ilhuicamina), who had reigned from 1440 to 1469...One of the most fateful decisions Moctecuhzoma made as king of the Mexica was to declare war against a powerful,independent city-state called Tlaxcala (CLASH -KALA). The Mexica warred against the people of Tlaxcala(called the Tlaxcalteca) from 1504 to 1519—but could never conquer them, even though the Mexica were the most powerful people in Mexico. In the summer of 1519, the Tlaxacalteca allied themselves with the Spaniards and they played a substantial role in the destruction of the formidable Mexica empire.
Anglo-Powhatan Relations in Virginia What did King James I write about tobacco in his pamphlet A Counterblast to Tobacco?
A Counterblast to Tobacco.("Counterblast" means "strong rebuttal.") The king wrote incisive rebuttals to tobacco consumption in his leaflet, insisting that "tobacco is loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, and dangerous to the lungs." He analogized tobacco fumes to the smoke of Hell. Using ethnocentric language, the king urged his subjects not to imitate "the barbarous and beastly manners of the wild, godless, and slavish Indians, especially in so vile and stinking a custom."
Semester Introduction How did Washington Irving contribute to the myth of the flat earth in relation to Columbus's legacy?
According to Irving, the Spanish sages cited ancient authorities in support of their contention that the earth was flat.Irving then portrayed Columbus as a bold visionary who risked condemnation as a heretic by the Catholic Church to defend his position on the earth's roundness. This scene was repeated in various forms by historians and teachers for generations to come.
Enlightenment
Also known as the Age of Reason, was an intellectual and cultural movement in the eighteenth century that emphasized reason over superstition and science over blind faith. Using the power of the press, Enlightenment thinkers like John Locke, Isaac Newton, and Voltaire questioned accepted knowledge and spread new ideas about openness, investigation, and religious tolerance throughout Europe and the Americas. Many consider the Enlightenment a major turning point in Western civilization, an age of light replacing an age of darkness. Several ideas dominated Enlightenment thought, including rationalism, empiricism, progressivism, and cosmopolitanism. Rationalism is the idea that humans are capable of using their faculty of reason to gain knowledge. This was a sharp turn away from the prevailing idea that people needed to rely on scripture or church authorities for knowledge. Empiricism promotes the idea that knowledge comes from experience and observation of the world. Progressivism is the belief that through their powers of reason and observation, humans could make unlimited, linear progress over time; this belief was especially important as a response to the carnage and upheaval of the English Civil Wars in the seventeenth century. Finally, cosmopolitanism reflected Enlightenment thinkers' view of themselves as citizens of the world and actively engaged in it, as opposed to being provincial and close-minded. In all, Enlightenment thinkers endeavored to be ruled by reason, not prejudice. The Freemasons were a fraternal society that advocated Enlightenment principles of inquiry and tolerance. Freemasonry originated in London coffeehouses in the early eighteenth century, and Masonic lodges (local units) soon spread throughout Europe and the British colonies. One prominent Freemason, Benjamin Franklin, stands as the embodiment of the Enlightenment in British America (Figure 4.15). Born in Boston in 1706 to a large Puritan family, Franklin loved to read, although he found little beyond religious publications in his father's house. In 1718 he was apprenticed to his brother to work in a print shop, where he learned how to be a good writer by copying the style he found in the Spectator, which his brother printed. At the age of seventeen, the independent-minded Franklin ran away, eventually ending up in Quaker Philadelphia. There he began publishing the Pennsylvania Gazette in the late 1720s, and in 1732 he started his annual publication Poor Richard: An Almanack, in which he gave readers much practical advice, such as "Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise." Franklin subscribed to deism, an Enlightenment-era belief in a God who created, but has no continuing involvement in, the world and the events within it. Deists also advanced the belief that personal morality—an individual's moral compass, leading to good works and actions—is more important than strict church doctrines. Franklin's deism guided his many philanthropic projects. In 1731, he established a reading library that became the Library Company of Philadelphia. In 1743, he founded the American Philosophical Society to encourage the spirit of inquiry. In 1749, he provided the foundation for the University of Pennsylvania, and in 1751, he helped found Pennsylvania Hospital.
Semester Introduction What is significant about Ramón del Valle Inclán's statement, "Nothing is as it was, merely as it is remembered"?
Because people remember history differently, can be tricky to examine.
Pontiac's War Why is Pontiac's War significant in American history?
The war united natives from many tribes and nations from Canada to the Carolinas.
Chapter 2: Early Globalization: The Atlantic World, 1492-1650 What types of labor systems were used in the Americas? Did systems of unfree labor serve more than an economic function?
* indentured servants, african slaves, chattel slavery, encomienda*allowed control + free work ; physical power was necessary for maintaining society*justified action by viewing them as non-christian
Chapter 2: Early Globalization: The Atlantic World, 1492-1650 What were the various goals of the colonial European powers in the expansion of their empires? To what extent were they able to achieve these goals? Where did they fail?
*Britian: wanted to be better than rival countries*Spain: wanted money status and advantages over Portugal*France: wanted to expand their religion (catholic)*Dutch: interested in commerce
Semester Introduction What is significant about the following terms? •"Old" and "New" Worlds •Columbian exchange •Columbus's skills as navigator, ship handler, and marine cartographer •Columbus's darker legacy •El Requerimiento (1513)
-Old World refers to Africa, Asia, and Europe while New World refers to the Americas, including North America, Central America, and South America. -The Columbian exchange, also known as the Columbian interchange, named for Christopher Columbus , was the widespread transfer of plants, animals, culture, human populations, technology, diseases, and ideas between the Americas, West Africa, and the Old World in the 15th and 16th centuries. - ???? -in1495, Columbus forced the Arawak natives on the island of La Española (also known as Hispaniola, which lies southeast of Cuba and west of Puerto Rico) to excavate gold and harvest crops. When the Arawaks soon resisted, Columbus ordered his Spanish soldiers—heavily armed with cannons, crossbows, guns, pikes, swords, horses, and attack dogs—to pacify the island. According to Spanish accounts, hundreds—perhaps thousands—of natives were killed in the pacification. That same year, Columbus ordered his men to send 1,500 Arawaks as slaves to Spain. In doing so, Columbus inaugurated the slave trade across the Atlantic. -In 1513, the Spanish government issued a document called El Requerimiento(The Requirement). The royal decree explicitly stated that God had given the New World to the pope [Julius II], and that, in turn, the pontiff had given "these islands and mainland" of the New World to the rulers of Spain.Further, if the natives did not accept obedience to the Spanish government and the Christian religion, they would be treated as rebels, and would be dispossessed of their property and enslaved.
Anglo-Powhatan Relations in Virginia What is significant about the following names and terms? John Rolfe Great Charter of 1618 Opechancanough Tsenacommocah Anglo-Powhatan "Treaty" of 1646
-john Rolfe managed to cross the harsh-tasting variety of tobacco grown by the Powhatan Confederacy with a milder strain from the Caribbean. The new hybrid flourished in Chesapeake soil. Within five years,Virginia tobacco became an addictive luxury that almost any English citizen could afford. Suddenly, the settlers had hit upon a sure way of making their colony profitable. Virginia tobacco spawned a bumper crop of rival brands, packaged with exotically eye-catching labels. One package, for example, depicted Indians in feathered headdresses, holding tobacco leafs and smoking long pipes. -In 1618, reformer Sir Edwyn Sandys was named head of the Virginia Company of London. Sandys set straightaway to make life in Virginia more attractive, hospitable, and humane. He introduced a series of reforms known as the Great Charter of 1618. Three reforms were implemented:1. Martial law was ended.2. The House of Burgesses was established. The House was a local representative assembly which had authority to frame laws for the colony. The first legislative assembly in English North America met in the Jamestown church in July 1619. The assembly was not democratic, or even representative in the modern sense, but it marked the beginnings of political community in Virginia.3. The headright systemal located land to individuals. Those already in Virginia received one hundred acres apiece (once their indentured terms had expired). New settlers received fifty acres. Anyone who paid the passage of other immigrants to Virginia received fifty acres "per head." The headright system was an economic incentive to attract more desperately-needed laborers to British America. -Opechancanough took power in 1618. Over the next four years, the English expanded rapidly in Virginia. Chief Opechancanough contemptuously watched year after year as the English tobacco mania grew. Even before succeeding his brother Wahunsonacock, Opechancanough harbored a visceral contempt for the English intruders.Now that he wielded power, Opechancanough decided that slaughtering the white aliens was the only means left to save his people—and their ancestral ways of life. Nevertheless, he did not immediately unleash his warriors in 1618. For four years, he propped up the façade of peacemaker—he repeatedly proclaimed that he respected the armistice of 1614, and that he wanted to peacefully coexist with the English.On Good Friday,March 22, 1622—as the English settlers were solemnly observing Jesus Christ's crucifixion—Opechancanough and his followers launched a surprise raid on English plantations and tobacco ships anchored in the rivers. In the previous four years, the English had expanded 100 miles up the James River; thus, many homes and plantations were isolated from the Jamestown garrison. -The natives called Virginia, Tsenacommocah [ZEN-AH-CO-MO-CAH] which translates from the Algonquian language: "The densely inhabited land" or, "Land filled with people." The name is edifying—that Virginia was not an empty land there for the taking and filling by white English settlers. -here were three important provisions in the Anglo-Powhatan Treaty. (1) The Powhatans and their native allies were immediately forced to abandon coastal Virginia. (2) They were relocated to lands in the interior of Virginia that were "reserved" for them by the English government. (3) The treaty also stipulated that any native found in the coastal area,without wearing a coat and badge supplied by English guards at various frontier checkpoints, could be shot on sight.As a result of this "treaty," the Powhatan natives were regarded as strangers and aliens in the land of their ancestors.The Powhatans,in effect, became subjects of the English Crown. The shaman's prophecy of a nation rising from the East had been fulfilled.
Chapter 3: Creating New Social Orders: Colonial Societies, 1500-1700 What impact did Europeans have on their New World environments—native peoples and their communities as well as land, plants, and animals? Conversely, what impact did the New World's native inhabitants, land, plants, and animals have on Europeans? How did the interaction of European and indigenous American societies, together, shape a world that was truly "new"?
1. The Europeans had very big impact on the New World, unfortunately, it was mostly negative impact on the environment, native people, flora and fauna. The environment was gradually destroyed in order to create more space for farmlands and building settlements. The majority of the native population was treated very badly, and also the diseases brought by the Europeans annihilated their populations. Lot of animals and plants got endangered, some lost most of their ranges, and some even went extinct. 2. The New World's native inhabitants had both positive and negative effect on the Europeans. The positive was that they thought them how to survive in the new environment, as well as introducing them to numerous crops. The negative are the several diseases transferred tot he Europeans, like syphilis, which turned out to be fatal for lot of Europeans. The plants from the New World had huge positive effect, as the Europeans managed to sort out the malnutrition problem with some of them, like the potato, and use others for getting making lot of profit, like the tobacco. The animals of the New World though didn't really had any significant impact on the Europeans, as the Europeans valued the animals they brought much more. 3. The interaction between the Indians and the Europeans managed to create a unique new world in its own way. Despite the relations not being very good, especially at the start, gradually they started to communicate more, share ideas and technologies, teach other different things. Also, the culture that was taking shape had elements from both sides, and in numerous areas the population even became mixed, giving rise to a mixed race, mestizo, which quickly became dominant in what is now Latin America. The adoption of both sides of things that can be useful for further development created a unique way of life, politics, economy.
French Jesuits
A handful of French Jesuit priests also made their way to Canada, intent on converting the native inhabitants to Catholicism. The Jesuits were members of the Society of Jesus, an elite religious order founded in the 1540s to spread Catholicism and combat the spread of Protestantism. The first Jesuits arrived in Quebec in the 1620s, and for the next century, their numbers did not exceed forty priests. Like the Spanish Franciscan missionaries, the Jesuits in the colony called New France labored to convert the native peoples to Catholicism. They wrote detailed annual reports about their progress in bringing the faith to the Algonquian and, beginning in the 1660s, to the Iroquois. These documents are known as the Jesuit Relations (Figure 3.7), and they provide a rich source for understanding both the Jesuit view of the Indians and the Indian response to the colonizers. The Jesuit Relations (Figure 3.7) provide incredible detail about Indian life. For example, the 1636 edition, written by the Catholic priest Jean de Brébeuf, addresses the devastating effects of disease on native peoples and the efforts made to combat it. French Jesuit missionaries to New France kept detailed records of their interactions with—and observations of—the Algonquian and Iroquois that they converted to Catholicism. (credit: Project Gutenberg). Let us return to the feasts. The Aoutaerohi is a remedy which is only for one particular kind of disease, which they call also Aoutaerohi, from the name of a little Demon as large as the fist, which they say is in the body of the sick man, especially in the part which pains him. They find out that they are sick of this disease, by means of a dream, or by the intervention of some Sorcerer. . . . Of three kinds of games especially in use among these Peoples,—namely, the games of crosse [lacrosse], dish, and straw,—the first two are, they say, most healing. Is not this worthy of compassion? There is a poor sick man, fevered of body and almost dying, and a miserable Sorcerer will order for him, as a cooling remedy, a game of crosse. Or the sick man himself, sometimes, will have dreamed that he must die unless the whole country shall play crosse for his health; and, no matter how little may be his credit, you will see then in a beautiful field, Village contending against Village, as to who will play crosse the better, and betting against one another Beaver robes and Porcelain collars, so as to excite greater interest.
African forms of slavery
Bacon's Rebellion, an uprising of both whites and blacks who believed that the Virginia government was impeding their access to land and wealth and seemed to do little to clear the land of Indians, hastened the transition to African slavery in the Chesapeake colonies. The rebellion takes its name from Nathaniel Bacon, a wealthy young Englishman who arrived in Virginia in 1674. Despite an early friendship with Virginia's royal governor, William Berkeley, Bacon found himself excluded from the governor's circle of influential friends and councilors. He wanted land on the Virginia frontier, but the governor, fearing war with neighboring Indian tribes, forbade further expansion. Bacon marshaled others, especially former indentured servants who believed the governor was limiting their economic opportunities and denying them the right to own tobacco farms. Bacon's followers believed Berkeley's frontier policy didn't protect English settlers enough. Worse still in their eyes, Governor Berkeley tried to keep peace in Virginia by signing treaties with various local native peoples. Bacon and his followers, who saw all Indians as an obstacle to their access to land, pursued a policy of extermination. This new system of African slavery came slowly to the English colonists, who did not have slavery at home and preferred to use servant labor. Nevertheless, by the end of the seventeenth century, the English everywhere in America—and particularly in the Chesapeake Bay colonies—had come to rely on African slaves. While Africans had long practiced slavery among their own people, it had not been based on race. Africans enslaved other Africans as war captives, for crimes, and to settle debts; they generally used their slaves for domestic and small-scale agricultural work, not for growing cash crops on large plantations. Additionally, African slavery was often a temporary condition rather than a lifelong sentence, and, unlike New World slavery, it was typically not heritable (passed from a slave mother to her children). Slavery formed a cornerstone of the British Empire in the eighteenth century. Every colony had slaves, from the southern rice plantations in Charles Town, South Carolina, to the northern wharves of Boston. Slavery was more than a labor system; it also influenced every aspect of colonial thought and culture. The uneven relationship it engendered gave white colonists an exaggerated sense of their own status. English liberty gained greater meaning and coherence for whites when they contrasted their status to that of the unfree class of black slaves in British America. African slavery provided whites in the colonies with a shared racial bond and identity.
Semester Introduction Why is Columbus's first expedition across the Atlantic in 1492 viewed as a triumph of discovery and a tragic descent into destruction?
But,Native Americans—and others—will ask: "How could Columbus have discovered a land that had been discovered thousands of years earlier and inhabited by millions of indigenous peoples by 1492?" More troubling, to indigenous Americans, and to othes, Columbus has come to symbolize devastation—not salutary discovery.
Development of American Slavery Why was the availability of white indentured servants evaporating during the late 1660s?
By the 1660s, the availability of white indentured servants began to evaporate in Virginia and Maryland because economic conditions had improved in England. With more opportunity for work at home in England, poorer citizens were less willing to risk life and limb for an opportunity at economic prosperity in America. Thus, white indentured servants became harder to recruitin the 1660s. But the work on tobacco plantations in Virginia and Maryland during that time was increasing, intensifying the demand for African slaves in the American colonies.
Semester Introduction What did Christopher Columbus hope to discover in 1492?
Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer and navigator. In 1492, he sailed across the Atlantic Ocean from Spain in the Santa Maria, with the Pinta and the Niña ships alongside, hoping to find a new route to India.
Probanza de mérito
Columbus's 1493 letter—or probanza de mérito (proof of merit)—describing his "discovery" of a New World did much to inspire excitement in Europe. Probanzas de méritos were reports and letters written by Spaniards in the New World to the Spanish crown, designed to win royal patronage. Today they highlight the difficult task of historical work; while the letters are primary sources, historians need to understand the context and the culture in which the conquistadors, as the Spanish adventurers came to be called, wrote them and distinguish their bias and subjective nature. While they are filled with distortions and fabrications, probanzas de méritos are still useful in illustrating the expectation of wealth among the explorers as well as their view that native peoples would not pose a serious obstacle to colonization. In 1493, Columbus sent two copies of a probanza de mérito to the Spanish king and queen and their minister of finance, Luis de Santángel. Santángel had supported Columbus's voyage, helping him to obtain funding from Ferdinand and Isabella. Copies of the letter were soon circulating all over Europe, spreading news of the wondrous new land that Columbus had "discovered." Columbus would make three more voyages over the next decade, establishing Spain's first settlement in the New World on the island of Hispaniola. Many other Europeans followed in Columbus's footsteps, drawn by dreams of winning wealth by sailing west. Another Italian, Amerigo Vespucci, sailing for the Portuguese crown, explored the South American coastline between 1499 and 1502. Unlike Columbus, he realized that the Americas were not part of Asia but lands unknown to Europeans. Vespucci's widely published accounts of his voyages fueled speculation and intense interest in the New World among Europeans. Among those who read Vespucci's reports was the German mapmaker Martin Waldseemuller. Using the explorer's first name as a label for the new landmass, Waldseemuller attached "America" to his map of the New World in 1507, and the name stuck. The exploits of the most famous Spanish explorers have provided Western civilization with a narrative of European supremacy and Indian savagery. However, these stories are based on the self-aggrandizing efforts of conquistadors to secure royal favor through the writing of probanzas de méritos (proofs of merit). Below are excerpts from Columbus's 1493 letter to Luis de Santángel, which illustrates how fantastic reports from European explorers gave rise to many myths surrounding the Spanish conquest and the New World. This island, like all the others, is most extensive. It has many ports along the sea-coast excelling any in Christendom—and many fine, large, flowing rivers. The land there is elevated, with many mountains and peaks incomparably higher than in the centre isle. They are most beautiful, of a thousand varied forms, accessible, and full of trees of endless varieties, so high that they seem to touch the sky, and I have been told that they never lose their foliage. . . . There is honey, and there are many kinds of birds, and a great variety of fruits. Inland there are numerous mines of metals and innumerable people. Hispaniola is a marvel. Its hills and mountains, fine plains and open country, are rich and fertile for planting and for pasturage, and for building towns and villages. The seaports there are incredibly fine, as also the magnificent rivers, most of which bear gold. The trees, fruits and grasses differ widely from those in Juana. There are many spices and vast mines of gold and other metals in this island. They have no iron, nor steel, nor weapons, nor are they fit for them, because although they are well-made men of commanding stature, they appear extraordinarily timid. The only arms they have are sticks of cane, cut when in seed, with a sharpened stick at the end, and they are afraid to use these. Often I have sent two or three men ashore to some town to converse with them, and the natives came out in great numbers, and as soon as they saw our men arrive, fled without a moment's delay although I protected them from all injury.
First Great Awakening
During the eighteenth century, the British Atlantic experienced an outburst of Protestant revivalism known as the First Great Awakening. (A Second Great Awakening would take place in the 1800s.) During the First Great Awakening, evangelists came from the ranks of several Protestant denominations: Congregationalists, Anglicans (members of the Church of England), and Presbyterians. They rejected what appeared to be sterile, formal modes of worship in favor of a vigorous emotional religiosity. Whereas Martin Luther and John Calvin had preached a doctrine of predestination and close reading of scripture, new evangelical ministers spread a message of personal and experiential faith that rose above mere book learning. Individuals could bring about their own salvation by accepting Christ, an especially welcome message for those who had felt excluded by traditional Protestantism: women, the young, and people at the lower end of the social spectrum. The Great Awakening caused a split between those who followed the evangelical message (the "New Lights") and those who rejected it (the "Old Lights"). The elite ministers in British America were firmly Old Lights, and they censured the new revivalism as chaos. Indeed, the revivals did sometimes lead to excess. In one notorious incident in 1743, an influential New Light minister named James Davenport urged his listeners to burn books. The next day, he told them to burn their clothes as a sign of their casting off the sinful trappings of the world. He then took off his own pants and threw them into the fire, but a woman saved them and tossed them back to Davenport, telling him he had gone too far.
Semester Introduction What was the Silk Road, and what goods were transported along its routes?
Europeans had reached Asia across largely overland passages collectively called the "Silk Road"—acquiring silks, precious metals, jade, diamonds, and other gems, ebony and ivory, perfumes, dyes, tea, Persian carpets, and drugs (namely quinine and opium. European traders ventured to Asia to obtain such spices as pepper, nutmeg, clove, and cinnamon that were essential to preserve food in the era before refrigeration--and to provide a little variety to a monotonous diet. In addition to their uses as preservatives in the late Middle Ages, spices were also used as condiments, medicines, and deodorants.
Maroon communities
Everywhere, Africans resisted slavery, and running away was common. In Jamaica and elsewhere, runaway slaves created maroon communities, groups that resisted recapture and eked out a living from the land, rebuilding their communities as best they could. When possible, they adhered to traditional ways, following spiritual leaders such as Vodun priests.
Development of American Slavery How was black slavery used to cultivate cash crops in the American South?
Five chief cash crops were grown in the pre-Civil War American South: tobacco, Slaves planted, cultivated, and reaped tobacco. Slave laborers also performed many of the skilled services on tobacco plantations, such as curing (or, preserving) tobacco leaves. Slaves dug irrigation channels, and served as blacksmiths, carpenters, and coopers (or, barrel makers). Before the Civil War, most tobacco was transported on rivers and canals. Slaves handled the heavy barrels of tobacco, and manned the river and canal boats and barges that ferried the crop to market. rice, On the rice plantations, slaves were set to work planting rice seeds and flooding the fields to enable the seedlings to sprout. Later, slaves drained the fields so that hoes could be used to remove the weeds. Of course, slave laborers reaped the rice crop during the harvest season. between 1720 and 1790, a massive influx of African slaves entered South Carolina. Male slaves built floodgates, canals, and ditches to move water so that rice fields became—in one planter's words—a "huge hydraulic machine." Female slaves planted, hoed, and processed the rice. sugar cane, Sugar cane slaves built earthen dikes and a series of dams to protect the cane crops from the rivers. Once the land had been sufficiently cleared, ditched, and diked to support a crop, the slave force went to work plowing and planting seed cane. Cutting and harvesting sugar cane was back-breaking. indigo, In the 1740s, indigo (a crucial source of blue coloring matter for textiles) emerged as an important export crop in South Carolina, and, to a lesser degree, in Georgia. By 1775, South Carolina indigo planters were exporting one million pounds a year. Blacks from the Gold Coast of Africa—where indigo was grown—were sold to American indigo planters. cotton. Cotton cultivation demanded an immense amount of physical labor in hot, humid conditions. The crop required constant attention from April to July, when the fields had to be cleared of grass, and the soil around the cotton plants kept loose. In early September, cotton harvesting commenced. Picking could continue into January, or even February. Cotton harvesting utilized the labor of all available hands, including the elderly and children. Then, when the cotton had been picked, slaves were told to clear additional land, in anticipation of a new planting. Thus, cotton cultivation consumed the entire year.
Anglo-Powhatan Relations in Virginia How important was tobacco cultivation in English plans to colonize Roanoke Island?
In 1584, the English attempted a colony on a small island the natives called Roanoke, off the coast of North Carolina. Sir Walter Raleigh, the main English investor behind the colony, was interested in establishing tobacco farms on the island. He was also the driving force behind a tobacco craze that was sweeping England at the time.However, the English never got the chance to plant tobacco on Roanokeas they were plagued with a host of hardships, including malnutrition, disease, native assaults, internal bickering, and depressed morale.??
Development of American Slavery What is significant about the 1662 Virginia law that decreed that slavery was an inheritable condition "according to the condition of the mother"?
In 1662, Virginia legislators decreed that slavery was an inheritable status"according to the condition of the mother." In this way, Virginia assured that the children of black women remained in bondage—so that a supply of perpetual bonded servants would be secured.The 1662 law made yet unborn generations subject to slavery, and served as a powerful economic incentive for risking an initial investment in slavery. If slaves kept reproducing, planters would continue to reap a never-ending supply of laborers.
Development of American Slavery How did the Royal African Company contribute to the African slave trade?
In 1672, the British Parliament chartered a government corporation,called the Royal African Company (R.A.C.),to develop England's role in the slave trade. The R.A.C. was granted a monopoly to ship slaves from West Africa to British possessions in the Americas. The company was small, with meager resources; therefore, the British slave trade was circumscribed,and slavery in the American colonies remained limited.One of the charter members of the R.A.C. was English Enlightenment philosopher John Locke, who wrote that all men have inalienable rights of life, liberty, and property
Development of American Slavery The earliest blacks in the Virginia colony were not slaves. What was their status?
In August 1619, a Dutch ship anchored at Jamestown, Virginia. The Dutch sea captain traded twenty Africans to the English colonists in Virginia for food and assorted provisions.The Africans worked in the Virginia colony not as slaves, but as indentured servants—mainly planting and reaping tobacco plants. Thus, the first Africans in British America were not bonds people, but servants laboring to gain their freedom.
Development of American Slavery What is significant about the status of chattel slavery?
In short, slaves were a form of property to be bought, sold,and inherited. The imposition of chattel slavery dehumanized and objectified African slaves. The development and entrenchment of chattel slavery changed the trajectory of American history.
Pontiac's War Why did British Superintendent of Indian Affairs Sir William Johnson urge Lord Jeffrey Amherst not to eliminate the British presents offered to the natives? Why did Amherst decline Johnson's advice?
Johnson made clear four points to Lord Amherst:•1: The natives never interpreted the presents as bribery. Instead, the natives saw the practice of gift-giving as both a diplomatic practice and a cultural symbol of respect.•2: To the natives, presents represented proof of a binding "chain of friendship"between them and the English. Indeed, gift-giving had never been a one-way street. There had always been native reciprocity, as the natives provided English officials with various gifts in kind.•3: The natives would interpret a termination of the gifts as a hostile act.4: Presents, as costly as they could be, and respect for the natives,would be far less expensive in the long run,than launching military campaigns against them. Only by continuing gift-giving, Johnson added, would natives remain peaceful and loyal to the British Crown.
Pontiac's War Who was Neolin and what did he urge the native Ohioans to do in 1763?
Lenape medicine man and prophet, emerged to lead his people towards a new glorious age. Neolin's name means "The Enlightened One" or, literally, "He Who Comes with Light."Neolin urged his people to avoid all contact and commerce with whites, who he called "white aliens." He insisted that there must be no communication, no trade, no sexual intercourse with the whites whatsoever. Neolin preached about the urgency for the natives to purify and regenerate their lives by purging themselves of all European influences and returning to their traditional ways of life.
Spanish system of encomienda
Physical power—to work the fields, build villages, process raw materials—is a necessity for maintaining a society. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, humans could derive power only from the wind, water, animals, or other humans. Everywhere in the Americas, a crushing demand for labor bedeviled Europeans because there were not enough colonists to perform the work necessary to keep the colonies going. Spain granted encomiendas—legal rights to native labor—to conquistadors who could prove their service to the crown. This system reflected the Spanish view of colonization: the king rewarded successful conquistadors who expanded the empire. Some native peoples who had sided with the conquistadors, like the Tlaxcalan, also gained encomiendas; Malintzin, the Nahua woman who helped Cortés defeat the Mexica, was granted one. The Spanish believed native peoples would work for them by right of conquest, and, in return, the Spanish would bring them Catholicism. In theory the relationship consisted of reciprocal obligations, but in practice the Spaniards ruthlessly exploited it, seeing native people as little more than beasts of burden. Convinced of their right to the land and its peoples, they sought both to control native labor and to impose what they viewed as correct religious beliefs upon the land's inhabitants. Native peoples everywhere resisted both the labor obligations and the effort to change their ancient belief systems. Indeed, many retained their religion or incorporated only the parts of Catholicism that made sense to them. The system of encomiendas was accompanied by a great deal of violence (Figure 2.14). One Spaniard, Bartolomé de Las Casas, denounced the brutality of Spanish rule. A Dominican friar, Las Casas had been one of the earliest Spanish settlers in the Spanish West Indies. In his early life in the Americas, he owned Indian slaves and was the recipient of an encomienda. However, after witnessing the savagery with which encomenderos (recipients of encomiendas) treated the native people, he reversed his views. In 1515, Las Casas released his native slaves, gave up his encomienda, and began to advocate for humane treatment of native peoples. He lobbied for new legislation, eventually known as the New Laws, which would eliminate slavery and the encomienda system.
French fur trade
Seventeenth-century French and Dutch colonies in North America were modest in comparison to Spain's colossal global empire. New France and New Netherland remained small commercial operations focused on the fur trade and did not attract an influx of migrants. The Dutch in New Netherland confined their operations to Manhattan Island, Long Island, the Hudson River Valley, and what later became New Jersey. Dutch trade goods circulated widely among the native peoples in these areas and also traveled well into the interior of the continent along preexisting native trade routes. French habitants, or farmer-settlers, eked out an existence along the St. Lawrence River. French fur traders and missionaries, however, ranged far into the interior of North America, exploring the Great Lakes region and the Mississippi River. These pioneers gave France somewhat inflated imperial claims to lands that nonetheless remained firmly under the dominion of native peoples. After Jacques Cartier's voyages of discovery in the 1530s, France showed little interest in creating permanent colonies in North America until the early 1600s, when Samuel de Champlain established Quebec as a French fur-trading outpost. Although the fur trade was lucrative, the French saw Canada as an inhospitable frozen wasteland, and by 1640, fewer than four hundred settlers had made their home there. The sparse French presence meant that colonists depended on the local native Algonquian people; without them, the French would have perished. French fishermen, explorers, and fur traders made extensive contact with the Algonquian. The Algonquian, in turn, tolerated the French because the colonists supplied them with firearms for their ongoing war with the Iroquois. Thus, the French found themselves escalating native wars and supporting the Algonquian against the Iroquois, who received weapons from their Dutch trading partners. These seventeenth-century conflicts centered on the lucrative trade in beaver pelts, earning them the name of the Beaver Wars. In these wars, fighting between rival native peoples spread throughout the Great Lakes region.
Chapter 1: The Americas, Europe and Africa Before 1492 What are the differences between the types of slavery traditionally practiced in Africa and the slavery that developed in the New World? How did other types of servitude, such as European serfdom, compare to slavery?
Slavery existed in Africa, but it was not the same type of slavery that the Europeans introduced. The European form was called chattel slavery. A chattel slave is a piece of property, with no rights. Slavery within Africa was different. A slave might be enslaved in order to pay off a debt or pay for a crime. Slaves in Africa lost the protection of their family and their place in society through enslavement. But eventually they or their children might become part of their master's family and become free. This was unlike chattel slavery, in which enslaved Africans were slaves for life, as were their children and grandchildren. When a person became a slave they became their masters personal property and they didn't have a chance of one day being free. All of their offspring will also become their masters property and they can be sold at any time. European serfdom was when a person seeking protection or relief became the serve to for those who can provide relief. Also debt can also be worked off through a form of servitude
Chapter 1: The Americas, Europe, and Africa Before 1492 Was race identified with slavery before the era of European exploration? Why or why not? How did slavery's association with race change the institution's character?
Slavery has a long history. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle posited that some peoples were homunculi, or humanlike but not really people—to him, this meant people who did not speak Greek. Both the Bible and the Koran sanction slavery. Vikings who raided from Ireland to Russia brought back slaves of all nationalities. During the Middle Ages, traders from the interior of Africa brought slaves along well-established routes to sell them along the Mediterranean coast. Initially, slave traders also brought European slaves to the Caribbean. Many of these were orphaned or homeless children captured in the cities of Ireland. The question is, when did slavery become based on race? This appears to have developed in the New World, with the introduction of gruelingly labor-intensive crops such as sugar and coffee. Unable to fill their growing need from the ranks of prisoners or indentured servants, the European colonists turned to African laborers. The Portuguese, although seeking a trade route to India, also set up forts along the West African coast for the purpose of exporting slaves to Europe. Historians believe that by the year 1500, 10 percent of the population of Lisbon and Seville consisted of black slaves. Because of the influence of the Catholic Church, which frowned on the enslavement of Christians, European slave traders expanded their reach down the coast of Africa. When Europeans settled Brazil, the Caribbean, and North America, they thus established a system of racially based slavery. Here, the need for a massive labor force was greater than in western Europe. The land was ripe for growing sugar, coffee, rice, and ultimately cotton. To fulfill the ever-growing demand for these crops, large plantations were created. The success of these plantations depended upon the availability of a permanent, plentiful, identifiable, and skilled labor supply. As Africans were already familiar with animal husbandry as well as farming, had an identifying skin color, and could be readily supplied by the existing African slave trade, they proved the answer to this need. This process set the stage for the expansion of New World slavery into North America.
Collision of the Mexica and Spanish Worlds What is significant about Hernán Cortés's act of treason and the eighty-day Spanish-Tlaxcalteca siege of the Mexica capital?
Soon after, Cortés committed treason,by renouncing his allegiance to Governor Velázquez. Cortés wanted no one standing between him and glory. He wanted the fame of conquering the Mexica empire for himself. In late August 1519, the Spaniards reached the kingdom of Tlaxcala. The Tlaxcalteca resisted the Spaniards by force for three weeks until they realized that the newcomers were no friends of Moctecuhzoma. After three weeks of fighting and on-again, off-again negotiations, the Spaniards and Tlaxcalteca sealed an alliance that would exertenormous historical consequences. The lord of Tlaxcala [Dio Xicotencatl the Elder] ordered 5,000 seasoned Tlaxcalteca warriors to join the Spanish army. Cortés now had a huge army and was ina position to march toward the heart of the Mexica empire. Good luck was still with Cortés. The siege of the Tenochtitlán began in May 1521. But,even with the odds stacked heavily against them, the Mexica were neither passive nor helpless. Cuauhtémoc led an heroic defense of the Mexica capital. Tenochtitlán held out against the Spanish and Tlaxcalteca siege for eighty days. But,the Spaniards had cut off food and fresh water. The residents of Tenochtitlán were reduced to eating lizards and grass. And the deadly pox was taking a terrible toll. On August 13, 1521, following savage, block-to-block, hand-to-hand fighting, the great city surrendered.
Chapter 3: Creating New Social Orders: Colonial Societies, 1500-1700 Describe the attempts of the various European colonists to convert native peoples to their belief systems. How did these attempts compare to one another? What were the results of each effort?
Spanish- Forceful, often pressed it upon people they'd conquered. - Missionaries French - Jesuits, like Spanish missionaries Dutch - Had religious diversity, but it doesn't looks like they were particularly focused on conversion English - Puritans also attempted to convert - Aggressive expansion - Towns for converts
Pontiac's War Why was American jubilation following the end of the French and Indian War short-lived?
The American elation was soon tempered by the announcement of a new British land policy which, if enforced, would favor Native Americans while hurting white American colonists.
Chapter 4: Rule Britannia! The English Empire, 1660-1763 How did the ideas of the Enlightenment and the Great Awakening offer opposing outlooks to British Americans? What similarities were there between the two schools of thought?
The Enlightenment was a rational, thought-based period and way of looking at the world, while the Great Awakening was a faith-based revival that took over the colonies during the same time frame. Both stressed the idea of human equality and the ability to question and challenge those in positions of authority.
Chapter 4: Rule Britannia! The English Empire, 1660-1763 What shared experiences, intellectual currents and cultural elements drew together British subjects on both sides of the Atlantic during this period? How did these experiences, ideas, and goods serve to strengthen those bonds?
The Great Awakening and Enlightenment drew together all British subjects with new experiences and educational opportunities for both of them.This was religious revival that swept through the British American colonies. This Evangelical Revival was a series of Christian revivals that swept Britain and its Thirteen Colonies. The revival movement permanently affected Protestantism as adherents strove to renew individual piety and religious devotion.
Wampum
The abundance of European goods gave rise to new artistic objects. For example, iron awls made the creation of shell beads among the native people of the Eastern Woodlands much easier, and the result Chapter 3 | Creating New Social Orders: Colonial Societies, 1500-1700 87 was an astonishing increase in the production of wampum, shell beads used in ceremonies and as jewelry and currency. Native peoples had always placed goods in the graves of their departed, and this practice escalated with the arrival of European goods. Archaeologists have found enormous caches of European trade goods in the graves of Indians on the East Coast.
Mercantilism
The economic philosophy of mercantilism shaped European perceptions of wealth from the 1500s to the late 1700s. Mercantilism held that only a limited amount of wealth, as measured in gold and silver bullion, existed in the world. In order to gain power, nations had to amass wealth by mining these precious raw materials from their colonial possessions. During the age of European exploration, nations employed conquest, colonization, and trade as ways to increase their share of the bounty of the New World. Mercantilists did not believe in free trade, arguing instead that the nation should control trade to create wealth. In this view, colonies existed to strengthen the colonizing nation. Mercantilists argued against allowing their nations to trade freely with other nations. Spain's mercantilist ideas guided its economic policy. Every year, slaves or native workers loaded shipments of gold and silver aboard Spanish treasure fleets that sailed from Cuba for Spain. These ships groaned under the sheer weight of bullion, for the Spanish had found huge caches of silver and gold in the New World. In South America, for example, Spaniards discovered rich veins of silver ore in the mountain called Potosí and founded a settlement of the same name there. Throughout the sixteenth century, Potosí was a boom town, attracting settlers from many nations as well as native people from many different cultures. Colonial mercantilism, which was basically a set of protectionist policies designed to benefit the nation, relied on several factors: colonies rich in raw materials, cheap labor, colonial loyalty to the home government, and control of the shipping trade. Under this system, the colonies sent their raw materials, harvested by slaves or native workers, back to their mother country. The mother country sent back finished materials of all sorts: textiles, tools, clothing. The colonists could purchase these goods only from their mother country; trade with other countries was forbidden.
Pontiac's War What economic rationale was developed by the British Board of Trade as a powerful motivation behind the Proclamation Act of 1763?
The logic behind the proclamation was that if the whites and natives were separated, Pontiac's War would end and the British could draw down their troops in North America and save lives and money. In London, the Board of Trade devised another economic rationale for excluding white Americans from the lands beyond the Appalachian Divide. In a memorandum to the His Majesty's Privy Council, the Board of Trade urged "keeping the colonists as near as possible to the Ocean" so that they would remain dependent on trade with England.
Development of American Slavery Why was the expansion of African American slavery slow?
The main reason for this was that it was more expensive—at least in the short run—to buy black slaves than to contract white indentured servants from England.As a result, the black population in British America grew slowly. In 1640, only 150 blacks were reported living in Virginia; in 1650, 300 blacks were in colony; in 1690, 3,000 blacks called Virginia their home.
Middle passage
The perilous, often deadly transatlantic crossing of slave ships from the African coast to the New World. Once sold to traders, all slaves sent to America endured the hellish Middle Passage, the transatlantic crossing, which took one to two months. By 1625, more than 325,800 Africans had been shipped to the New World, though many thousands perished during the voyage. An astonishing number, some four million, were transported to the Caribbean between 1501 and 1830. When they reached their destination in America, Africans found themselves trapped in shockingly brutal slave societies. In the Chesapeake colonies, they faced a lifetime of harvesting and processing tobacco.
Anglo-Powhatan Relations in Virginia What was the "starving time"? What important lesson was learned because of it?
The winter of 1609-1610 was called "the starving time." It was a brutally frigid and insufferably long winter. Of 560 persons who entered that winter, only sixty survived.To the survivors at Jamestown—and those back in London—the lessons of the starving time were clear. If Virginia was to survive and prosper, the colonists had to develop a sound and vital economic base. Without such a firm economic anchorage, the Jamestown colony would chronically verge upon collapse. The English would have to farm, harvest lumber, build ships,or manufacture goods (perhaps glassmaking or silkworks) in Virginia in order to ensure the colony's success and prosperity.
Repartimiento
The world native peoples had known before the coming of the Spanish was further upset by Spanish colonial practices. The Spanish imposed the encomienda system in the areas they controlled. Under this system, authorities assigned Indian workers to mine and plantation owners with the understanding that the recipients would defend the colony and teach the workers the tenets of Christianity. In reality, the encomienda system exploited native workers. It was eventually replaced by another colonial labor system, the repartimiento, which required Indian towns to supply a pool of labor for Spanish overlords. A Spanish colonial system requiring Indian towns to supply workers for the colonizers.
Semester Introduction Where did Leif Eiriksson and the Greenlandic Norsemen establish the Vinland colony?
eif Eiriksson and the Greendlandic Norsemen had found a way across the Atlantic to North America and established a Viking settlement(called Vinland) at L'Anse aux Meadows in the modern Canadian province of Newfoundland around A.D. 1000
Semester Introduction What did Florentine astronomer Paolo del Pozzo Toscanelli argue concerning a sea route from Europe to Asia?
that a westward voyage was feasible. Toscanelli drew a map showing many small islands in the western sea between Europe and Asia. Mariners, he wrote, could use islands as watering and provisioning way stations during the journey
