Introduction

The United States of America was founded on July 4, 1776 yet its history began centuries earlier when many western European nations began exploring the Ocean Sea for trade routes to reach the fabulous wealth of the Far East. The spices, silks and other exotic luxuries sought by these nations were not unknown to the Europeans of the fifteenth century but they had recently become more expensive and difficult to obtain as a result of changes in the eastern Mediterranean. Western Europeans had first acquired a taste for pepper and other spices as a result of the several "Crusades," which occurred between 1095 and 1290, which were intended to liberate the Holy Land from Muslim domination. These European expeditions also sought to maintain the security of the Byzantine Empire, the last remnant of the late Christian Roman Empire whose capitol of Constantinople was not only the largest Christian city in the entire world but also a Christian stronghold which grew into a very important trading center for Western Europe.

While the early Crusaders enjoyed considerable success in capturing Jerusalem and establishing a Christian kingdom, ultimately the crusades failed to secure Christian domination of the Holy Land and in 1453 the capitol of the Byzantine Empire, Constantinople, fell to the Ottoman Turks.

The fall of this city changed the established trade route system, Constantinople controlled access to the Black Sea and was the major hub of trade with the Far East which made it a very important trade center for Christian Europe This collapse of Constantinople did not mean that trade would stop between Western Europe and the eastern Mediterranean but costs would rise and shipping time would increase, and consequently there was profit to be made if new and more efficient trade routes could be established.

Another religious and political change occurred at the far western end of the Mediterranean, the Reconquista of Spain. In 1492 Spain had expelled the "Moors" or Muslims out of Spain and had secured it as an entirely Christian country. After centuries of struggle between Christians and Muslims in the west the struggle shifted to the east leaving complete Christian domination in the Western Mediterranean and essentially Muslim domination in the Eastern Mediterranean. At the end of the fifteenth century the face of Europe greatly changed. The Iberian Peninsula, where Spain and Portugal are located, was the most western part of Europe, and had been the site of years of struggle between Catholic Spain and the Muslim Moors, became wholly Christian. In 1492 with the removal of the last Moorish kingdom and the conversion or expulsion of all Spanish Jews, the Reconquista, or re-conquest of Spain was complete. This meant that Spain was now in a very secure position and could turn its wealth and military experience to new great projects. Spain and its neighbor Portugal would now turn to the Atlantic competing to find new trade routes to India and China. The competition between Spain and Portugal lead to the 1493 Treaty of Tordesillas in which the Pope divided the world between these two countries. An imaginary line was drawn through what was thought to be the center of the Atlantic Ocean and Portugal was granted all new lands to the east and Spain received all new lands to the west. While this may seem to have greatly benefited Spain over Portugal since Spain would be granted most of the new lands of the Americas, this was not the case. In 1488 Portuguese sailor Bartholomeu Dias had reached the Cape of Good Hope and by 1493 Portugal was establishing trade links and colonies in the Far East by sea, which had the effect of granting Portugal a trade monopoly. This forced Spain to aggressively seek a trade route to the west if it were to compete with Portugal These events contributed greatly to the discovery and exploration of the New World and the establishment by many Western European Nations of Empires in the Americas.

Questions for Chapter One:

  1. Why is America not named for Leif Ericson?
  2. Why were Spain and Portugal the first Western European nations to seek ocean trade routes?
  3. Who was Henry the Navigator, Queen Isabella, Bartholomeu Dias, the "Grand Khan," Vasco de Balboa, Hernan Cortes, Francisco Pizarro, Ponce de Leon, Ferdinand Magellan, Cabeza de Vaca, and Hernando de Soto?
  4. What was the name of the city founded by Columbus?
  5. What two early Spanish settlements would eventually became part of the Unites States?
  6. Who were the Conquistadors?
  7. What was a Requerimiento?
  8. What was the Inquisition?
  9. How did the Europeans contrast with the natives that they found in the Americas?
  10. What was the impact of European contact with the American Natives?
  11. Why were other countries such as France, the Netherlands, and England years behind Spain in establishing American empires?
  12. What effects did the Reformation have on American exploration?
  13. What was Elizabeth I’s primary interest in the America’s?
  14. How did English colonial objectives and techniques differ from those of the Spanish?
  15. What were the London Company and the Plymouth Company? What was a joint stock company?
  16. What was the importance of tobacco?
  17. Who were John Smith, John Rolfe, the Powhatan Indians and Pocahontas?
  18. Who were the Puritans? What does it mean to be Popish? What is the Anglican Church? Who was Queen Mary?
  19. Who were the Pilgrims and how are they related to the Puritans? Who was William Bradford? What was the Mayflower?
  20. Who was "Squanto" and the other Wampanoags?
  21. What is the related significance of the Mayflower Compact and the establishment in 1619 of the House of Burgesses in the history of the United States?
  22. How would you contrast the differences between the establishment of the New England colonies of the Plymouth Plantation and the Massachusetts Bay colony with the earlier colony in Virginia?
  23. What was "saving grace" and who were the "visible saints?"
  24. Who were John Winthrop, Roger Williams, Anne Hutchinson, and Thomas Hooker?
  25. While the English were settling Virginia and Massachusetts what colonies did the French and Dutch establish in North America?
  26. Who were Samuel de Champlain, Henry Hudson, and Peter Minuit?
  27. What was the Great Migration?
  28. What is the difference between how "religious toleration" was practiced by the Puritans and by the Calverts?
  29. Why was Maryland established?
  30. What was the Carolina Charter and what was unusual about it?
  31. What is a "leet-man?"
  32. How did the English establish New York and New Jersey?
  33. Who was William Penn and what were the Quakers?
  34. During this faze of European colonialisation what impact did the colonizers and the native Americans have on each other?

 

Questions from Chapter Two:

  1. What method of colonization was used by the Spanish in regard the Pueblo Indians.
  2. What did Pope lead in 1680?
  3. What were the "tidewater," the "low country," and the "back country?"
  4. What was "seasoning?"
  5. How long could a man of twenty years expect to live in the Chesapeake region in the 1700’s? How did this affect marriages and childrearing?
  6. How important was land in motivating people to move to the colonies? What was a land "dividend?" What was a the headright system and what was a quitrent?
  7. What were indentured servants, squatters and squatter’s rights?
  8. When and why was slavery introduced in the colonies and why did it replace indentured servitude?
  9. What was the Royal African Company?
  10. How did slave traders acquire African captives?
  11. What relation did tobacco have with slavery? Why was tobacco "their darling?"
  12. King James I of England condemned tobacco but later changed his mind, why?
  13. How did tobacco production and price variations relate to Bacon’s Rebellion? How did Bacon’s Rebellion relate to the institutionalization of slavery?
  14. What slave labor produced cash crops joined tobacco by 1740.
  15. By 1730, as the slave population increased in the southern colonies, what proportion of the population was in bondage? Where in the south were slaves in the majority?
  16. How many African slaves were brought to the Americas, what proportion were brought to the English north American colonies?
  17. What did the South Carolina Negro Act of 1740 create?
  18. What were "outlandish blacks," a "pass," and which slave were the most likely to try and escape?
  19. How were living conditions for families in the colonial south?
  20. How was the founding of Georgia different from the other English colonies? Why was the importation of rum and Africans prohibited?
  21. Why was life in New England healthier than the southern colonies?
  22. What did it mean to be "covenanted people?"
  23. How did the Puritans regard women and their children?
  24. Who were the visible saints? What was the Half-Way Covenant?
  25. Why was the baptism of children a "hot" issue?
  26. What does it mean for a colony to have a charter either from the Crown or Parliament?
  27. What did the Puritans mean when they thought of the purpose of government? Did the Puritans practice the separation of church and state?
  28. How did "town life" shape the distinctiveness of New England?
  29. What does it mean to refer colonial New England colonies as "democracies without democrats?" Were these colonies democratic? What is the importance of town meetings?
  30. How was the future of New England shaped by events in the 1680’s? What does it mean to say the that New England at that time was being "anglicized?" How did this affect democracy in the region?
  31. What is the importance of the "Crisis in Salem Village?"
  32. Harvard was established in 1636, why? How did the Puritans promote education?
  33. Why was Yale established?
  34. What is an early example of the authority of the clergy being questioned in newspapers? How was Benjamin Franklin connected to these events?
  35. How did Puritan values regarding usury, prosperity, social leadership as well as the natural environment of New England relate to the development of Atlantic trade?
  36. Why did indirect trade rather than direct trade become the typical method of New England shipping? What was the first example of this "triangular trade?" How did this effect Boston?
  37. What were the middle colonies? How did their "in-betweenness" make them different from the New England colonies and the Chesapeake Bay colonies?
  38. What traits did the middle colonies have that "would be seen as distinctly "American?" Why did these colonies come to be primarily populated by non-English colonists? Who were the dominate colonists?
  39. What was "the best poor man’s country in the world" and what made this seemingly true?
  40. What was the Dutch Patroon system?
  41. What were the opportunities available to colonists who only possessed artisan skills, where could they settle, and what were their prospects?
  42. What was the importance of "Leisler’s Rebellion?"
  43. Why was the trial of John Peter Zenger a pivotal event in American history?
  44. Who were the Paxton Boy’s?

Conclusion

These first two chapters have covered a very wide epoch in American history, from the time before the voyages of Columbus to the first writing of Benjamin Franklin. In this time great empires had been built in America by various Western European nations and many of the seeds of the future United States have been sown. Besides the founding of the English colonies themselves that would ultimately form the original thirteen states, the most important events may have been the following: the writing of the Mayflower Compact, the establishment of the House of Burgesses, the New England town meeting, wide voting rights, "triangular trade," and the Zenger Trial.

These events were crucial because they all effected the forming of the political rights and structures of the United States. The Mayflower compact was the first written constitution produced in America, and it became a model for many following voluntary constitutions, including the Constitution. The House of Burgesses was the first elected representational government body and like the New England town meeting greatly shaped the notion of the citizen’s right to participate in government. In most of the English colonies the citizen’s right to vote, although being still highly restricted, was far more liberal than that in England or most any other European nation and it would became something of a tradition that this right would continue to be expanded through out American history. The Zenger trial also illustrates a break with English and European law and tradition, this trial lead to the American right to the freedom of the press, an important element of the Bill of Rights. The reason that "triangular trade" is so important is not directly due to its importance in the growth of New England as a trading region but through the objects of trade during what has been called "the middle passage." This was the part of the triangle that brought Africans in bondage to be sold as slaves in American markets. Through this trade slavery spreads through out the western hemisphere greatly influencing many aspects of American history even up to the present time.