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[edit] Table of contents

Colonial America

The Republic until 1877

The Republic 1877 to 2000

2000 to the Present

Appendices

Keywords (People, Events, etc)

Licensing and Contributors

[edit] Preface

Contents | Cover page | Next Chapter

This textbook is based initially on the College Entrance Examination Board test in Advanced Placement United States History. This seems to be the best reference on which to build a textbook, since it is a standard on the subject and covers what most U.S. history students study in high school and college.

It has been reorganized and re-edited in Nov 2008 to better meet the content and organization that the college board has defined for a course in AP U.S. History. The content of the book was carefully chosen for NPOV, significance and interest. We are very interested in the success of the book and any feedback and improvments would be greatly appreciated.

Enjoy! AP Course Description http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/ap/history_us/topics_1_9.html?ushist

[edit] Colonial America

[edit] Introduction

Contents | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

[edit] Content and Contributions

This is, to the best of our knowledge, the world's first open content US History Textbook. The users are invited to tweak and refine this book until there is nothing better available. The authors are confident that this will happen because of the success of the Wikipedia site.

[edit] Licensing

All content contained herein shall be available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

[edit] Brief overview of European history (before 1492)

Contents | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

The peoples of Europe have had a tremendous impact on the development of the United States throughout the course of U.S. history. Europeans "discovered" and colonized the North American continent and, even after they lost political control over its territory, their influence has predominated due to a common language, social ideals, and culture. Therefore, when endeavoring to understand the history of the United States, it is helpful to briefly describe their European origin.

[edit] Greece and Rome

See also: Ancient History/Greece and Ancient History/Rome
The Roman Empire

The first significant civilizations of Europe formed in the second millennium BC. By 800 BC, the Greek city-states began to gain dominance over European civilization. By about 500 BC, the state of Athens had created a democracy, but one that differs from today's democracies in certain respects. The city-states of Greece became a province of the Roman Empire in 27 BC.

Meanwhile, the city of Rome was founded (traditionally in the year 753 BC). Slowly, Rome grew and built its empire, which at various points included most of present-day Britain (a large part of Scotland never belonged to the empire), France (then known as Gaul), Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Iraq, Palestine (including the territory claimed today by the modern state of Israel), Northern Arabia, Egypt, the Balkans, and the entire north coast of Africa.

By 180 AD, the Roman Empire began to disintegrate. The Emperors were overthrown and anarchy resulted. But Diocletian (243 - 316), reinstated the Empire by 284. The Empire was restored and continued to regain territory until 395, when the Empire was so large that it had to be divided into two parts, each with a separate ruler. The Eastern Empire survived until 1453, but the Western Empire fell quickly. In 476, Germanic tribes rebelled against Rome and deposed the Western Roman Emperor, resulting in a long period of decline known as the "Dark Ages."

[edit] The Roman Empire to the Holy Roman Empire

A mitred Adhémar de Monteil carrying the Holy Lance in one of the battles of the First Crusade

After Rome's fall c.476, the remnants of the Western Roman Empire fell into the hands of several of Germanic tribes, such as the Visigoths, Anglo-Saxons, Vandals, and Franks. Among these, the Franks quickly rose to prominence.

Charlamagne (742 - 814), the King of the Franks, took power over great portions of Europe. He eventually took control of Rome, reestablishing the Western Roman Empire, which became known as the Holy Roman Empire due to its close association with the Roman Catholic Church. But "Holy Roman Empire" was a misnomer, famously neither Holy, Roman, or an Empire, because the Empire was actually a confederation of what was formerly known as Gaul with the early German states. Also, it was not exactly an Empire. Though the Emperor held great power, he could not control the Church, even in his own domain. This allowed the popes of the Church to exert great influence both in religious and political matters.

At the end of the eleventh century, prompted by Pope Urban II and calls for aid from the crumbling Eastern Roman Empire, some European kings and great nobles launched a century and a half of Crusades of hordes of Christians, first to reconquer, and then to hold, part of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from the Saracens (Arabs). The Crusaders ultimately failed in the face of powerful, resurgent, Muslim forces, but were recurrent disturbers of the Arab Empire. The Arabs were repeatedly torn by internal dynastic struggles such as Abbasides versus Fatimids, Shi'a versus Sunni, and numerous wars with the Turks (who succeeded them), Persians, and Mongols. The wars between Christian and Muslim empires lasted intermittently from the seventh century until World War I, and, to a degree, continue to the present in the Balkans, East Africa, Caucasus, East Indies, and Middle East.

[edit] Viking Exploration of North America

Danish seamen, painted mid-12th century.

In the eighth century, pushed from their homes in Scandinavia by war and population expansion, Norsemen, or Vikings, began settling parts of the Faeroe, Shetland, and Orkney Islands in the North Atlantic. Then they began exploration of the west, moving first to Iceland in approximately 874 and, later, led by Erik the Red, to Greenland. Leif Erikson, son of Erik the Red, and other members of the family began exploration of the North American coast in 986. There was at least one camp founded by Vikings in the latter region, now named Newfoundland, and in the 1960's archaeologists discovered Viking remains at L'Anse aux Meadows dating back to about 1000 AD. For whatever reason, the Viking settlement of Newfoundland failed, perhaps because of violent encounters with native peoples and, by the thirteenth century, Iceland and Greenland had also entered a period of decline, resulting from the "Little Ice Age" and bringing the Viking exploration of the west to a standstill. Expansion of Scandinavian traders and warriors into Russia, France, Italy, the British Isles, and Sicily had a profound effect on politics and the ruling classes of Europe.

[edit] The Renaissance

See also: European History

Despite the Christian losses of the Crusades, the soldiers who participated had realized one major fact: Eastern civilization was far more advanced than its Western counterpart. Its technology and culture outstripped feudal life west of the Byzantine Empire. With this in mind, Europeans began to import these concepts into their own native lands. Thus, it was not long before the continent began to enter a period of revival.

Roman and Greek art and culture were rediscovered during a period called the Renaissance. The Renaissance started in the Italian city-states and spread throughout most of Europe. The Italian city of Florence was the birthplace of this intellectual movement.

Although Western Christians failed to conquer the Holy Land, they were able to use their new-found experience and knowledge of the Mediterranean, a region whose technology was at a time superior to that of western Europe. Chinese technology such as gunpowder, silk, and printing filtered in from traders, adventurers, and scholars. In the Mediterranean, Europeans encountered writings of the ancient world that had been lost in Europe, and acquired a taste for new foods and flavors.

In the fifteenth century, the Mediterranean was a vigorous trading area. Europe used this water highway to import goods of many sorts. Grains and salts for preserving fish, Chinese silks, Indian cotton, precious stones, and above all, spices. Yes, Europe obsessed over these new spices. New spices meant new drugs, new cosmetics, dyes, perfumes, even glue and sugar. Peppers, cinnamon, cloves and other condiments used for flavoring and preserving food, proved a welcome addition to the bland diets of Europe.

[edit] The Rise of Portugal

Italy dominated trade. Genoa and Venice in particular ballooned into massive trading cities, and Italy used its monopoly to raise the price of goods, which would have been expensive in any case, because they were often brought overland from Asia to ports on the eastern Mediterranean. The mad prices, in turn, increased the desire of purchasers to find other suppliers, and of potential suppliers to find new, cheaper, routes to Asia.

Portugal was just one of many potential suppliers, and its location was well positioned to extend its influence into the Atlantic and down, south and east, to Africa. Prince Henry, son of King John I (r. 1385 – 1433), led the way of exploring new routes to the east and, in 1415, supported Portugal's capture of Ceuta in Muslim North Africa. He also sponsored voyages that pushed even farther down the West African coast, all the way south to Sierra Leone by the time of his death in 1460.

Under Portugal's King John II, who ruled from 1481 to 1495, Bartolomeu Dias finally sailed around the southernmost point of Africa to the Cape of Good Hope (1487-|88). Then, in 1497-99, Vasco da Gama of Portugal, sailed up the east coast of Africa to India.

Africa supplied Portugal with many profitable by-products. The Portuguese colonized and settled many islands in the Atlantic, such as the Madeira, Cape Verde, The Azores, and Sao Tome. These islands supplied them with sugar, and gave them territorial control of the Atlantic. West Africa was even more promising, not only unearthing a valuable trade route to India, but also providing the Portuguese with ivory, fur, oils, black pepper, gold dust, and a supply of “black gold” -- i.e., dark skinned slaves who were used as domestic servants, artisans, and market or transportation workers in Lisbon. Later, they were used as laborers on sugar plantations in the Atlantic.

[edit] The New World

Christopher Columbus

In Europe, the doctrines of the powerful Roman Catholic Church were timidly questioned by scientists such as Nicolaus Copernicus 1473 - 1543) and Galileo Galilei (1564 - 1642), who suggested by way of careful observation that the earth revolved around the sun. At the time, the church supported the Ptolemaic planetary system, which placed Earth at the center of the universe.

Many Europeans dreamed of exploration. One, the Italian Christopher Columbus 1451 - 1506), born Christofo Colombo, decided to sail around the globe to reach India by way of the Atlantic, rather than to travel overland through Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia.

Contrary to popular myth, it was largely accepted in Europe during Columbus' time that the world was round, which was also central to either the prevailing Copernican or Ptolemaic models of the solar system. In fact, sailors feared sailing west due to the unknown distance and uncharted winds of the West Atlantic, not because they feared sailing off the "edge of the world." Columbus' inspiration for exploring westward was his 30 percent underestimation of the circumference of the earth.

First, Columbus needed to fund his voyage. He approached King John II of Portugal (1455 - 1495) for aid, but the King's Council of Scientific Advisers rejected Columbus' proposals mostly on financial grounds, but also because of his lack of academic knowledge. After all, Columbus didn't know where he was going when he set out, didn't know where he was when he got there, and didn't know where he had been when he got back. Columbus then looked to Portugal's rival on the seas, Spain. King Ferdinand V of Aragon (1452 - 1516), and his wife Queen Isabella of Castile (1451 - 1504), rejected Columbus's plan in 1491. The Spanish rulers felt that Columbus demanded too many benefits and powers in the lands he was proposing to explore, including a percentage of the riches found in these lands, as well as certain titles such as Viceroy and Admiral. But after much negotiation, Columbus received the support of the Queen and funding to sail in April 1492. In that same year, the last Muslims were forced out of Granada by the Christian army. With the reunification of Spain complete, attention and funding became available for exploration to form the basis for the Age of Exploration and the Spanish Empire of the Americas.

[edit] Religious Tensions

Despite the failure of the Crusades, militant Western Christianity persisted in Spain in an effort known as the Reconquista (the "reconquest"), which purged the land of Muslims who had arrived there in 711. By the fifteenth century, the Muslims were confined to the kingdom of Granada, which bordered the Mediterranean Sea in the southern side of the Iberian Peninsula. Granada finally fell in 1492 to the Spanish Christians, ending the reconquista.

Elsewhere in Europe, the Pope's powers continued to grow, and in protest to the Roman Catholic Church, several Protestant churches were founded in Germany and France under reformers like Martin Luther and John Calvin. In England, King Henry VIII founded the Anglican Church. This division of Western Christianity caused much religious strife, and religious minorities were persecuted throughout Europe. This persecution created large amounts of people looking for a better life. Many of these people set out to create new homes in the Americas. One of the most notable of these groups were the Pilgrims.

[edit] Pre-Columbian America (before 1492)

Human civilization in America probably began in the last ice age, when prehistoric hunters crossed a land bridge between the Asian and American continents. We see human civilizations begin throughout both North and South america with different levels of complexity, technology and cohesiveness.

Some of the most powerful and developed civilizations occurred in South America. Many of its civilizations had developed writing which allowed a civilization a greater ability to spread, dominate and culturally develop. In South America we see some of the largest cities in the Ancient world.

In North America, cultures tended to be more fragmented and less unified. The tribe was often the major Socio-political unit, with cultural exchanges between tribes creating similar culture over vastly distances. We also see civilizations adapt and flourish in the rugged desert southwestern North America.

Many cultures suffered greatly from European colonization from exposure from European disease. On the other hand Native Americans did benefit from invasive animals like the horse that was introduced from European Explorers.


[edit] Early Inhabitants of the Americans

American history does not begin with Columbus's 1492 arrival in America. In actuality, America was settled long before the first European set shore on the continent. The beginning of civilization in America occurred during the last ice age, some 15 to 40 thousand years ago. At that time, huge ice sheets occuppied northern lands and consequently sea levels were much lower creating a land bridge between Asia and North America called the Bering land bridge. A gap in two large ice sheets would create a connection from lands near present day Alaska, though Alberta and into the continental United States.

Nomadic Asians following herds of wild game traveled into the continental United States. A characteristic arrow point was found and first described near the present day town of Clovis, NM. Specialized tools and common burial practices have also been described in many sites found throughout North America and into South America.

Clovis man could be considered one of Americans earliest civilizations. It is not clear whether the Clovis people were one unified tribe or whether there were many tribes related by common technology and belief. Their nomadic trek across 2000 rugged miles in one of the great feats of pre-historical man. The Clovis culture disappears dramatically from the archaeological record 12,900 years ago. There is widespread speculation about what caused their disappearance. Theories range from the extinction of the mammoth to sudden environmental changes caused by a comet impacting or earth or the break of a massive freshwater lake, Lake Agassiz.

There is considerable controversy about Pre-Clovis settlement of North and South America. Comparative culture and linguistics offer evidence of influences of early America by several different contemporary cultures. Some genetic and time-dating studies point to the possibility that ancient Americans came from other places and arrived earlier than Clovis sites in North America. Perhaps some ancient settlers to the hemisphere traveled by boat along the seashore, or arrived by boats from the Polynesian islands

As time went on, many of these first settlers settled down and began to farm and domesticate animals. Groups of people formed stable tribes and formed a common language until more distant relatives could no longer understand them. Comparative linguistics, or the study of languages of different tribes show fascinating diversity with tribes showing similarities between tribes hundreds of miles apart, yet startling differences with neighboring groups.

At time, tribes would gain regional importance and dominate large areas of America. Empires rose across the Americas that rivaled the greatest ones in Europe. For their time, some of these empires were highly advanced.

When referring to these empires, historians have difficulty, as the native people did not have a unified name for themselves. At first, Europeans called natives "Indians". This term came from the belief by Christopher Columbus that he had discovered India. Despite Amerigo Vespucci ascertaining that the Americas were not actually India, Indian continued to be used as the de facto name for native inhabitants until around 1960. Starting in the 1960s, the term "Native American" was used. One concern critics have with this term is that anyone who is born in America can be considered a Native American, making it too vague to use as a descriptor for a particular group of people. In addition to Native American, there is also "American Indian". In Canada, the term "First People" is used. All these terms for the native people of America show just how diverse Pre-Columbian America was and the disagreement that continues between scholars today about this period.

[edit] Early Empires of Mesoamerica

Meso-American civilizations are included in some of the most powerful, and advanced civilizations of the ancient world. Reading and writing was widespread throughout Meso-America, and each of these civilizations acheived impressive political, artistic, scientific, and architectual accomplishments. Each of these civilizations gathered the political, and technological resources to build some of the largest, most ornate and highly populated cities in the ancient world.

The aboriginal americans settled in the Yucatan penisulas of preset-day Mexico around 10,000BC. By 2000BC, we see a complex culture called the Mayan society emerge. The mayans developed a strong political, artistic and religous identity amoungst the highly populated yucatan lowlands. The classic period (250-900AD) witnesses a rapid growth of the Mayan culture and it gains dominence within the region and influence throughout present-day Mexico. Large independant cities-states are founded and become the political, religious, and cultural centers for Mayan peoples.

Rather than a political unification, Mayan society was unified by a deeply developed religion. Their religion was highly influenced and supported by careful observations of the sky. The mayans were one of the foremost astrologers (and astronomers) of the ancient world. Extremely careful observation of the heavens led to a very sophisticated measurements of time and a great awareness of the movement of stars through the sky; espacially of the bright planet Venus which alternately visits the morning and evening sky. Mayan art is also considered one of the most sophisticated and beautiful of the ancient New World.

The Mayan culture saw a decline during the 8th and 9th century. Although its causes are still the subject of intense scientific speculation, archaeologists see a definite cessation of inscriptions and architectural construction. The Mayan culture continued as a regional power until its discovery by Spanish conquistadores. In fact, an independent, non-centralized government allowed the Mayans to strongly resist the Spanish conquest of present-day Mexico. Mayan culture is preserved today throughout the Yucatan, although many of the inscriptions have been lost.

The Aztec culture begins with the migration of the Mexica people to present-day central Mexico. The leaders of this group of people created an alliance with the dominant tribes forming the Aztec triple alliance, and created an empire that influenced much of present-day Mexico.

The Aztec confederacy began an campaign of conquest and assimilation. Outlying lands were inducted into the empire and become part of the complex Aztec society. Local leaders could gain prestige by adopting and adding to the culture of the Aztec civilization. The Aztecs adopted cultural, artistic, and astronomical innovations from its conquered people.

The heart of the Aztecs' power was an economic unity. Conquered lands paid a tribute to the capital city Tenochtitlan, the present-day site of Mexico City. Rich in tribute, this capital grew in influence, size and population. When the Spanish arrived in 1521, it was the fourth largest city in the word (including the once independent city Tlatelco, which was by then a residential suburb) with an estimated population of 212,500 people. It contained the massive Temple de Mayo, a twin-towered pyramid 197 feet tall, 45 public buildings, a palace, two zoos, a botanical garden, and many houses. Surrounding the city and floating on the shallow flats of Lake Texcoco were enormous chinampas: floating garden beds that fed the many thousands of residents of Tenochtitlan.

While many Meso-American civilizations practiced human sacrifices, none performed it to the scale of the Aztecs. To the Aztecs, human sacrifice was a neccesary appeasement to the gods. According to the own records, one of the largest slaughters ever performed happened when the great pyramid of Tenochtitlan was reconsecrated in 1487. The Aztecs reported that they had sacrificed 84,400 prisoners over the course of four days.

Arriving in Tenochtlan, the Spanish would be the downfall of aztec culture. Although shocked and impressed by the scale of Tenochtlan, the display of massive human sacrifice would shock european sensitivity and the abundant displays of god and silver would enflame their greed. The spanish killed the reigning ruler, Montezuma in June 1520 and lay siege to the city, destroying it 1521. The aztecs were humbled by the spanish alliance to a competiting tribe, the Tlaxcala.

The Incan civilization was the largest pre-columbian empire in America. The empire with the accession of Manco Capac to emporer of a tribe in the Cuzco area of modern-day Peru around 1200.

Religion was significant in Inca life. The royal family were believed to be descendants of the Inca Sun God. Thus, the emperor had absolute authority, checked only by tradition. Under the emperors, a complex political structure was apparent. The Inca Emperor, regional and village leaders, and others were part of an enormous bureaucracy. For every ten people, there was on average one official. The organization of the Empire also included a complex transportation infrastructure. To communicate across the entire empire, runners ran from village to village, relaying royal messages.

In 1438, Pachacuti, ambitious and likely the greatest of the Incan emperors, came to the throne. Pachacuti rebuilt much of the capital city, Cuzco, and the Temple of the Sun. The success of Pachacuti was brilliant military command (he is sometimes referred as the "Napolean of the Andes") and a brilliant political campagne of integration. Leaders of regions that he wanted to conquer were bribed with luxury goods and enticed by promises of privilege and importance. The Incans also become had a prestigious educational system that extolled the benefits of Incan civilization. Much of the expansion throughout south american was peaceful.

At its height of power in the late 15th century, Incan civilization had conquered a vast patchwork of languages, people and culture from present-day Ecuador the whole length of South America to present-day Argentina.

Machu Picchu, the "Lost city of the Incas".

Cuzco the capital city, was said by the spanish to be "as fine as any city in Spain". Perhaps the most impressive city of the Incan was not its capital, cuzco, but the city Machu Picchu.

This mountain retreat is built high in the andes and is sometimes call the "Lost city of the Incas." It was intended as a mountain retreat for the leaders of Incan empire and shows great artistry- the abundant dry stone walls entirely built without motar and the blocks cut so carefully that one can't insert a knife-blade between the massive blocks.

The spanish discovered the Incan during a civil war of succession and enjoyed great military superiority over the slow seige warfare that the Incan had employed against its enemies. Fueled by greed in having the opportunity to plunder another rich civilization, they conquered the incan emporer and had him put to death. The Incan empire fell quickly 1533. A small resistance force fled to the mountains waging a guerilla war of resistance for another 39 years.

The Meso-American Empires were undoubtably the most powerful and unified civilizations in the new world. Writings were common in the meso-America and allowed these cultures to spread in power and influence far more then their counterparts in North America. Each of these civilizations built impressive urban areas and had a complex culture. They were as 'civilized' as the spanish whom conquered them in the 15 and 16th century.

[edit] Early Empires of the Southwest

In the southwestern continental United States, distinct civilizations began that had adapted to the harsh arid conditions. One prominent group were the Anasazi whom lived in the present day Northeastern Arizona and surrounding areas. The topography of this area is that of a flat arid, desert plain, surronded by small areas of high plateau, called mesas. Softer rock layers within the mesas eroded to form steep canyons and overhangs along their slopes.

The Anasazi culture used these cave-like overhangs in the side of steep mesas as shelter from the brief, fierce southwestern storms. They also found natural seeps and diverted small streams of snowmelt into small plots of maize, squash and beans. Small seasonal rivers formed beds of natural clays and dried muds. The Anasazi used hardened dry mud, called adobe, along with sandstone to form intricate buildings and were sometimes found high in the natural overhangs of the mesas. The Anasazi culture were also skilled at forming the natural clays into pottery.

Between 900 - 1130 AD a period of relatively wet conditions allowed the Anasazi people to flourish. Traditional architecture was perfected, pottery became intricate and artistic, turkeys were demosticated, and trade over long distances influenced the entire region. Following this golden period was the 300 year drought called Great Drought. The Anasazi culture was stressed and erupted into warfare. Scientists once believed the entire people vanished, possibly moving great distances to avoid the arid desert. New research suggests that the anazasi dispersed; abandoning the intricate buildings and moving towards smaller settlements to utilize the limited water that existed.

Borderng the Anasazi culture in the north, a separate civilization emerged in southern Arizona, called the Hohokam. While many native americans in the southwest used water irrigation on a limited scale. It was the hohokam culture that perfected the technology (all without the benefit of modern powered excavating tools). The ability to divert water into small argricultural plots meant that the Hohokam could live in large agricultural communities of relatively high population density. This was particularly true in the Gila River vally, where the Gila River was diverted in many places to irrigate large fertile plains and numerous compact towns. The bigger towns had a great house at its center, which was a large Adobe/stone structure. Some of these structures were four stories in size and probably were used by the managerial or religous elites. Smaller excavation or pits were enclosed by adobe walls and used as primary residences. Smaller pitrooms and pits were used for many different functions.

The successful use of irrigation evident in the extensive Casa Grande village. Situated between two primary canals, the Casa Grande site has been the focus of nearly 9 decades of archaeological work. The original town was built around a great house and incorporated open courtyards and cirular plazas. By the 10th century neighboring settlements had been built to accomodate a large highly developed region. The scale of this community can be seen in the results of one excavation of part of it in 1997. The project had identified 247 pithouses, 27 pitrooms, 866 pits, 11 small canals, a ballcourt, and portions of four adobe walled compounds.

The hohokam culture disintegrated as they had difficulty maintaining the canals in the dry conditions of the drought. Small blockages or collapses of the canal would choke the intricate irrigation networks. Large towns and extensive irrigation canals were abandoned. The people gave up their cultural way of life and dispersed into neighboring tribes.

Native Americans adapted the arid desert southwest. A period of relatively wet conditions saw many cultures in the area flourish. Extensive irrigation was delvoped that were among the biggest of the ancient world. Elaborate adobe and sandstone buildings were constructed. Highly ornamental and artistic pottery was created. Dry conditions neccesitated more a more minimal way of life and the elaborate accomplishments of these cultures were abandoned.

[edit] Early Empires of the Mississippi

The mound-building people was one of the earliest civilization to emerge in North America. Beginning around 1000BC cultures developed that used burial mounds for religious and burial purposes. These moundbuilding people are categorized by a series of cultures that describe dinstinctive artwork and artifacts found in large areas throughout present-day eastern United States.

The burial mound was the principle characteristic of all of these societies. These large structures were built by piling baskets of carefully selected earth on top of a mound of earth. Sometimes built on top of them were small buildings. Some of these mounds were quite large. The Grave Creek Mound in the panhandle of present day West-Viginia is nearly 70 feet tall and 300 feet in diameter. Other mounds have even been shown to be oriented in a way that allows for astronomical alignments such as solstices,and equinoxes.

Mound building cultures spread out in size and importance. The first culture, The Adena lived in present-day Southern Ohio and surrounding areas. The succeeding cultures united into an impressive trade system that allowed each cultures to influence each other. The Hopewell exchange included groups of people throughout the continental Eastern United States. There began to be considerable social stratitication within this people. This organization predates the emergance of the tribe as a socio-political group of people that would dominate later eastern and western native american civilization.

The climax of this civilization was the missippian culture. Groups had become progressed to social complexity comparable to Post-Roman, Pre-Consolidationa Tribal England. Mounds became numerous and some settlements had large complexes of mounds. Mounds were pyramid shaped with truncated tops. Structures were frequently built on top of the mounds. Institutional social inequalities existed such as slavery and human sacrifice. Cahokia, near the importance trade routes of the Missippi and Missouri rivers became an influential and highly developed east to the Atlantic Ocean. community. Extensive trade networks extended from the Great lakes to the Gulf of Mexico and

Cahokia was one of the great centers of Missippian culture and its largest settlement of missippian. The focal point of the settlement was the ceremonial mound called Monk's Mound. Monk's Mound was the largest mound ever constructing by mound-building people and was nearly 100 feet tall and 900 feet long. Excavation on the top of Monk's Mound has revealed evidence of a large building - perhaps a temple - that could be seen throughout the city. The city was spread out in a large plain south of Monks mound.

Monk's Mound located at the Cahokia site near Collinsville, Illinois.

The city proper contained 120 mounds at a varying distances from the city center. The mounds were divided into several different types each of which may have had its own meaning and fuction. A circle of posts immediate to the monks mound marked a great variety of astronomical alignments. The city was surrounded by a series of watchtowers and occupied a diamond shape pattern that was nearly 5 miles across. It its height, the city may have contained as many as 40,000 people making it the largest in North America.

It is likely the missippian culture was dispersed by the onslaught of viral diseases such as smallpox that was brought by the european explorers. Urban areas were particularly vulnerable to diseases and Cahokia was abandoned in the 1500's. The dispersal of tribes made it impractical to build or maintain mounds and many were found abandoned by European explorers.

Native Americans in the Eastern Continental United States developed and share mound-building cultures early in North American History. Groups of native americans would become more stratified as time went on and develop into tribes. These tribes participated in long networks of trade and cultural exchanges. The importance of trade routes developed urban cities of great importance.

[edit] Contact with European Culture

European contact brought immediate changes in many tribes of North America. One of the most significant changes to all indian tribes was the introduction of viral diseases and epidemics. Smallpox was probably the single biggest scourge to hit North America. Infected contagious indians spread the plague far inland almost immediately after early encounters with European settlers. Historians estimate that over 80% of all Native Americans died from diseases soon after first contact. The effects traumatized many powerful and important cultures. Urban areas were particularly vulnerable and native american culture adapted by becoming more isolated, less unified, and with a renewed round of intribal warfare as tribes seized the opportunity to gain resources once owned by rivals.

On the other hand, Europeans brought invasive plants and animals. The horse was re-introduced to america (as original paleo-american populations of wild horse from the Bering land bridge was extinct) and quickly adapted to free range on the sprawling great plains. Tribes of nomadic Native Americans were quick to see the horse's value as an increase in there mobility; allowing them to better adapt to changing conditions and as a valuable asset in inter-tribal warfare.

[edit] Vikings (1000-1013)

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[edit] Who were the Vikings?

Map showing area of Scandinavian settlements during the 9th to 10th centuries. Also the trade and raid routes, often inseparable, are marked.

The Norsemen (Norwegians) who lived around the beginning of the second millennium are today more commonly known as Vikings. The Vikings were farmers who "traded" during the slow months. Now, "trading" doesn't mean "I'll give you five sheep for that cow." It means "I'll give you five sheep for that cow. If you don't want to trade, I'll kill you." These people loved to travel in boats from one place to another, and this led to the second discovery of North America (Native Americans first, Vikings second, and Columbus third). Although Irish monks, most famously Brendan, and other European explorers had voyaged in the western waters, the Vikings established a settlement, the remains of which can be seen today at L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland.

[edit] Proported Ancestry and Descendants

The Norse are believed by some to have descended from the Huns, a people of uncertain ancestry. The Norse are believed by some to be the ancestors of the Goths and of modern Germans. There is no proof for these claims.

[edit] Snorri Sturluson

Snorri Sturluson (1178 – September 23, 1241) was an Icelandic historian, poet and politician. He was two-time elected lawspeaker at the Icelandic parliament, the Althing. He was the author of the Prose Edda or Younger Edda, which consists of Gylfaginning ("the fooling of Gylfi"), a narrative of Norse mythology, the Skáldskaparmál, a book of poetic language, and the Háttatal, a list of verse forms. He was also the author of the Heimskringla, a history of the Norwegian kings that begins with legendary material in Ynglinga saga and moves through to early medieval Scandinavian history. For stylistic and methodological reasons, Snorri is often taken to be the author of Egils saga.

As a historian and mythographer, Snorri is remarkable for proposing the theory (in the Prose Edda) that mythological gods begin as human war leaders and kings whose funeral sites develop cults (euhemerism). As people call upon the dead war leader as they go to battle, or the dead king as they face tribal hardship, they begin to venerate the figure. Eventually, the king or warrior is remembered only as a god. He also proposed that as tribes defeat others, they explain their victory by proposing that their own gods were in battle with the gods of the others

Snorri Sturluson was born into the wealthy and powerful Sturlungar family of the Icelandic Commonwealth, a sovereign nation, about 1178. His parents were Sturla Þórðarson[2] of Hvamm and Guðný Böðvarsdóttir. He had two older brothers, Þórðr Sturluson (the oldest) and Sighvatr Sturluson.

By a quirk of circumstance he was raised from the age of three (or four) by Jón Loftsson, a relative of the Norwegian royal family, in Oddi, Iceland. As Sturla was trying to settle a lawsuit with Father Páll Sölvason, the latter's wife lunged suddenly at him with a knife, intending, she said, to make him like his hero Odin (one-eyed), but bystanders deflected the blow to the cheek. The resulting settlement would have beggared Páll. Loftsson intervened in the Althing to mitigate the judgement and to compensate Sturla, offered to raise and educate Snorri.

Snorri therefore received an education and made connections that he might not otherwise have made. He attended the school of Sæmundr fróði, grandfather of Loftsson, at Oddi. He never returned to his parents' home. His father died in 1183 and his mother as guardian soon wasted Snorri's share of the inheritance. Loftsson died in 1197. The two families then arranged a marriage in 1199 between Snorri and Herdís, the first daughter of Bersi. From her father, Snorri inherited an estate at Borg and a chieftainship. He soon acquired more property and chieftainships.

Snorri and Herdís were together for four years at Borg. They had a few children. The marriage succumbed to Snorri's philandering, and in 1206 he settled in Reykholt as manager of an estate there, but without Herdís. He made significant improvements to the estate, including a hot outdoor bath (Snorralaug). The bath and the buildings have been preserved to some extent. During the initial years at Reykholt he had several more children by different women: Gudrun, Oddny and Thuridur.

[edit] Eric "the Red" and his Children

Eric "the Red" fled Norway to Iceland to avoid facing a murder charge, and later was banished from Iceland for yet another murder. His children would have great impact on the discovery and explorations of North America.

[edit] Bjarni Ericson

Bjarni travelled around trading in his little knarr. A knarr is a small Norwegian boat that only fits about three to five people. Bjarni sighted Vinland (modern Newfoundland).

An interesting fact is that Leif Ericson bought Bjarni Herjólfsson's boat about ten years later, in about 995 C. E. This is the same boat in which Bjarni had discovered Vinland. Leif Ericson was about thirty years old (or thirty three, depending on whether one follows the "Eiríks saga rauða", i.e. the Saga of Eric the Red, or the "Grœnlendinga saga", or the Greenlanders Saga).

[edit] Thorvald Ericson

Explored from 1004 to 1005 AD.

[edit] Thorfinn Ericson

Traveled from 1008-1009 AD. He bravely took cattle with him on his knarr, hoping to settle in Greenland. "Greenland" is a misnomer, since it's covered in ice; his cattle died.

[edit] Freydis Erikidottir

Freydis was Eric's daughter, his fourth child. Since Freydis was a woman, there were many restrictions put upon her, but she wanted to make a name for herself. In 1013 AD, she explored with 2 Icelandic men, and killed them and their men upon arriving in Vinland (North America).

[edit] Leif Ericson

Leif Ericson did further exploration of Vinland and settled there. In 986, Norwegian-born Eirik Thorvaldsson, known as Eirik the Red, explored and colonized the southwestern part of Greenland. It was his son, Leiv Eiriksson, who became the first European to set foot on the shores of North America, and the first explorer of Norwegian extraction now accorded worldwide recognition.

The date and place of Leiv Eiriksson's birth has not been definitely established, but it is believed that he grew up on Greenland. The Saga of Eric the Red relates that he set sail for Norway in 999, served King Olav Trygvasson for a term, and was sent back to Greenland one year later to bring Christianity to its people.

[edit] Exploration (1266-1522)

European contact with the American continent began as a brief exploration by the Vikings. Knowledge of their new-found land became legend. European desire for spices and contact with Asia allowed intrepid explorers the opportunity to re-discovery the American Continent. Christopher Columbus, incorrectly calculating the size of the earth, undertook a voyage around the world. His legacy was not to find a new route to Asia, as he hoped, but to find a new continent. This continent was named America, after another early explorer, Amerigo Vespucci.

Other countries apart from the Spanish began to explore and establish settlements in the New World. Jacques Cartier undertook a northern voyage for the French. There they began the settlement of New france, developing the Fur industry and fostering a more respectful relationship with many of the inhabitants. The Spanish conquistadors invaded the new world looking for riches. While some Spanish invaders destroyed the powerful Aztec and Incan cultures, others chased legends, such as the fountain of youth and the hidden city of gold. With the Spanish empire spanning much of the South and New France situated in the North, there was still room for the English to exploit. As English nationalism rose in the 16th century, The English began to colonize the mid-Atlantic region of the Continent.


[edit] The Vikings make first Contact

The Vikings were a group of Scandinavian warriors. During the 8th Century, the Vikings began a campaign of conquest and exploration. For 200 years, they carried out brutal raids on towns and treasuries throughout Europe. In the North, they began new settlements on the largely uninhabited islands of the North Atlantic. The story of American Exploration begins with a Viking called "Erik the Red". Accused of murder and banished from his native home of Iceland in about 982, Eric explored and later founded a settlement in, what is now, Greenland. Realizing the harsh bleak landscape of Greenland would need many people to prosper, Eric returned to Iceland after his exile had passed, and coined the word "Greenland" to appeal to the overpopulated and treeless settlement of Iceland. Eric returned to Greenland in 985 and established two colonies with a thriving population of nearly 5000.

Erik's son, Leif Eiríksson, was drawn to rumors of lands to the west seen by a Viking who was blown off course during a storm. During 1003-1004, Leiff Erikson explored the North-East reaches of North America. He landed in three places, the first he named Helluland ("Land of the Flat Stones"), possibly present-day Baffin Island. The second he named Markland ("Wood-land"), possibly present-day Labrador. The third was where he established a small settlement called Vinland. The location of Vinland is uncertain but an archeological site in Newfoundland (L'anse aux Meadows) was identified as the site of a modest Viking settlement and is the oldest confirmed presence of Europeans in North America. Despite an hospitable climate and abundant resources, the settlement in Vinland was abandoned as tension rose between the Vikings and the native inhabitants, called skraelingar by the Vikings. Bickering also broke out among the Norseman themselves. Experts think the settlement lasted less than two years.

Viking civilization had reached its high water mark. Christianity and the emergence of a unified Christian kingdom in Norway would cause disunity within the the Viking civilization. Europe would soon fall into a series of devastating bouts of epidemic disease. Explorations of a New Land to the West would become a legendary tale of the feared Viking pirates. Nearly 500 years would pass before another European saw the American continent.

[edit] The Triumph of Christopher Columbus

By the 15th Century trade in Europe was expanding. The Roman Empire had broken up into several strong Kingdoms. Trade for luxuries such as spices and silk had inspired European explorers to seek new routes to Asia. The fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 was a pivotal reason for European exploration. Trade throughout the Ottoman Empire was difficult and unreliable. In particular, Portugal held a lead in exploration and was slowly exploring the shores of the African Continent in search of a better route to the spices and luxuries of the Orient.

It was upon this backdrop that an explorer, Christopher Columbus, submitted his plans for a voyage to Asia by sailing around the world. By the late 15th century most educated Europeans knew the world was round. The Greek mathematician, Eratosthenes, had accurately deduced that the world was approximately 25,000 miles in diameter. Based on this figure many of the experts studying Columbus's plans, on behalf of the European monarchies that he approached, correctly felt it was too far for any contemporary sailing ship to go. Columbus contested the measurements claiming that the world was much smaller than widely believed.

After several approaches to the Spanish Monarchy, the Spanish King, King Ferdinand decided to give Columbus a chance, despite the advice of his advisers. Perhaps he would find something that could give the Spanish an opportunity to compete with their neighboring kingdom of Portugal. As it turned out, Columbus succeeded and launched Europe towards a new age of discovery. Columbus set out on his landmark voyage on Aug 3, 1492. Five weeks later, the long voyage would come to an end when land was sighted. This was an island in the present-day Bahamas. During this voyage Columbus also explored the northeast coast of Cuba and the northern coast of Hispaniola. On his return to Spain, his news of the new lands discovered spread throughout Europe. Columbus was to make three more voyages to the New World, exploring the area of the Caribbean and the mainland of Central and South America.

Columbus had been granted the authority by the Spanish Monarchy to claim the land for the Spanish, begin a settlement, trade for valuable goods or gold and explore. He was also made governor of all the lands which he found. Columbus become an increasing savage and brutal governor, with three subsequent voyages to explore and exploit the riches and resources of the Native Americans. He enslaved and stole from the natives, at one point threatening to cut off the hands of any native who failed to give him gold. His brutal reign would foreshadow the arrival of the Spanish warriors called the Conquistadors who would plunder and destroy the large, wealthy Aztec, Incan and Mayan civilizations.

Christopher Columbus believed for the remainder of his life, that he had reached Asia. However, it was another Spanish explorer, Amerigo Vespucci who gave his name to the new continent. Amerigo tried to describe the lands around his islands and deduce its proximity to Asia. From his voyages, Amerigo deduced that Columbus had found a new Continent. This new continent would be named America.

[edit] French Empire in North America

Christopher Columbus's voyages inspired other European powers to seek out the new world as well. Jacques Cartier was a respected mariner, he proposed a trip to the north to investigate whether Asian lands could be reached from the North. His trip in 1534 retraced much of the voyages of the vikings and established contacts with natives in modern-day Canada. He explored some of northern Canada, established friendly relations with the American indians, and discovered that the St Lawrence river region neither had abundant gold or a northwest passage to Asia.

During the 16th century, the taming of Siberian wilderness by the Russians had established a thriving fur trade which created a great demand for fur throughout Europe. France was quick to realize that the North held great potential as a provider of gold. Samuel de Champlain settled the first permanent settlement in present-day Canada and created a thriving trade with the native Americans for beaver pelts.

Meanwhile, in the South, Early french protestants, called Huguenots, had the opportunity to leave hostile European lands while advancing French claims to the new world. Settlements in present-day Florida and Georgia would create tension with Spanish conquistadors, who after conquering Caribbean lands would begin to expand their search for new lands.

[edit] Spanish Empire in North America

The Spanish conquistador, Ponce de Leon was an early visitor to the Americas, traveling to the new world on Columbus's second voyage. He became the first governor of Puerto Rico in 1509. However, upon the death of Christopher Columbus, the spanish did not allow Christopher's son (who also had committed atrocities upon the native Americans of the Caribean) to succeed. The governors were released and replaced with successors from Spain. Ponce de Leon, freed of his governorship, decided to explore areas to the north, where there was rumored to be a fountain of youth that restored the youth of anyone drinking from it. Ponce de Leon found an peninsula on the coast of North America, called the new land 'Florida' and chartered a colonizing expedition. Ponce de Leon's presence was brief as he was attacked by native American forces and died in nearby Cuba. By the early 16th century spanish conquistadors had penetrated deep into the central and south american continents. Large native americans cultures had collected large troves and gold and valuables and given them to leaders of these prosperous empires. Spanish conquistadors realized that they held considerable military and technological superiority over these cultures and attacked them, destroying the aztec culture in 1521 and the incan culture 1532. The wealth seized by the spanish would lead to piracy and a new wave of settlements as the other colonial powers became increasingly hostile to the spanish. Many areas and nations that were solely colonized by the spanish were inudiated by english and french pirates. By 1565, Spanish forces looked to expand Spanish (and Catholic) influence in the New World and attacked the French settlement of Fort Caroline. The Spanish navy overwhelmed 200 French hugenot settlers slaughtering even as they surrended to superior spanish military might. The Spanish formed the settlement of St Augustine as an outpost to ensure that French Huguenots where no longer welcome in the area. This is the oldest continuously occupied European-established city in North America.

[edit] British Empire in North America

England funded an initial exploratory trip shortly after Christopher Columbus's first voyage. John Cabot made the trip for England in 1501. He was explored the North American continent (correctly deducing that the spherical shape of the earth made it a shorter distance to the New World in the North than the South islands that christopher was exploring. Encouraged he asked for the english monarchy for a more substancial expediation to further explore and settle the lands which he found. The ships departed and were never seen again.

The English monarchy remained preoccupied with internal affairs for much of the 16th century. By the beginning of the 17th century The English had consolidated much of the british isles and were beginning a much more formidable foe, espacially its navy which was building in preparation for a massive strike upon the spanish armada.

Sir William raleigh had gained considerable favor from the english monarchy by suppressing rebellions in ireland and sought to establish an empire in the new world. His Roanoke colony would be relatively isolated from existing settlements in North America. He privately funded the colonies (unlike earlier efforts that were usually funded and sponsered by monarchies). The colony was thought to be destroyed during a three year period in which English was at war with spanish and did serious damage to the spanish navy.

The war left the english monarchy drained of money and resources such that the english monarchy sold a charter containing lands between present-day south carolina to the US-Canda border to two competing groups of investors; the Pymouth company and the London company. The two companies were given the North and South portions of this area, respectively.

The Northern plymouth settlement in maine faltered and was abandoned, however the London company established the Jamestown settlement in 1606. This settlement faltered but steadied by the determination of John Rolfe, the settlement developed tobacco as a cash crop for the colony and served as a beginning for the colonial state of Virginia.

[edit] Early Colonial Period (1492 - 1607)

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[edit] The Arrival of Columbus

Christopher Columbus and three ships - the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria - set sail on August 3, 1492. On October 12, a lookout cried out that he had sighted land. The crew set foot on an island that day, naming it San Salvador. It is unknown which exact island was discovered by Columbus. (Note that the island presently called San Salvador is so-called in honor of Columbus' discovery; it is not necessarily the one on which Columbus set foot.)

The Native Americans inhabiting the islands were described as "Indians" by Columbus, who had believed that he had discovered the East Indies (modern Indonesia). In reality, he had found an island in the Caribbean. He continued to explore the area, returning to Spain. Columbus' misconception that he found Asia was corrected years later by the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci, after whom America may be named.

[edit] The Protestant Reformation

In Europe, the power of the Pope and the influence of Catholicism was undoubted. The Catholic religion affected every aspect of politics on the continent. However, in the sixteenth century, the conditions were ripe for reform. Gutenberg's printing press made the spread of ideas much easier. The influence of nationalism grew, and rulers began to resent the power possessed by the Pope.

The Protestant movement may have commenced earlier, but the publication of Ninety-Five Theses by Martin Luther in 1517 spurred on the revolution within the Church. Luther attacked the Church's theology, which, he believed, misrepresented The Bible and placed too much authority in the hands of the clergy, and wished to reform the Church. After being excommunicated, Luther published many books on Reform. Luther's works were most influential in Germany and Scandinavia.

Persons other than Luther championed the cause of Reform. In Switzerland, Huldreich Zwingli advanced Protestant ideas, which mostly affected his home country. Similarly, Frenchman John Calvin helped the spread of Protestantism in France and the Netherlands.

English Protestantism resulted from the direct influence of the British monarch. Henry VIII (1509-1547) sought to divorce his wife, Catherine of Aragon, because she had failed to produce a viable male heir to the throne. When his divorce led to excommunication by the Pope, Henry simply declared the entire country free of Catholic domination and a bastion of Protestantism. Henry reasoned that England could survive under its own religious regulation (Anglican) and he named himself head of the church.

[edit] Elizabethan England

Elizabethan Succession

After Henry VIII died, he was succeeded by his son Edward VI (1547-1553) who reigned briefly before dying. Edward's death led to the ascension of Henry's daughter by Catherine, Mary I (1553-1558). A staunch Catholic, Mary sought to return England back to the Catholic church. Her religious zeal and persecution of Protestants earned her the nickname, "Bloody Mary." After a short reign, she was succeeded by her half-sister, Elizabeth. Elizabeth I (1558-1603) was the daughter of Henry's second wife, Anne Boleyn. Her ascendency to the throne resulted when neither of her half siblings, Edward and Mary, produced an heir to the throne.

Religious Reform

Under her siblings' reign, the nation constantly battled religious fervor as it sought to identify itself as either Protestant or Catholic. Henry VIII had severed ties with the Roman Catholic Church upon his excommunication after divorcing Catherine of Aragon. He established the Church of England (the precursor to the Anglican Church) as the official state religion and named himself, not the Pope, as its head. Under Mary, the country returned to Catholic rule. The Elizabethan Age brought stability to English government. Elizabeth sought a compromise (the Elizabethan Settlement) which returned England to a nation governed by Protestant theology with a Catholic ritual. Elizabeth called Parliament in 1559 to consider the Reformation Bill that re-established an independent Church of England and redefined the sacrament of communion. Parliament also approved the Act of Supremacy, establishing ecclesiastical authority with the monarch.

Economic Reform

Elizabeth's far more important response was to stabilize the English economy following the 1551 collapse of the wool market. To respond to this economic crisis, Elizabeth used her power as monarch to shift the supply-demand curve. She expelled all non-English wool merchants from the empire. Her government placed quotas on the amount of wool that could be produced while also encouraging manors to return to agricultural production. She also started trading directly with the Spanish colonies in direct violation of their tariff regulations. This maritime violation would later result in an attack on England by the Spanish Armada in 1588.

Queen Elizabeth was a very popular monarch. Her people followed her in war and peace. She remained unmarried until her death, probably through a reluctance to share any power and preferring a series of suitors. This gave her the name, the Virgin Queen, and in honor of her, a colony was named Virginia a few years after her death.

In the aftermath of the Armada's overwhelming defeat and building on the development of a strong fleet started by Henry VIII, England began to gain recognition as a great naval power. Nationalism in England increased tremendously. Thoughts of becoming a colonial power were inspired. These thoughts were aided by the fact that the defeated Spanish lost both money and morale, and would be easy to oppose in the New World.

[edit] Early Colonial Ventures

Richard Hakluyt

In 1584, Richard Hakluyt proposed a strong argument for expansion of English settlement into the new world. With his Discourse Concerning Western Planting, Hakluyt argued that creating new world colonies would greatly benefit England. The colonies could easily produce raw materials that were unavailable in England. By establishing colonies, England would assure itself of a steady supply of materials that it currently purchased from other world powers. Second, inhabited colonies would provide a stable market for English manufactured goods. Finally, as the economic incentives were not enough, the colonies could provide a home for disavowed Englishmen.

Roanoke

The English had already begun the exploration of the New World prior to the Armada's defeat. In 1584, Queen Elizabeth granted Sir Walter Raleigh a charter authorizing him to explore the island of Roanoke, which is part of what is now North Carolina.

Between 1584 and 1586, Raleigh financed expeditions to explore the island of Roanoke and determine if the conditions were proper for settlement. In 1586, about a hundred men were left on the island. They struggled to survive, being reduced to eating dogs. They were, however, rescued- except for fifteen men whose fate remained a mystery.

After another expedition in 1587, another group of men, women, and children- a total of more than one-hundred people- remained on the island. Governor John White of the Roanoke colony discovered from a local Native American tribe that the fifteen men who were not rescued were killed by a rival tribe. While attempting to gain revenge, White's men killed members of a friendly tribe and not the members of the tribe that allegedly killed the fifteen men.

Having thus strained relations with the Natives, the settlers could not survive easily. John White decided to return to England in 1587 and return with more supplies. When he returned, England faced war against Spain. Thus delayed, White could not return to Roanoke until 1590. When he did return, White discovered that Roanoke was abandoned. All that gave clue to the fate of the colony was the word Croatan, the name of a nearby Native American tribe, carved out on to a tree. No attempt was made to discover the actual cause of the disappearance until several years later.

There are only theories as to the cause of the loss of Roanoke. There are two major possibilities. Firstly, the settlers may have been killed by the Natives. Second, the settlers may have assimilated themselves into the Native tribes. But there is no evidence that settles the matter beyond doubt.

[edit] Review Questions

Use the content in this chapter and/or from external sources to answer the following questions. Remember to properly cite any sources used.

  1. Identify or explain the significance of the following people:
    (a) Christopher Columbus
    (b) Martin Luther
    (c) King Henry VIII
    (d) Richard Hakluyt
    (e) Elizabeth I
    (f) Sir Walter Raleigh
  2. What primary factor(s) led to the shift from Catholicism to Protestant belief in England?
  3. Why did King Henry VIII establish the Church of England? How did this influence the English Reformation?
  4. Differentiate between Elizabeth I's policies and Henry VIII's. What attitudes did the English have toward Elizabeth and her rule?
  5. What did the defeat of the Spanish Armada symbolize to all of Europe?
  6. What difficulties did the colonists of Raleigh face between 1584 and 1587? What was the fate of the colony?

[edit] The English Colonies (1607 - 1754)

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[edit] Types of Colonies

In America, there were three different types of colonies. First, corporate colonies were established by corporations known as "joint stock companies". A joint stock company was a project in which people would invest shares of stock into building a new colony. Depending on the success of the colony, each investor would receive profit based on the shares he bought. This method of investing proved to be less risky than starting a colony from scratch, and in the process each investor could have some influence on how the colony was run. For example, these investors often elected their own public officials.

Meanwhile, proprietary colonies were owned by a person or family, who could make laws and appoint officials as he or they pleased. Finally, royal colonies were under the direct control of the King, who usually appointed a Royal Governor.

[edit] Virginia and Jamestown

Founded in 1607 with a charter from the Virginia Company of London, Jamestown was the first permanent English colony in the Americas. However, the swampy terrain was a breeding ground for mosquitoes, which carried a variety of diseases - dysentery, malaria, smallpox - that the English were unaccustomed to. Many of the settlers fell prey to these infections and died shortly after.

In addition, Virginia's initial government had no backbone, and its individual members frequently quarreled over policies. The colonists themselves frantically searched for any precious metals (i.e. gold) they could find, ignoring their deteriorating health in the process. Furthermore, "Indian raids" also weakened any hopes of defense and unification, and gradually the population of the colony declined. By the winter of 1609-1610, also known as the Starving Time, only 60 settlers remained from the original 500 passengers.

Despite these shortcomings, it was the work of two men that helped the colony to survive: John Smith and John Rolfe. John Smith, who arrived in Virginia in 1608, introduced an ultimatum - those who did not work would not receive food or pay. His struggle to improve the colony's conditions succeeded - the colonists learned how to raise crops and trade with the nearby Indians, with whom Smith had made peace.

In 1612, John Rolfe, an English businessman, discovered that Virginia had ideal conditions for growing tobacco. This singular discovery led to an explosion of success as the plant became the colony's major cash crop. With English demand for tobacco rising, Virginia had now found a way to economically support itself.

In 1619, Virginia set up the House of Burgesses, the first elected legislative assembly in America. It marked the beginnings of self-government, as opposed to the martial law that was previously imposed on the colonists.

Simultaneously, however, the king declared Virginia a royal colony, or a colony run by the English monarchy. While the House of Burgesses was still allowed to run the government, the king nevertheless appointed a royal governor to settle disputes and enforce certain British policies.

[edit] Massachusetts Bay Colony

Meanwhile, the English had their own problems with religious tension. The Pilgrims, a radical group of Protestants, faced persecution because they disagreed with the official Church of England. In 1620, forty-one Pilgrims sailed for the new world. Based on numerous contemporary accounts, it is quite clear that the Pilgrims originally intended to settle the Hudson River region near present day Long Island, New York. Once Cape Cod was sighted, they turned south to head for the Hudson River, but encountered treacherous seas and nearly shipwrecked. They then decided to return to Cape Cod rather than risk another attempt to head south. After weeks of scouting for a suitable settlement area, the Mayflower's passengers finally landed at Plymouth in present-day Massachusetts on Dec. 26, 1620.

They agreed to govern themselves in the manner set forth in the Mayflower Compact, which was named for the Pilgrims' ship, The Mayflower. After two years they abandoned the communal form of partnership begun under the Mayflower Compact and in 1623 assigned individual plots of land to each family to work. William Bradford, who was selected as governor after John Carver died has left us with a journal that helps to understand the challenges, encounters with native americans and successes of the colony. (1) (2)

Ten years later, the Massachusetts Bay Company, a joint stock company, acquired a charter from King Charles of England. The colony of Plymouth was eventually absorbed by Massachusetts Bay, but it did remain separate until 1691.

A large group of Puritans migrated to the new colony of Massachusetts Bay. The colony, ironically, did not provide religious freedom. It only permitted male Puritans to vote and established Puritan ideas as part of the official religion of the colony (The Act of Toleration).

[edit] New Netherland

New Netherland (Dutch: Nieuw-Nederland), was the territory on the eastern coast of North America in the 17th century which stretched from latitude 38 to 45 degrees north as originally discovered by the Dutch East India Company with the yacht Half Moon under the command of Henry Hudson in 1609 and explored by Adriaen Block and Hendrick Christiaensz from 1611 until 1614. Their map of 1614, presented to the States General, claimed the territory as New Netherland for the Republic of the Seven United Provinces.

A private commercial venture since patents were issued by the States General in 1614, New Netherland became a province of the Dutch Republic in 1624. At that time the northern border was reduced to 42 degrees north in acknowledgment of the inevitable intrusion of the English north of Cape Cod.

According to the Law of Nations, a claim on a territory required not only discovery and charting, but also settlement. In May 1624 the Dutch completed their claim by landing 30 Dutch families on Noten Eylant, modern Governors Island.

Over the next few decades New Netherland was run by less than adequate director-generals. Wars with the Native Americans erupted, and conficts with the English seemed destined to destroy the colony. All of that changed when Peter Stuyvesant was appointed Director-General in 1647. As he arrived he said "I shall govern you as a father his children". He expanded the colonies borders, conquering New Sweden in 1655 and resolved the border dispute with New England in 1650. He improved defences to protect the colonists against Native American raids, and the population of the colony went from 500 in 1640, to 9,000 by 1664. In August of 1664, four English warships arrived in New York Harbor demanding the surrender of the colony. At first, Stuyvesant vowed to fight for the colony, but he received little support from the colonists due to lack of ammunition and gunpowder, thus, he was forced to surrender. This event would spark the Second Anglo-Dutch War in which, the Dutch captured Suriname. Both sides kept the territory they had captured following the treaty.

[edit] Revolution in England

Ever since the "Magna Carta" England had an unusual form of government where the power of Parliament was balanced against that of the king. In the mid seventeenth century this division of powers resulted in the English Civil War.

In 1637, King Charles attempted to expand the influence of the Church of England to Scotland. The Scots did not take this action kindly, and attacked the north of England. The King, in order to raise funds, summoned Parliament. Parliament, on the basis of many unresolved grievances regarding personal rights while also favoring a non-military solution, opposed the King and tried to increase its own power. Charles's unsuccessful attempt to bypass parliament, by using an Irish Catholic army on Scottish Protestants, further incensed the Parliamentarians.

Eventually, by 1642, hostilities between some members of Parliament and the King were so great that armed conflict became unavoidable. The Parliament, supported by the Scots, won the Civil War in 1646, when King Charles surrendered. Parliament gained assurances of royal restraint, but the Army remained unsatisfied. War broke out again in 1648, the Army being led by the Puritan Oliver Cromwell.

Charles settled his disputes with Scotland and allied himself with them. But Cromwell defeated the Scottish Army, and had Charles beheaded in 1649. Under a new written constitution called the "Instrument of Government" Cromwell was appointed as head of state for life or "Lord Protector" in 1653. England was governed by a mixture of parliaments and military councils until Cromwell's death in 1658. He was succeeded as head of state by his son, Richard who was removed by the army after seven months. Immediately afterwards there was an attempted military coup but General Monck's English army in Scotland marched to London to save Parliament. Parliament re-established the monarchy under Charles II in 1660 but after the civil war Parliament had become the true power in England.

Friction continued between the monarchy and Parliament throughout the seventeenth century and the overthrow of James II in England in the "Glorious Revolution" cemented Parliament's power and was accompanied by the "English Bill of Rights" in 1689 which is in some respects a forerunner of the US Constitution.

Large numbers of the more extreme elements found their way to the Colonies both before and after the Civil War. Most importantly freeborn Englishmen had ceased to be subject to the absolute power of a monarch but the colonies did not always share this privilege. Though the American Revolution was still more than a century away, these and other consequences of the Civil War caused the build-up in revolutionary sentiments.

[edit] Mercantilism

Mercantilism was an economic idea that a nation's power depended on the value of its exports. Under the idea of mercantilism, a nation could establish colonies to help produce more goods which were then exported, increasing the strength of the nation. Essentially, mercantilists believed that colonies should have been established not for the benefit of settlers, but for the benefit of the home country.

The Parliament of England passed the Navigation Acts to increase the benefit the English derived from its colonies. Firstly, the Acts required that any colonial imports or exports travel only on ships registered in England. Also, the colonies were forbidden to export tobacco and sugar to any nation other than England. Furthermore, the colonies could not import anything manufactured outside England unless the goods were first taken to England, where taxes were paid, and then to the colonies.

Of course, many colonists resented the Navigation Acts because it regulated them more and reduced opportunities for profit. The English, they felt, profited, while the hard-working colonists lost potential wealth!

[edit] The Remaining Colonies

In an attempt to gain supremacy over trade, and in following mercantilist ideas, the English waged war against the Dutch in 1664. The English took control over the Dutch harbor of New Amsterdam on the Atlantic coast of America. James, the brother of King Charles II, received the charter for New Amsterdam and the surrounding Dutch territory. James granted a portion of the territory, present-day New Jersey, to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Cartaret. James retained present-day New York for himself as a proprietary colony.

In 1634, Lord Baltimore appointed George Calvert of England to settle Maryland, a narrow strip of land north of Virginia and south of Pennsylvania, as a Catholic colony via a royal charter. Fifteen years later, in 1649, he signed the Act of Toleration, which proclaimed religious freedom for its colonists, among whom Protestants would become the majority despite the original charter. After Lord Baltimore's death several years later, Margaret Brent, the wife of an esteemed landowner in Maryland, executed his will as governor of the colony. She defied gender roles in the colonies by being the first woman of non-royal heritage to govern an English colony.

In 1673 the Dutch, lead by Michiel de Ruyter, briefly reoccupied New Netherland again, this time naming it New Orange. After peace was made, ending the Third Anglo-Dutch War, they agreed to return it back to the English.

At the other end of the Eastern Seaboard, the territory of Carolina was granted as a proprietory colony to eight different nobles. The proprietors divided Carolina into two separate colonies- North and South Carolina.

Charles II also granted William Penn the territory now known as Pennsylvania. Penn granted refuge to Quakers, a group of Protestants who opposed the Church of England, in his new colony. But the people of Delaware, who were mostly non-Quakers, separated from Pennsylvania in 1704.

The charter for Georgia, the last of the thirteen original colonies, was granted to James Oglethorpe and others in 1732. Georgia was first established as a "buffer" colony to protect the other colonies from attacks from the Spanish in Florida, as well as the French in Louisiana. Because of this, Georgia was the only colony to receive funds from England at the outset. Oglethorpe's goal was to provide Georgia as a place where debtors from England could regain financial standing.

[edit] The Lords of Trade

In an attempt to enforce mercantilist policies, King Charles II created the Lords of Trade as a new committee on the Privy Council. The Lords of Trade attempted to affect the government of the colonies in a manner beneficial to the English, rather than to the colonists.

The Lords of Trade, in an attempt to gain more power, attempted to convert all American colonies to royal ones. Under King James II, the successor to Charles II, New York, New Jersey, and the Puritan colonies were combined into the Dominion of New England in 1687.

However, the Dominion would not last for much time. In England, the Catholic James II was seen as a danger by Protestants. James was overthrown (he was technically held abdicated by Parliament) in the bloodless Glorious Revolution of 1688. In 1689, James' daughter Mary II and her husband William III took the throne as joint rulers. William and Mary dismantled the Dominion of New England, dissolved the Lords of Trade (Which William replaced with a Board of Trade, which was an advisory body), and reestablished the various separate colonies.

[edit] The Economy, Slavery, and Colonial Expansion

From the middle of the seventeenth century to the start of the Civil War, commercial agriculture was intimately associated with different types of servitude. During the colonial period, slaves grew much of the tobacco in Virginia and the Carolinas, rice in the low country of South Carolina and Georgia, and sugar on the Caribbean islands. During the same period, tens of thousands of British men and women were imported to the American colonies, especially to Virigina and the Carolinas, as indentured servants, or as punishment for lawbreaking. Even after release from indenture, many of these white people remained in the economic lower classes, though not subject to the slave codes, which became more harsh as time passed, denying almost all liberty to slaves in the southern colonies. Neither southerners, who used slaves as field laborers and servants, nor northerners, who supplied slaves and food to the southern and Caribbean plantations and consumed the products of slave labor, questioned the economic value of slavery.

Among the whites sent to the colonies by English authorities were many Scots-Irish people from Ulster. Known for hardiness, combativeness and harsh Calvinist religious beliefs, Scots-Irish settled in the frontier region of the Appalachian Mountains and eventually beyond in the Ohio and Mississippi country. Though the Scots-Irish had been at odds with England back home, in America their desire for land and freedom pushed the colonial boundary westward at little cost to the government, and provided an armed buffer between the eastern settlements and Native American tribes which had been driven away from the seaboard. Colonial frontiersmen endured a very harsh life, building their towns and farms by hand in a dense wilderness amid economic deprivation and native attack.

[edit] British Interference

The colonists sincerely believed that they had the right to govern themselves, being separated from Britain by an ocean and having founded an entirely new society. Such ideas were encouraged by the Glorious Revolution and 1689 Bill of Rights, which established that Parliament and not the King had the ultimate authority in government. Slowly, as interference from the Crown increased, the colonists felt more and more resentful about British control over the colonies.

In the 1730's, the Parliament began to pass laws regulating the Americas. The Sugar Act established a tax of six pence per gallon of sugar or molasses imported into the colonies. By 1750, Parliament had begun to ban, restrict, or tax several more products. This provoked much anger among the colonists, despite the fact that their tax burdens were quite low, when compared to most subjects of European monarchies of the same period.

[edit] Road to Revolution (1754 - 1774)

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[edit] The French and Indian War

(The following text is from Wikipedia)


The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was the North American chapter of the Seven Years' War. The name refers to the two main enemies of the British: the royal French forces and the various American Indian forces allied with them. The conflict, the fourth such colonial war between the kingdoms of France and Great Britain, resulted in the British conquest of all of New France east of the Mississippi River, as well as Spanish Florida. The outcome was one of the most significant developments in a century of Anglo-French conflict. To compensate its ally, Spain, for its loss of Florida, France ceded its control of French Louisiana west of the Mississippi. France's colonial presence north of the Caribbean was reduced to the tiny islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon.

[edit] Naming the war

The conflict is known by several names. In British North America, wars were often named after the sitting British monarch, such as King William's War or Queen Anne's War. Because there had already been a King George's War in the 1740s, British colonists named the second war in King George's reign after their opponents, and thus it became known as the French and Indian War.[1] This traditional name remains standard in the United States, although it obscures the fact that American Indians fought on both sides of the conflict.[2] American historians generally use the traditional name or the European title (the Seven Years' War), and have also invented other, less frequently used names for the war, including the Fourth Intercolonial War and the Great War for the Empire.[1]

In Great Britain and France, the North American theatre of the Seven Years' War war usually has no special name, and so the entire worldwide conflict is known as the Seven Years' War (or the Guerre de sept ans). The "Seven Years" refers to events in Europe, from the official declaration of war in 1756 to the signing of the peace treaty in 1763. These dates do not correspond with the actual fighting in North America, where the fighting between the two colonial powers was largely concluded in six years, from the Jumonville Glen skirmish in 1754 to the capture of Montreal in 1760.[1]

In Canada, both French- and English-speaking Canadians refer to it as the Seven Years' War (Guerre de Sept Ans) or the War of the Conquest (Guerre de la Conquête), since it is the war in which New France was conquered by the British and became part of the British Empire. This war was also known as the Forgotten War.

[edit] Impetus for war

[edit] Territorial expansion

There were numerous causes for the French and Indian War, which began less than a decade after France and Britain had fought on opposing sides in the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748). Both New France and New England wanted to expand their territories with respect to fur trading and other pursuits that matched their economic interests. Using trading posts and forts, both the British and the French claimed the vast territory between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, known as the Ohio Country. English claims resulted from royal grants which had no definite western boundaries. The French claims resulted from La Salle's claiming the Mississippi River for France—its drainage area includes the Ohio River Valley. In order to secure these claims, both European powers took advantage of Native American factions to protect their territories and to keep each other from growing too strong.

Newfoundland's Grand Banks were fertile fishing grounds and coveted by both sides. The conclusion of this war would see France keeping only the islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon, allowing them access to the Grand Banks to this day.

[edit] Religious ideology

The English colonists also feared papal influence in North America, as New France was administered by French governors and Roman Catholic hierarchy, and missionaries such as Armand de La Richardie were active during this period. For the predominantly Protestant British settlers, French control over North America could have represented a threat to their religious and other freedoms provided by English law. Likewise, the French feared the anti-Catholicism prevalent among English holdings. In this period, Catholicism was still enduring persecution under English law.

[edit] Céloron's expedition

In June 1747, Roland-Michel Barrin de La Galissonière, the Governor-General of New France, ordered Pierre-Joseph Céloron to lead an expedition to the Ohio Country wit