Spanish (Colonial Spain)
What were three main motivations for Spanish colonization in the Americas?
Answer: They sought gold, spread Christianity, and claimed territory for the crown.
What was the fur trade?
Primary economic motivation centered on harvesting and trading valuable animal pelts, especially beaver fur.
What was New Netherland / New Amsterdam and what was its primary focus?
The Dutch established a profitable trading colony centered on commerce, shipping, and the port settlement at what is now New York City.
What were common motivations for English colonization in North America?
Motivations included economic opportunity, religious freedom, land for settlement, and expanding English power overseas.
What was the encomienda system?
A system that forced Indigenous labor and tribute under Spanish rule, often replacing earlier tribute systems.
How did French colonists typically interact with Indigenous peoples?
The French approach often relied on alliances, intermarriage, and relatively cooperative relations with Indigenous nations in order to secure trade.
What was the Dutch West India Company?
The company that funded Dutch colonization, trade, and settlement in North America.
What was Jamestown?
An early English colony that struggled with starvation, conflict, and later tobacco cultivation that shaped labor needs.
Who was Hernán Cortés?
A famous Spanish explorer whose conquests brought the Aztec Empire under Spanish control in the early 1500s.
What was New France?
A region in North America (inland waterways and St. Lawrence River valley) where the French established settlements and trade networks.
How did the Dutch typically engage with Indigenous nations in their colony?
Dutch relations with local Indigenous peoples were often focused on trade (especially furs) but also included land deals and occasional conflicts.
What were typical effects of English settlement on Indigenous communities?
English settlers often displaced Indigenous peoples, engaged in land seizure and warfare, and imposed new legal and settlement patterns that transformed Indigenous ways of life.
What were the demographic and social consequences of Spanish colonization for Indigenous peoples?
The large-scale decline of Indigenous populations due to disease, violence, and forced labor after European contact.
What role did missionaries play in French colonization)?
French missionaries who sought to convert Indigenous peoples to Christianity, often learning local languages and living among communities.
A 1664 takeover in which the English seized the colony and renamed the main city and colony.
What was the development of plantation labor systems (including slavery and indentured servitude) in English colonies?
A labor system that emerged to meet plantation needs in English colonies, increasingly relying on enslaved Africans and indentured servants, especially in the Chesapeake and Southern colonies.
What were the major causes and consequences of Indigenous population decline and social disruption following European colonization?
This phenomenon combined disease brought by Europeans, violent conquest, forced labor systems, loss of land, and disruption of societies; it varied by colonizer and region but reshaped the Americas after 1492.