Age of Exploration
An Italian navigator funded by Spain who landed in the Caribbean in 1492, initiating sustained European contact with the Americas.
Christopher Columbus
The first permanent English settlement in North America, founded in Virginia.
Jamestown
A religious group seeking to purify the Church of England; founders of many New England colonies.
Puritans
A Christian movement emphasizing inner spiritual light, equality, pacifism, and religious tolerance.
Opponents of the ratification of the U.S. Constitution who feared a strong central government and pushed for a Bill of Rights to protect individual liberties.
Anti-Federalists
The massive transfer of plants, animals, people, diseases, and ideas between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres after 1492.
Columbian Exchange
An early Jamestown settler who developed a profitable tobacco crop, helping the colony survive.
John Rolfe
A subset of Puritans who believed the Church of England was beyond reform and sought to form independent congregations.
Separatists
A period of intensified fear about demonic activity and harmful supernatural practices, marked by widespread accusations, trials, and executions—especially targeting women in early modern Europe and colonial New England.
Witch Craze
A global conflict involving major European powers; in North America it’s known as the French and Indian War. Great Britain’s victory reshaped colonial politics and taxation.
Seven Years’ War (1756–1763)
The Spanish monarchs who unified Spain and financed Christopher Columbus’s 1492 voyage.
King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella
Portuguese islands off Africa where Europeans first developed large-scale sugar plantations using enslaved labor—an early model for Caribbean and American slavery.
Madeira Islands
A self-governing agreement signed by Pilgrims establishing a civil body politic for order and cooperation.
Mayflower Compact (1620)
A series of religious revivals in the 1730s–1740s that emphasized emotional preaching and personal religious experience. The most famous preacher was George Whitefield.
Great Awakening
An uprising of Massachusetts farmers protesting debts and taxes, highlighting weaknesses in the Articles of Confederation.
Shays’ Rebellion (1786–1787)
A Spanish priest who advocated for Indigenous rights and criticized the brutal treatment of Native Americans in Spanish colonies.
Bartolomé de Las Casas
A major slave uprising in South Carolina where enslaved Africans attempted to flee to Spanish Florida.
Stono River Revolt (1739)
Leader of the Pilgrims and longtime governor of Plymouth Colony.
William Bradford
Founder of Pennsylvania and a prominent Quaker who promoted religious freedom and peaceful relations with Native Americans.
William Penn
A meeting of colonial delegates to coordinate resistance to British policies after the Intolerable Acts.
First Continental Congress (1774)
An agreement between Spain and Portugal dividing newly discovered lands outside Europe along a line set by the Pope.
Treaty of Tordesillas (1494)
A harsh set of laws from Barbados that defined enslaved people as property and severely restricted their rights; later influenced slavery laws in the American South.
Barbados Slave Code (1661)
One of the first written constitutions in the colonies, establishing a representative government in Connecticut.
Fundamental Orders of Connecticut (1639)
A law granting religious freedom to all Christians in Maryland, especially protecting Catholics.
Maryland Act of Toleration (1649)
The treaty that ended the American Revolution, recognizing U.S. independence and setting new boundaries.
Treaty of Paris (1783)