European Exploration

Question 1

Fall of Constantinople (1453)

Answer 1

The Ottoman capture cut off overland trade routes to Asia, pushing Europeans to find new sea routes and launching the Age of Exploration

Question 2

Age of Exploration

Answer 2

Late-1400s to 1600s ear of European ocean voyages aimed at new trade routes, land claims, and Christian conversion.

Question 3

Christopher Columbus (1492)

Answer 3

Genoese sailor funded by Spain who sailed west, reached Caribbean islands, and opened lasting contact between Europe and the Americas.

Question 4

“Indians” misnomer

Answer 4

Columbus thought he had reached Asia and called the Taíno “Indians,” a mistaken label Europeans continued using.

Question 5

Conquistador

Answer 5

Spanish soldier-explorers who conquered American lands seeking wealth, converts, and personal or national prestige.

Question 6

“God, Gold, and Glory”

Answer 6

Three main Spanish motives: spread Catholicism, seize riches, and gain fame for themselves and Spain.

Question 7

Ferdinand Magellan

Answer 7

Portuguese navigator whose Spanish-backed crew (1519-1522) completed the first circumnavigation of Earth, proving a global sea route.

Question 8

Jacques Cartier

Answer 8

French explorer who sought a Northwest Passage, mapped the St. Lawrence River, and laid groundwork for New France.

Question 9

French fur trade

Answer 9

French colonists built coastal fisheries and inland posts, trading furs with Native nations through mostly cooperative alliances.

Question 10

Defeat of the Spanish Armada (1588)

Answer 10

English navy’s victory that ended Spanish naval dominance and allowed England to pursue overseas colonies.

Question 11

Push–pull factors for English migration

Answer 11

Crowded cities, religious conflict, and economic hopes drove English settlers to America’s eastern seaboard.

Question 12

New Amsterdam (Manhattan)

Answer 12

Dutch trading colony founded in the 1620s, noted for diversity and tolerance; seized by England in 1664 and renamed New York.

Question 13

Columbian Exchange

Answer 13

Global transfer of plants, animals, diseases, and cultures between the Old and New Worlds after 1492.

Question 14

Smallpox in the Americas

Answer 14

Old World disease that killed millions of Indigenous people, weakening resistance to European conquest and settlement.

Question 15

Mercantilism

Answer 15

Economic theory that a nation should export more than it imports and treat colonies as sources of raw materials and captive markets.

Question 16

Triangular Trade

Answer 16

Atlantic system: European goods to Africa; enslaved Africans (Middle Passage) to the Americas; sugar, tobacco, and cotton to Europe.

Question 17

Salutary Neglect

Answer 17

British habit of loosely enforcing trade laws on colonies, allowing them to develop self-government and local industries.

Question 18

Mayflower Compact (1620)

Answer 18

Pilgrim agreement for self-government based on majority rule and Biblical principles—first governing document of Plymouth Colony.

Question 19

House of Burgesses (1619)

Answer 19

First elected legislative assembly in North America, created in Virginia and modeled on the English Parliament.

Question 20

New England town meetings

Answer 20

Local gatherings where (initially) church members voted on taxes and laws—an early form of direct democracy.

Question 21

Indentured servant

Answer 21

Person who worked 4–7 years for passage to America, then received “freedom dues”; common labor source before slavery became dominant.

Question 22

Bacon’s Rebellion (1676)

Answer 22

Uprising of former indentured servants in Virginia; convinced planters to rely more heavily on permanent African slavery.

Question 23

Lakota adoption of horses

Answer 23

Spanish horses let Plains tribes such as the Lakota shift from woodland life to mobile bison hunting on horseback.

Question 24

Firearms & fur trade

Answer 24

European guns intensified inter-tribal competition for fur territories, increasing warfare and altering power balances.

Question 25

French and Indian War (1754–1763)

Answer 25

North American theater of the Seven Years’ War; Britain defeated France and gained Canada and lands east of the Mississippi.

Question 26

Treaty of Paris (1763)

Answer 26

Ended the French and Indian War; France ceded Canada to Britain, Spain received Louisiana west of the Mississippi.

Question 27

Proclamation of 1763

Answer 27

Britain barred settlement west of the Appalachians to avoid Native wars, angering colonists eager for land.

Question 28

Albany Plan of Union (1754)

Answer 28

Benjamin Franklin’s proposal to unite colonies for defense and trade; rejected but seeded the idea of colonial unity.

Question 29

Rise of George Washington

Answer 29

Virginian officer who gained leadership experience in the French and Indian War, later leading the Continental Army.

Question 30

Britain’s war debt (1763)

Answer 30

Seven Years’ War doubled Britain’s debt, prompting new colonial taxes that fueled Revolutionary unrest.

Question 31

Catawba Nation formation

Answer 31

Disease and warfare forced smaller Southeastern tribes to merge, forming the Catawba in colonial South Carolina.

Question 32

Shift to African slavery

Answer 32

After 1676, Chesapeake planters moved from unstable indentured labor to hereditary African slavery for plantation work.