Essential Questions:
• What does it mean to say that Europeans
"conquered" the land and peoples of North
America?
• What were the advantages & disadvantages of
Spanish, French, & English colonial patterns in
terms of long-term colonization in America?
Advantages for
long-term
colonization
Spain
France
England
Disadvantages for
long-term
colonization
The Spanish Colonies
in America
A World Transformed
• Native Americans were eager for
European trade; they were not initially
victims of Spanish exploration
• They became dependent on and indebted
to Europeans
• Disease decimated perhaps 95% of
Native American population
Spanish
Conquests
& to
The Spanish
used the encomienda
system
create large cashColonies
crop plantations using
Native
American
& African
slave labor
Spanish
missionaries
focused
heavily on converting Native
Americans & establishing missions
From Plunder to Settlement
• By 1650, 1/2 million Spaniards
immigrated to the New World
Whites from Spain
– Mostly unmarried males came to New
World;
intermarriage
Whites
born
in Americaled to mixed-blood
mestizos & mulattos
– Distinguished between social classes:
peninsulares & creoles
– The Spanish government operated strict
control over the colonies
Spanish Empire
• Its conquering of the Americas would allow Spain to become
the most powerful empire in the world during the 16th Century
• “We came here to serve God and King… and to get rich”
• Not only disease, but civil wars and religious superstitions
also allowed the Europeans, namely the Spanish, to conquer
the Native Americans (who GREATLY outnumbered the
explorers)
• The advanced technology of the Europeans offered an
incredible advantage in combat
– Gunpowder, cannon, and bullets vs. bows and arrows
– Horses (transport and cavalry) and also pigs, cattle, and
goats (foodstuffs) played a very important role in conquest
Spanish-American Culture
• The Spanish conquerors would establish
the encomienda system
– Encomienda – a system of villages granted to
a privileged Spanish officer or aristocrat
• Was responsible for providing for Spanish
missionaries and contributing wealth to the empire
• Extreme class discrepancy: at one end were the
wealthy conquistadores and at the other the
impoverished natives
The Spread of Catholicism
• Catholic missionaries quickly spread to the Americas in the wake
of the conquistadors’ victories
• The Natives were viewed as pagans and the Catholic religion
was in turn imposed upon the people
– The spreading epidemics were seen as the wrath of God
upon the pagans and justified the actions of the godfearing Spanish
• A few missionaries would become the only advocates that the
Natives had among the Europeans
– Bartolome de la Casas and A Brief Relation of the
Destruction of the Indies
– Poet Staceyann Chin reads Bartolomé de Las Casas
Spanish Exploration of the US
• Spain would never develop successful settlements (in terms of trade
and power) in US territory  mainly due to its primary lust for gold
and silver instead of developing centers of trade
– Juan Ponce de Leon – explored Florida
– Hernando de Soto – explored the Southeast US
– Francisco Coronado – explored the Southwest US
– St. Augustine – the oldest surviving settlement in the US,
established in 1565 in Florida
– Spanish missions would dot the Southwest US with some
surviving today
• Santa Fe was the 1st permanent seat of government in the US
• By 1630 there were over 50 missions and 3,000 Spanish in the
New Mexico territory
The Horse
• The introduction of the horse would forever
transform the Native American cultures of the US
– Tribes such as those of the Great Plains
converted from agriculturally domestic to
nomadic within a very short period of time
after acquiring and breeding a significant
horse population
– Following the buffalo herds became the focus
of Native society
The French Colonies
in America
The French Claim Canada
• In 1608, Samuel de Champlain founded
Quebec; French Empire eventually included
St. Lawrence River, Great Lakes, Mississippi
• The French government strictly controlled the
colonies but made little effort to encourage
settlement
• Because the fur trade was the basis of the
colonial economy, Indians became valued
trading partners (not exploitive like Spain)
Like Spain, the French gov’t
encouraged converting Native
Americans & establishing missions
The English Colonies
in America
The English Colonies
• In the 1600s, English settlers arrived in
North America
– English colonization differed from Spanish &
French because the English gov’t had no
desire to create a centralized empire in the
New World
– Different motivations by English settlers led to
different types of colonies
Migrating to the English Colonies
• 17th century England faced major social
changes:
– The most significantly was a boom in
population; Competition for land, food, jobs led
to a large mobile population (vagrants?)
– People had choices: could move to cities,
Ireland, Netherlands, or America (but this was
most expensive & dangerous)
Migrating to the English Colonies
• Motives for migration to America:
– Religious: purer form of worship
– Economic: Escape poverty or the threat of
lifelong poverty
– Personal: to escape bad marriages or jail
terms
•
Migration to America was facilitated by the
English Civil War & Glorious Revolution
The Stuart Monarchs
Four Colonial Subcultures
• The values of the migrants dictated the
“personality” of the newly created colonies;
led to distinct (not unified) colonies
– The Chesapeake
– New England
– Middle Colonies
– The Carolinas & Georgia
By the early 1600s, Spain, England, & France
had large territorial claims in North America
(but these colonies were not heavily populated,
especially in Spanish & French claims)
These colonial claims came largely
at the expense of the Native
Americans already living there