BELL RINGER
• Which colonial
power had the
largest land claim
in 1763?
• The smallest?
• Why did
European nations
want to claim
land in the
Americas?
BELL RINGER
• Imagine you are an early explorer in
the Americas & while walking along in
the woods, & you noticed that the
letters “CRO” had been carved into a
tree, what would you think it meant?
Who would you think carved it? Would
you think it was a warning?
COLUMBUS CLAIMING THE “NEW
WORLD” FOR SPAIN.
MOTIVES DRIVING EUROPEANS TO
EXPLORE
• Two Motives
• Find a sea route
to Asia
• Carry
Christianity’s
message
COLUMBUS
• Convinced the rulers of
Spain to finance a trip
to Asia by going West.
• Landed on unmapped
islands in the “new
world” (Caribbean)
and called them the
West Indies.
• He would change the
lives of millions of
people in Europe,
Africa, and the
Americas.
LAND CLAIMS IN THE AMERICAS, 1763
• During the 1500’s, explorers
from Portugal, France,
England, the Netherlands,
Spain, and other European
countries followed
Columbus to the Americas
and claimed the lands they
explored for their home
countries.
• Settlers followed the
explorers and started
colonies governed by their
home country.
SETTLERS
• Colony
• Settlement begun by
a group of people in
a distant region that
is governed by their
home country.
COLONIES
• While a colony
might have limited
local self-rule, all
major decisions
concerning its
government and
economy are made
by its home country.
COLONIAL EMPIRES
• Colonial Empires
• A group of colonies
all controlled by the
same home country.
• By 1700, several
European nations
had claimed large
colonial empires in
the Americas.
SPAIN
• Spain’s empire was
the oldest and most
extensive, stretching
from the valleys of
California
southward through
Mexico, Central
America, and South
America.
PORTUGAL
• Portugal came to
South America in
the early 1500s,
claiming half of
that colony it called
Brazil.
FRANCE
• In the early 1600’s
France began
building its colonial
empire far to the
north claiming most
of Canada, the
heartland of North
America, and the
Mississippi River
Valley.
ENGLAND
• England was late to
the colonization
party but by 1733,
they had 13
colonies along the
Atlantic coast of
North America.
WHY BUILD AN OVERSEAS COLONY?
• 1) Wealth
• 2) Power
• Colonies were seen
as a source of
valuable raw
materials to their
home countries.
• Example
• During the 1500’s gold
and silver flowing into
Spain from its American
empire made that
country one of the
richest in Europe.
THE FRENCH CASH IN!!!
• In the 1600’s France
made fortunes
turning beaver pelts
from French
Canada into
fashionable
headgear for
European
gentleman.
COLONISTS LEAVING EUROPE
• What do you see
happening in this
etching?
• Who are the people in
the boat?
• Where are they
leaving?
• Who are the people on
the land?
• How does this etching
make you feel?
• What is the artist trying
to convey?
COLONISTS LEAVING EUROPE
• In this picture, we
see an artist’s
interpretation of
Puritans escaping
England in a small
boat. They are
rowing toward a
ship that will take
them to America.
QUESTION
• Why would anyone choose to abandon family,
home, and country to face unknown dangers and
hardships in a distant colony halfway around the
world?
• Push and Pull Factors
PUSH AND PULL FACTORS
PUSH FACTORS
• Push Factors
• Problems that “pushed”
Europeans away from
their homeland.
PULL FACTORS
• Pull Factors
• Opportunities that
“pulled” Europeans to the
new world.
ECONOMIC PUSH AND PULL FACTORS
• Push Factors
• Financial reasons
• Amazing abundance
• Many Europeans
were willing to risk all
for a fresh start in a
new place.
• Pull Factors
• Thick forests filled with
game.
• Flocks of birds so huge
that they darkened the
sky.
• Streams choked with
fish.
• Soil so rich that
cornstalks grew “as
high as a man can
reach, and even
higher.”
RELIGIOUS INTOLERANCE PUSH
FACTOR
• In the 1600’s, anyone who did
not conform to the teachings
of the official state church,
whether Catholic or Protestant,
was viewed with deep
suspicion and often
persecuted.
The Pilgrims were
followed by more
religious nonconformists:
Puritans, Quakers,
Catholics, Jews,
Baptists, French
Huguenots, and
others.
• Separatists
• People who separated from
the official church of
England.
• In 1608, the Separatists left
England for the Netherlands
where they would be free to
worship.
• Unfortunately they felt like
strangers in the land so they
decided to become “Pilgrims”
and cross the Atlantic to start
new lives where they would be
free to worship as they please.
A PEOPLE NEITHER PUSHED OF PULLED
• Portuguese
• Holds the honor of
having begun the
enslavement of
Africans.
• In 1444, Portuguese
ships began returning
home from Africa with
human cargoes to be
sold as slaves.
• African slaves would
go on to sail to
America with the early
Spanish explorers.
• During the 1500’s,
Spanish colonists
began importing
large numbers of
Africans to toil on
sugar plantations in
the West Indies.
• By 1619, few Africans
were brought to the
English colony of
Virginia and sold as
servants.
13 ENGLISH COLONIES
The original 13 English colonies
were founded between 1607
and 1733. By 1733, there were
13 English colonies strung out
along the Atlantic seaboard.
• New England Colonies
• Massachusetts
• Connecticut
• Rhode Island
• New Hampshire
• Middle Colonies
• New York
• New Jersey
• Southern Colonies
• Maryland
• Virginia
• North Carolina
• Pennsylvania
• South Carolina
• Delaware
• Georgia
NEW ENGLAND COLONIES
• Physical Characteristics
• Hilly region described by
an early settler as a “rocky,
barren, bushy, wild-woody
wilderness.”
• Settlement
• The Pilgrims led the way to
New England founding the
settlement of Plymouth in
1620.
• Between 1630 and 1643,
more than 20,000 English
Puritans migrated to New
England seeking religious
freedom.
• Religion
• The people in New England
were united by their Puritan
faith where they settled in
compact villages centered
around their church. Farm
fields surrounded their
villages.
• Difficulties
• Harsh climate, hilly terrain,
and thin rocky soil made
farming difficult.
• Their best crops came from
the forest and the sea.
MIDDLE COLONIES
• Physical Characteristics
• A region of contrasts.
• New Jersey and Delaware
• Flat and gently rolling hills
• Rich soil and easy to plow
and plant.
• New York and Pennsylvania
• Coastal plains to the
Appalachian mountains
• Area rich in timber and
beavers.
• The People
• Very diverse
• From different nations
• Different religions
• Economy
• Most people lived by farming
while there were a number of
merchants , mechanics,
shippers, and tradespeople.
SOUTHERN COLONIES
• Physical
Characteristics
•
•
•
•
•
No solid coastline
Great bays
Broad tidal rivers
Low lying swamps
Climate and soil are
ideal for warm weather
crops.
• Economics
• Large plantations built
on large rivers.
• Southern planters
raised tobacco, rice,
sugar cane, and
indigo.
• For the thousands of
Africans who labored
on the plantations as
slaves, life was neither
easy nor pleasant.
RESULTS ON NATIVE AMERICANS
• Coming of Europeans
a disaster for Native
Americans.
• # dropped from 12
million to 500,000
• Diseases
• Conflict over land
grew.
RESULTS ON NATIVE AMERICANS
• John Eliot, a Puritan
missionary, preaching to
the Native Americans of
Massachusetts. Elliot, who
translation of the Bible was
the first Bible printed in
North America, gathered
Native Americans together
in Christian towns and set
the pattern for two
centuries of missionary
work among the Native
Americans.