Colonial Society: Settlements, Slavery, and Governance (1607-1754) Glossary

A 1676 armed uprising in Virginia by frontier settlers against Governor Berkeley that accelerated the transition to racial slavery.

An agricultural crop grown primarily for sale and export rather than personal consumption, such as tobacco, rice, and indigo in the colonial South.

A system in which enslaved people were treated as property that could be bought, sold, and inherited, with status passed to children.

A widespread religious revival in the 1730s-1740s emphasizing personal conversion and emotional spirituality.

A Virginia policy granting 50 acres of land for each person whose passage to the colony was paid.

The first representative legislative assembly in British North America, established in Virginia in 1619.

A labor system in which workers contracted to serve for a fixed period in exchange for passage to America.

The first permanent English settlement in North America (1607), located in Virginia. It survived through tobacco cultivation.

A 1620 agreement among Pilgrim settlers establishing self-governance by majority rule in Plymouth Colony.

The forced transatlantic voyage of enslaved Africans from West Africa to the Americas.

A Protestant group founded by George Fox, known for pacifism, egalitarianism, and opposition to slavery. William Penn founded Pennsylvania as their refuge.

The British policy of loosely enforcing trade regulations in the colonies, allowing significant colonial self-governance through much of the 17th and early 18th centuries.

The largest slave uprising in British colonial America (1739, South Carolina), leading to harsher slave codes.

A New England form of direct democracy in which property-owning men gathered to vote on local governance matters.

A transatlantic trade network connecting Europe, Africa, and the Americas through the exchange of goods, enslaved people, and raw materials.