Timeline

38,000-12,000 BC
Ancient hunters migrate to Americas
c. 1200 BC
Corn production in American Southwest
300-900 AD
The people of the Valley of Mexicothe Mayabuild the city of Teotihuacan
300-1600 AD
Ghana, Mali, and Songhai empires in West Africa
700-1450
Cahokia and other Mississippian centers develop in North America
1337-1453
Hundred Years’ War between England and France
1434
Portuguese first explore West African coast
1418
Prince Henry “the Navigator” of Portugal seeks direct trade with sub-Saharan Africa
c. 1450
Introduction of the caravel
1453
Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans and practical loss of the Silk Road
1482
Christopher Columbus serves on trading vessels in Portuguese ports in Africa
1488
Portuguese captain Bartolomeu Dias rounds Africa’s southern tip
January 2, 1492
Spain retakes Granada, ending ten years of war
August 3, 1492
Columbus and his expedition depart Spain
October 12, 1492
Columbus’s crew first sights land in the Americas
1494
Treaty of Tordesillas creates distinctive spheres of control for Portugal and Spain over newly discovered lands
1497
John Cabot charts northern North American coast for England
1507
Martin Waldseemller labels New World “America” in honor of Amerigo Vespucci
1519
Ferdinand Magellan initiates the first circumnavigation of the globe
1524
Giovanni de Verrazzano explores from Carolinas to Nova Scotia for France
1532
Portuguese create first permanent colony in Americas, in Brazil
c. 1550
Iroquois Confederacy formed
Topics
A Growing World
In the fifteenth century the rise of stable nation-states, combined with the loss of the Silk Road, drove European monarchies to expand the borders of their known world in search of new trade and wealth.

The era of feudal domains was giving way to bureaucratic, sovereign, and indivisible nation-states vying for wealth and prestige.

The fall of Constantinople in 1453 took away the rich trade with the spices, silks, and gems of the East.

The search for new routes to the East touched off the Age of Exploration, which initiated a multidirectional exchange of foods, technologies, and cultures among all peoples of the Atlantic World.

Native American and West African Societies before Contact
Archeological evidence suggests that the earliest inhabitants of the Americas arrived ten thousand years ago.

Some traveled by boat from Asia.

Some crossed the Bering land bridge connecting Siberia to Alaska.

By 1492, an estimated 58 to 113 million native peoples lived in the Americas.

They built cities and trade networks and developed their own religions, economies, and culturesall of which varied by region and according to the available resources.

Two prominent groups resided in the Valley of Mexico: the Maya and the Aztecs.

The Maya:
Thrived between 300 and 900 AD
Built the city of Teotihuacan, which contained pyramids, temples, and palaces
Extended their empire to more than 50 states
Developed an advanced system of writing, mathematics, and scientific knowledge.

The Aztecs:
Thrived between 1200 and 1521
Established a militaristic state with Tenochtitlan as a capital
Effectively controlled territories surrounding their capital from the Pacific to the Gulf Coast
Were paid tribute in gold, turquoise, cotton, and human sacrifice by conquered peoples under them.

Many native groups flourished throughout the present-day United States:
The Hohokam, Anasazi, and Pueblo in the Southwest, with complex agricultural practices
The Adena-Hopewell and Mississippi Valley peoples, who built towns and vast trade networks
The Iroquois and Algonquians, who inhabited the eastern woodlands.

When Europeans arrived on the African continent, they encountered diverse, complex cultures with a rich past.

The Ghana, Mali, and Songhai empires, in turn, dominated western Africa since before 300 AD.

A largely agricultural people, Africans organized under these empires also engaged in overseas trading.

A religious people, their leaders were imbued with both political and spiritual authority.

Technology and Early European Exploration
Portugal initiated the Age of Exploration with its exceptional navigation and technological skills.

By the early 1400s, Portugal had developed the premier navy of Europe.

In about 1418, Prince Henry “the Navigator” determined to find the sub-Saharan African source of wealth he saw in North African marketplaces and trade directly.

Using a light, maneuverable, strong ship called the caravel, as well as new technologies such as the astrolabe, Henry’s fleets sailed farther and farther south along Africa’s coast.

Christopher Columbus, a Genoese sailor, spent time in the 1480s on merchant vessels trading with Portuguese ports in Africa and learned of their quest for the East.

In 1485, Columbus approached Portugal’s King John II with the idea of traveling west to reach China and India, but he was rejected.

After many rejections, in 1492 Columbus convinced Spain’s King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella to fund the voyage. Spain, newly unified, needed new trade to refill its coffers.

Columbus’s crews spotted a Caribbean island on October 12, 1492. They made their first settlement on Hispaniola.

News of the New World spread quickly. Reports written by Amerigo Vespucci in about 1502 proved that what was found was a new continent, waiting to be exploited.

England sent John Cabot to discover the fabled Northwest Passage; Cabot arrived in Newfoundland in 1497.

France:
Sponsored Giovanni da Verrazano, who visited present-day North Carolina in 1524
Funded Jacques Cartier, who explored the St. Lawrence River in 1534
The Treaty of Tordesillas divided all of the New World between Spain and Portugal. Other nations were left to look for the “Northwest Passage” to the Orient.

Key Terms
A Growing World
Atlantic World
Term used to describe both the geographic region encompassing the Atlantic Ocean and the four continents of Europe, Africa, North America, and South America, as well as the interactions and relationships among the peoples of this region.

feudal vassals
Land-owning nobility tied to their lords through mutual bonds of service; a vassal defended his lord, and the lord protected and rewarded his vassals with riches and land. The lord might in turn be a vassal to another lord, and the vassal might have vassals of his own.

nation-state
A political entity with well-defined borders recognized as sovereign, stable, and indivisible. Historically, the European nation-state began to emerge during the Age of Exploration, providing a stable foundation for the actions of exploration.

Silk Road
Collective term for well-used trading routes connecting western Europe with India and China, running through the gateway city of Constantinople.

Age of Exploration
Popular term (also Age of Discovery) for the period from c. 1450 to 1600 when European navigators discovered and charted new lands to the West and East.

Native American and West African Societies before Contact
Maya
Inhabitants of the Yucatan Peninsula whose civilization was at its height from 300 to 900 AD. Their civilization included a unique system of writing, mathematics, architecture, sculpture, and astronomy.

Aztecs
Inhabitants of the Valley of Mexico who founded their capital, Tenochtitlan, in the early fourteenth century. Prior to the arrival of the Spanish, the Aztecs built a large empire in which they dominated many neighboring peoples. Their civilization included engineering, mathematics, art, and music.

Iroquois Confederacy
Indian group located in central New York State. Five tribesthe Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecasformed the Iroquois Confederacy.

matrilineal
A system in which family membership and heredity pass from mother to children.

Songhai
Dominant West African state in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Askia Mohammed (ruled 1493-1528) expanded the empire; reformed government, banking, and education; and adopted Islamic law.

Technology and European Exploration
Prince Henry “the Navigator” (1394-1460)
Henry “the Navigator” of Portugal, who established a school for navigators and geographers. He sought to increase the power of Portugal by promoting exploration of trade routes to the East by way of Africa.

caravel
Type of ship developed around 1450 employing technology that would let it travel farther into uncharted waters and withstand the rough seas of the open Atlantic.

astrolabe
Navigation instrument for estimating latitude by measuring the distance of the sun and stars from the horizon.

Christopher Columbus (c. 1451-May 20, 1506)
Italian mariner who sailed for Spain in 1492 in search of a western route to Asia. He located San Salvador in the West Indies, opening the Americas to European exploration and colonization.

Bartolomeu Dias (c. 1451-May 29, 1500)
Portuguese sailor and navigator and the first known European to sail around the southernmost tip of Africa, in 1488.

King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella
Spanish monarchs who united Spain and funded Columbus’s voyages to the New World beginning in 1492.

Treaty of Tordesillas (1494)
Agreement between Spain and Portugalarbitrated by Pope Alexander VI in 1494, renegotiated later on Portugal’s initiative, and sanctioned by Pope Julius II in 1506splitting all newly discovered lands of the New World between those two nations alone.

Amerigo Vespucci (March 9, 1454-February 22, 1512)
Italian navigator and cartographer who first identified South America as a continent in 1502.

Northwest Passage
Fabled water route sought by explorers as an alternative route to reach the Far East by going north of North America. Despite explorers’ hopes for finding such a shortcut, the Northwest Passage did not in fact exist where they could find it; it was blocked by Arctic ice until 2007.

John Cabot
John Cabot is an Italian-born English explorer and navigator. In Italy, he is recognized as Giovanni Caboto.

Alonza de Ojeda
Alonza de Ojeda was a navigator, governor and conquistador. He travelled through the Southern Caribbean and Northern South America. He is well-known for having named Venezuela, which he explored throughout his first two expeditions.

Vincente Yanez Pinzon
Vincente Pinzon was a Spanish explorer and navigator who sailed with Christopher Columbus on his first voyage to the New World. Vincente Pinzon sailed to the Brazilian coast. From there, he sailed northwest to the Amazon River, whose mouth he investigated. He sailed north to northeastern Venezuela and then returned to Spain
Gasper Corte-Real
Gasper Corte-Real was a Portuguese explorer who sailed to Greenland in 1500, and perhaps also reached the coast of North America. Gaspar vanished at sea about 1501, and his brother Manuel died trying to find him.

Rodrigo de Bastidas
Rodrigo de Bastidas was a Spanish conquistador and explorer who surveyed the northern coast of South America, discovered Panama, and founded the city of Santa Marta.

Vasco de Balboa
Vasco de Balboa was a Spanish conquistador and explorer. He was the first European to see the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean after crossing the Isthmus of Panama overland.

Juan Ponce de Leon
Juan Ponce de Leon was a Spanish explorer and soldier who was the first European to set foot in Florida. He also established the oldest European settlement in Puerto Rico and discovered the Gulf Stream. Ponce de Leon was searching for the legendary fountain of youth and other riches.

Juan de Solis
Juan Diaz de Solis was a Spanish navigator and explorer. He served as navigator on expeditions to the Yucatan in 1506-1507[4] and Brazil in 1508 with Vicente Yanez Pinzon.

Pedro de Mendoza
Pedro de Mendoza y Lujan was a Spanish conquistador, soldier and explorer, and the first adelantado of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata.

Francisco de Coronado
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado was a Spanish ruler, explorer and conquistador. He was the first European to explore North America’s Southwest.

Hernando Alarcon
Hernando de Alarcon was a Spanish navigator of the 16th century, noted for having led an early expedition to the Baja California peninsula and for penetrating the lower Colorado River, perhaps as far as the modern California-Arizona boundary.

Garcia de L. Cardenas
Garcia Lopez de Cardenas is credited with the first European discovery of the Grand Canyon.

Francisco de Orellana
Francisco de Orellana was a Spanish explorer and conquistador. He completed the first known navigation of the length of the Amazon River. He also founded the city of Guayaquil in modern-day Ecuador.

Juan Cabrillo
Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo was a Spanish or Portuguese explorer (his nationality is uncertain). Cabrillo was the first European explorer of the Californian coast. Cabrillo named San Diego Bay and Santa Barbara.

Alonso de Pineda
Alonso Alvarez de Pineda was a Spanish explorer and map-maker. De Pineda sailed for the Spanish Governor of Jamaica, Francisco de Garay, who sent him to explore and chart the Gulf Coast from Florida to Mexico in 1519.

Hernando Cortes
Hernan Cortes was a Spanish adventurer and conquistador who overthrew the Aztec empire and claimed Mexico for Spain.

Ferdinand Magellan
Ferdinand Magellan was a Portuguese explorer who led the first expedition that sailed around the Earth. Magellan also named the Pacific Ocean.

Giovanni da Verrazano
Giovanni da Verrazzano was an Italian navigator who explored the northeast coast of North America from Cape Fear, North Carolina to Maine while searching for a Northwest passage to Asia. Verrazzano sailed for King Francis I of France.

Pedro Alvarez Cabral
Pedro Alvares Cabral (1467-1520) was a Portuguese nobleman, explorer, and navigator who was the first European to see Brazil. His patron was King Manuel I of Portugal, who sent him on an expedition to India.

Francisco Pizarro
Francisco Pizarro was a Spanish conquistador who traveled through much of the Pacific coast of America along Peru. He discovered the Incan empire and conquered it brutally and quickly, stealing immense hoards of gold, silver, and other treasures.

Jacques Cartier
Jacques Cartier was a French explorer who led three expeditions to Canada, in 1534, 1535, and 1541. He was looking for a route to the Pacific through North America but did not find one. Cartier paved the way for French exploration of North America.

Francisco de Ulloa
Francisco de Ulloa was a Spanish explorer who explored the west coast of present-day Mexico under the commission of Hernan Cortes.

Hernando de Soto
Hernando De Soto was a Spanish explorer who sailed the Atlantic Ocean and was the first European to explore Florida and the southeastern US.

Marcos de Niza
Fray Marcos de Niza was a Franciscan priest who is said to have traveled to the fabled “Seven Golden Cities of Cibola” in what is now the western part of New Mexico.

Walter Raleigh
Sir Walter Raleigh was a British explorer, poet, historian, and soldier. Raleigh led expeditions to both North America and South America; he was trying to found new settlements, find gold, and increase trade with the New World.

John Smith
John Smith was an English adventurer and soldier, and one of the founders and leaders of the Jamestown, Virginia, settlement. Smith also led expeditions exploring Chesapeake Bay and the New England coast.

Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer who sailed across the Atlantic Ocean in 1492, hoping to find a route to India (in order to trade for spices). He made a total of four trips to the Caribbean and South America during the years 1492-1504, sailing for King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella of Spain.

Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon
Lucas Vazquez de Ayllon was a Spanish explorer who in 1526 established the short-lived San Miguel de Gualdape colony, the first European attempt at a settlement in what is now the continental United States.

John Fremont
John Charles Fremont was an American military officer, explorer, and the first candidate of the anti-slavery Republican Party for the office of President of the United States. During the 1840s, that era’s penny press accorded Fremont the sobriquet The Pathfinder.

Zebulon Pike
Zebulon Montgomery Pike was an American explorer and military officer. Pike tried to find the source of the Mississippi River; he also explored the Rocky Mountains and southwestern North America. Pike’s Peak in Colorado is named for him.

Sir Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake was a British explorer, slave-trader, in the service of England, mayor of Plymouth, England, and naval officer (he was an Admiral). Drake led the second expedition to sail around the world in a voyage lasting from 1577 to 1580.

Bartholomew Diaz
Bartholomew Diaz was a nobleman of the Portuguese royal household, and was a Portuguese explorer. He sailed around the southernmost tip of Africa in 1488, the first European known to have done so.

Edwin Aldrin
Edwin Eugene Aldrin was the second man to walk on the moon. Also known as “Buzz” or “Dr. Rendezvous,” Aldrin was the Lunar Module Pilot on NASA’s Apollo 11 mission. He and Neil Armstrong were on the moon for about 2 hours, collecting rock samples and doing lunar surface experiments.

Neil Armstrong
Neil Alden Armstrong was the first person to walk on the moon. He piloted NASA’s Apollo 11 mission, which took off on July 16, 1969. Armstrong and Edwin E. (Buzz) Aldrin, Jr., landed on the moon on July 20, 1969, in the lunar module (landing in the Mare Tranquillitatis), while Michael Collins orbited the moon in the command module.

Vasco da Gamma
Vasco da Gama was a Portuguese explorer who discovered an ocean route from Portugal to the East. Da Gama sailed from Lisbon, Portugal, around Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, to India in 1497-1499. At that time, many people thought that this was impossible to do because it was assumed that the Indian Ocean was not connected to any other seas.

Lewis ; Clark
Meriwether Lewis and William Clark set out in May 1804 to explore and map the American West. President Thomas Jefferson commissioned the expedition to explore the newly-bought Louisiana Territory. Lewis and Clark were accompanied by a crew of men, and later, the Shoshone Indian guide and interpreter Sacagawea and her infant son.

Kit Carson
Christopher Houston Carson was an American explorer, guide, fur trapper, Indian agent, rancher, and soldier, who traveled through the southwestern and western USA.

Juan Pardo
Juan Pardo was a Spanish explorer and conquistador who was active in the later half of the sixteenth century. He led a Spanish expedition through what is now North and South Carolina and into eastern Tennessee
Pedro de Coronas
Pedro de Coronas was a Spanish explorer in the 16th century who landed on the coast of present-day Currituck County in North Carolina; he is noted for his exploration of that territory in 1566 though the explorer remained in the Americas for only a few days before returning to the West Indies.

Rene de Laudonniere
Rene Goulaine de Laudonniere was a French Huguenot explorer and the founder of the French colony of Fort Caroline in what is now Jacksonville, Florida.

Daniel Boone
Colonel Daniel Boone was an American pioneer, soldier, and explorer; he was born near Reading, Pennsylvania. Boone founded the first US settlement west of the Appalachian mountains.

Richard Byrd
Admiral Richard Evelyn Byrd was an Arctic and Antarctic explorer, pioneering aviator, and US Naval Officer. On May 9, 1926, Byrd and Floyd Bennett made what may have been the first airplane trip over the North Pole, in a 15 1/2 hour flight; they flew from King’s Bay, Spitsbergen, Norway, to the North Pole and back again.

Henry Morgan
Admiral Sir Henry Morgan was an Admiral of the British Royal Navy, a privateer, and a pirate who made a name for himself during activities in the Caribbean, primarily raiding Spanish settlements. He was one of the most notorious and successful privateers in history, and one of the most ruthless who worked in the Spanish Main.

Captain Kirk
James Tiberius Kirk is a character in the movie Star Trek. Kirk was first played by William Shatner as the lead character in the original Star Trek series. Shatner voiced Kirk in the animated Star Trek series and appeared in the first seven Star Trek movies.

Captain Spock
Spock is a character in the Star Trek movies. First played by Leonard Nimoy in the original Star Trek series, Spock also appears in the animated Star Trek series, two episodes of Star Trek.

Sir Humphrey Gilbert
Sir Humphrey Gilbert was an English nobleman, Army officer, member of Parliament, and explorer. Early in his career, Gilbert started English settlements in Ireland and later, sailed to North America in search of a Northwest Passage. He founded an English settlement in Newfoundland.

Prince Henry the Navigator
Prince Henry the Navigator was a Portuguese royal prince, soldier, and patron of explorers. Henry sent many sailing expeditions down Africa’s west coast, but did not go on them himself.

James Cook
James Cook was a British explorer and astronomer who went on many expeditions to the Pacific Ocean, Antarctic, Arctic, and around the world. Cook was the first ship’s captain to stop the disease scurvy among sailors by providing them with fresh fruits. Before this, scurvy had killed or incapacitated many sailors on long trips.

Martin Frobisher
Sir Martin Frobisher was an English privateer, navigator, explorer, and naval officer. After years of sailing to northwestern Africa, and then looting French ships in the English Channel, Frobisher sailed to northeastern North America to search for a Northwest Passage.

John Franklin
Sir John Franklin was a British Royal Navy officer and Arctic explorer. Franklin also served as governor of Tasmania for several years. In his last expedition, he disappeared while attempting to chart and navigate a section of the Northwest Passage in the Canadian Arctic.

Marco Polo
Marco Polo was an Italian voyager and merchant who was one of the first Europeans to travel across Asia through China, visiting the Kublai Khan in Beijing. He left in 1271 with his father and uncle; they spent about 24 years traveling.

Lief Eriksson
Leif Eriksson the Lucky was a Viking explorer who was possibly the first European to sail to North America. Leif sailed north from the southern tip of Greenland, then went south along the coast of Baffin Island down to Labrador, and then landed in what is now called Newfoundland.

Eric The Red
Eric the Red was a Viking explorer who was the first European to sail to Greenland. He sailed from Iceland in 982 and led a group of colonists to Greenland in 985-986.

Cabeza de Vaca
Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca was a Spanish explorer who sailed to North America from Spain, leaving in 1527. He traveled from Florida to Texas on a raft, then walked from Texas to Mexico City. He also explored the Paraguay River in South America.

Bartholomeu Dias sailed on behalf of Portugal. He explored the West African coast until, in 1487, he rounded the Cape of Good HopeAfrica’s southernmost pointand proved that a sea route to India existed. Dias’s explorations of coastal West Africa also gave Portugal a territorial claim to a substantial portion of the region.

Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca was a member of an ill-fated Spanish expedition to the Gulf Coast of America. After most of the members of the party were lost at sea, de Vaca and a few others reached land, only to be captured by a band of Karankawa Indians. De Vaca adapted to life among the Native Americans, however, living among them as a healer and priest. Eventually, de Vaca and three others, including an African slave named Esteban, escaped. Using skills learned while living among the Karankawas, de Vaca and his band of men lived among various tribes as they made their way back to New Spain. Reaching Mexico City in 1536, de Vaca published an account of his travels,Relacion, which inspired other Spaniards to explore the territory north of Mexico.

King Henry VII of England sponsored the explorations of John Cabot in 1497. Cabot hoped to find a northern route to Asiathe so-called Northwest Passage. Though he failed to locate a shortcut to Asia, Cabot did reach Newfoundland and possibly Nova Scotia, which formed the basis of England’s territorial claim in North America.

This document is a firsthand account written by Bartolome de las Casas, a Catholic priest and Dominican friar from Spain, who immigrated to the West Indies in the early 1500s. De las Casas published this personal account in Spain to bring to light the abuses perpetrated by Spanish colonists against the native inhabitants of the West Indies. The author opposed the abuses committed by the Spanish and generally praised the natives of the West Indies for their kind nature and willingness to accept Christianity. Although he began his life in the West Indies as a slave owner on a plantation, he ultimately turned away from owning slaves and advocated against the plantation-styleeconomiendasystem.

The author expounds at length about the positive qualities of the indigenous people he has met in the Indies. One of their positive characteristics, in his estimation, is their openness to the Catholic faith and their demands for more knowledge and time to worship. Because of these demands, de las Casas argues that missionaries to this part of the world must be exceptionally hardworking.

The author is generous in his praise for the indigenous people of the Indies. He describes them as faithful and obedient to those they serve, whether their native lords or the Spanish. He also describes their receptivity to Christianity, specifically Catholicism. He ascribes this receptivity to an innate goodness and intelligence. The lives of these people are not universally good, however. De las Casas describes their diet as “poor and monotonous” in both quality and type of food. He also describes them as having “delicate constitutions” and being susceptible to death from even mild illness.

King Charles V of Spain issued the New Laws of the Indies in 1542 to govern the relationship between Spanish colonists and the indigenous peoples of the West Indies. As reports of cruelty against the indigenous people at the hands of the Spanish colonists reached the Spanish government, advocates such as Bartolome de las Casas agitated against theencomiendasystem. Theencomiendasystem resembled that of the plantation system that took root in the American South during the seventeenth century, a system that forced people into a life of servitude and hard labor. Charles V’s laws, which threatened landholders who violated the king’s legal directive with penalties, met with violent resistance from the colonists. Although the laws did liberate thousands of indigenous workers, theencomiendasystem remained in place for years to come.

In the areas colonized by Spain, audiencias maintained responsibility for judicial governance. These functioned as legal appeals courts and existed throughout the Americas. The New Laws charged these courts with the responsibility to ensure the humane treatment of indigenous people, including those released from encomiendas and turned over to the Royal Crown for final determination. The laws also charged the presidents and auditors of the audencias with making sure that those Indians released from encomiendas received instruction in the Catholic faith and better treatment overall.

The New Laws lay out certain judicial tenets for theaudienciasto follow. The courts are directed to appoint “men of trust and diligence” to pursue the cause of freeing the Indians from slavery in theencomiendas. Additionally, the judicial proceedings to free Indians are to be undertaken quickly and summarily, respecting the usages and customs of the indigenous people. Finally, with regard to the initial placement of Indians into theencomiendas, viceroys, governors,audiencias, and all other individuals are barred from doing so and are also required to turn over to the Royal Crown any Indians who are held by a person who dies.

Silk Road-Definition:
Collective term for well-used trading routes connecting western Europe with India and China, running through the gateway city of Constantinople.

Christopher Columbus Definition:
Italian mariner who sailed for Spain in 1492 in search of a western route to Asia. He located San Salvador in the West Indies, opening the Americas to European exploration and colonization.

Bartolomeu Dias Definition:
Portuguese sailor and navigator and the first known European to sail around the southernmost tip of Africa, in 1488.

King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella Definition:
Spanish monarchs who united Spain and funded Columbus’s voyages to the New World beginning in 1492.

Atlantic WorldDefinition:
Term used to describe both the geographic region encompassing the Atlantic Ocean and the four continents of Europe, Africa, North America, and South America, as well as the interactions and relationships among the peoples of this region.

feudal vassalsDefinition:
Land-owning nobility tied to their lords through mutual bonds of service; a vassal defended his lord, and the lord protected and rewarded his vassals with riches and land. The lord might in turn be a vassal to another lord, and the vassal might have vassals of his own.

nation-stateDefinition:
A political entity with well-defined borders recognized as sovereign, stable, and indivisible. Historically, the European nation-state began to emerge during the Age of Exploration, providing a stable foundation for the actions of exploration.

Age of ExplorationDefinition:
Popular term (also Age of Discovery) for the period from c. 1450 to 1600 when European navigators discovered and charted new lands to the West and East.

MayaDefinition:
Inhabitants of the Yucatan Peninsula whose civilization was at its height from 300 to 900 AD. Their civilization included a unique system of writing, mathematics, architecture, sculpture, and astronomy.

Aztecs Definition:
Inhabitants of the Valley of Mexico who founded their capital, Tenochtitlan, in the early fourteenth century. Prior to the arrival of the Spanish, the Aztecs built a large empire in which they dominated many neighboring peoples. Their civilization included engineering, mathematics, art, and music.

Iroquois ConfederacyDefinition:
Indian group located in central New York State. Five tribesthe Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecasformed the Iroquois Confederacy.

Matrilineal Definition:
A system in which family membership and heredity pass from mother to children.

SonghaiDefinition:
Dominant West African state in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Askia Mohammed (ruled 1493-1528) expanded the empire; reformed government, banking, and education; and adopted Islamic law.

Prince Henry “the Navigator” (1394-1460) Definition:
Henry “the Navigator” of Portugal, who established a school for navigators and geographers. He sought to increase the power of Portugal by promoting exploration of trade routes to the East by way of Africa.

caravelDefinition:
Type of ship developed around 1450 employing technology that would let it travel farther into uncharted waters and withstand the rough seas of the open Atlantic.

astrolabeDefinition:
Navigation instrument for estimating latitude by measuring the distance of the sun and stars from the horizon.

Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) Definition:
Agreement between Spain and Portugalarbitrated by Pope Alexander VI in 1494, renegotiated later on Portugal’s initiative, and sanctioned by Pope Julius II in 1506splitting all newly discovered lands of the New World between those two nations alone.

Amerigo VespucciDefinition:
Italian navigator and cartographer who first identified South America as a continent in 1502.

Northwest PassageDefinition:
Fabled water route sought by explorers as an alternative route to reach the Far East by going north of North America. Despite explorers’ hopes for finding such a shortcut, the Northwest Passage did not in fact exist where they could find it; it was blocked by Arctic ice until 2007.

Christopher Columbus (c. 1451-May 20, 1506) Definition:
Italian mariner who sailed for Spain in 1492 in search of a western route to Asia. He located San Salvador in the West Indies, opening the Americas to European exploration and colonization.

Bartolomeu Dias (c. 1451-May 29, 1500) Definition:
Portuguese sailor and navigator and the first known European to sail around the southernmost tip of Africa, in 1488.

Amerigo Vespucci (March 9, 1454-February 22, 1512) Definition:
Italian navigator and cartographer who first identified South America as a continent in 1502.

I want to welcome you all to the Jamestown settlement here in Virginia, who’ve been gracious enough to allow us to film here today. If you’re ever down in this area, please come by and visit. I think you’ll be enriched by it.

Jamestown is actually settled by the Virginia Company of London in 1607. It’s chartered in 1606 as a joint-stock company, which means that people can invest in this endeavor to go across the ocean and settle. You spread the risk by spreading out this kind of investment. So peace with Spain means that there’s no privateering, but it’s a tenuous peace, which means that England needs a place that could be protected if they need it. And they choose a site just down the river: Jamestown Island. And it has a deep water port where they can almost moor the ships at the back door of the fort. And it’s safe and easily defensible should Spanish attack ever come. There are problems. Jamestown Island is in a swamp. It’s unhealthy, there’s brackish water, insects, disease. If any of you have ever been to a swamp, you know what those are like. But it’s about more than just the poor location. It’s poor timing. They had come in the worst drought in 300 years. It makes the conditions even worse. And they had planned to trade with the natives for food, but drought means you can’t grow as much food. So it makes it even more tense with the native population.

Recent evidence does suggest that the Jamestown settlers actually tried to plant their own crops, but again, the drought makes it more difficult. Initially, there are lots of problems for the settlement. In 1607, there are 104 settlers. By the next year, only 38 survive. Between 1610 and 1624, there are 10,000 immigrants to Virginia. But by 1624, only 1,200 of them are still alive.

As we know from what we have done in this class, tobacco is the saving grace of the Virginia colony. Tobacco is introduced in Virginia in 1612 by John Rolfe, who later, as we know, married the Christianized Indian princess, Pocahontas, who became Rebecca. By 1630, tobacco exports had totaled one and a half million pounds. It meant two things. Number one, the king was getting rich from tobacco taxes. And it also meant people in Virginia were getting rich. And they were expanding. Tobacco depletes the soil, which means you need very large tracks of land in order to rotate crops. And people began to move inland in Virginia. It also means that you need a large labor force. It’s very important to have people to work this tobacco. So they institute what they call the headright system. 50 acres of land for every paid settler who came to Virginia. This brings in a large class of elites. It’s expensive to come to Virginia, so if you pay for somebody to come, you get 50 acres of land. That even accounts for indentured servants. Indentured servants usually served 5-7 years. They’re usually young, single men. They’re poorly treated. They’re poorly housed. They’re poorly clothed. And many don’t outlive their contract. Problems with the indentured servants, who are really a disenfranchised segment of society, actually contribute to the rise of slavery in Virginia across the 17th century.

But with economic security in Virginia, they need some government. In 1619 just down the river, the first Virginia House of Burgesses and the Virginia General Assembly meet. They only meet for a short time, but it’s important because it’s the first representative assembly in the New World, and it establishes a form of English government here in America. There are tensions that remain with the Native American population. In 1622, there’s an Indian massacre led by Openchancanough, who is the brother of Powhatan. He kills 347 people in this massacre. More would have died had they not been warned by a Native American young man living with an English family. In 1644, there’s a second massacre, which kills another 400 colonists. This time, there’s no early warning.

Meanwhile, religious issues drive another group across the Atlantic. There’s a move in England to purify the Church of England from the Roman Catholic influences that have remained since the time of Henry VIII. In 1608, Puritan separatists who are being persecuted actually leave for the Netherlands. They decide that they can’t purify the church from England, so they have to separate from it. The Scrooby congregation actually remains in the Netherlands until about 1618 or 1619. And they leave Holland for really two reasons. First, the one we’re most familiar with. They’re afraid of the corrupting influences of the Dutch on their children. The second, in 1619 a contract, a treaty with Spain was supposed to expire. What that meant was, if Spain could come into the Netherlands, they would also bring the Spanish Inquisition with them, and we all know what that meant for anyone that did not agree with the Catholic Church. They were also a joint-stock company, which means other non-separatists came with their group. But their purpose was to establish a place where Puritans could worship where they saw fit, and as long as you obeyed the rules of the colony, they didn’t care who came.

Well, we’re all familiar with the story. 1620 the Mayflower comes over, but they’re blown off course. Edwin Sandys, the leader of Virginia colony, actually had given the land at the far northern section of the Virginia Grant, near the mouth of the Hudson River. They’re blown off course. They land in Plymouth, and the first thing they do is set up a government. They do that with the Mayflower Compact. It’s very interesting. The Mayflower Compact actually does several things, but one of the most important things it does is let the king know they are not trying to start their own country. Independence is not in their mindset. They say, “King, we love you. We’re still British citizens. It’s just we want to set up our civil government according to the laws of God and our covenanted relationship with Him.” Plymouth doesn’t prosper. They have many of the same problems as Jamestown settlers. They also have the additional problem that separatism is not exactly the most popular religious view. They’re eventually swallowed up by the neighbor: Massachusetts Bay.

So, what brought the Puritans to Massachusetts Bay? Between 1629 and 1640, Charles I is trying to eliminate all Puritan members of the Anglican Church. There’s also a period of economic crisis and widespread disease. So, Massachusetts Bay becomes a haven. There’s also a pull factor to the New World. Puritans have a drive to convert the natives, and they wanted to trade with the natives for goods. In 1630, the Puritans arrive aboard the Arabella. Now, there are many ships in the flotilla. It’s a large group of colonists, and when they come, these are carefully chosen people. Some had to actually send letters of recommendation, if they weren’t known, in order to win the other leaders.

This was to be their city on a hill. The problem-how to live godly values in an evil world. They believe the government is a covenant with God, which means there are legal issues, as well. Applicants for church members had to give long conversion narratives in the Puritan world, and that was the only way you had the right to vote. You also had a group of people who were strong students of the Bible. They knew the Bible. And if they were overzealous, there could be legal problems as well as religious ones. And there’s great diversity. I was brought up in a world of Baptists. There’s a running joke in our family. If you get five Baptists in a room, you have five opinions. This was kind of what was going on in Massachusetts Bay. There’s an emphasis there on biblical authority, but among “so many earnest students of the Bible,” there was always one to discover a new and heretical meaning in a familiar passage and demand everyone else accept it.

After they arrived, misfits are actually banished to England or sent to other colonies. This leads to one of the most important things in American history. It’s the Massachusetts Body of Liberties. This is a written legal code; it’s a Bill of Rights. A hundred provisions including things like no taxation without representation, the right to a trial by jury, and the right to due process. Now, they find it necessary there also to place an authority figure to mediate religious and political disputes. They unify church and state, but the unification doesn’t come under a minister; it comes under an elected official. So, there are changes going on in what they do between the English and the new American colonial system. And these are going to play out as we continue to study.

In the first decade of the seventeenth century England began a second round of colonizing attempts. This time jointstock companies were used as the vehicle to plant settlements rather than giving extensive grants to a landed proprietor such as Gilbert or Raleigh, whose attempts at colonization in the 1570s and 1580s had failed.

The founding of Virginia marked the beginning of a twenty-five year period in which every colony in the New World was established by means of a joint-stock company. A variety of motives intensified the colonizing impulse – international rivalry, propagation of religion, enlarged opportunity for individual men – but none exceeded that of trade and profit. The companies were created to make a profit; their in vestments in the colonies were based on this assumption. Early in the 1630’s merchants and investors discovered that they could employ their money in other more rewarding enterprises. After 1631, therefore, no colony was founded by mercantile enterprise, but by that date the enterprisers had left a legacy of colonization that was to endure.

In these instructions for the Virginia Company, the power of Spain and the fear derived from past failures invade every line. The detail and precision of the instructions reflect the work of experienced men; Richard Hakluyt, the younger, for example, probably had a hand in writing them.

As we doubt not but you will have especial care to observe the ordinances set down by the King’s Majesty and delivered unto you under the Privy Seal; so for your better directions upon your first landing we have thought good to recommend unto your care these instructions and articles following.

When it shall please God to send you on the coast of Virginia, you shall do your best endeavour to find out a safe port in the entrance of some navigable river, making choice of such a one as runneth farthest into the land, and if you happen to discover divers portable rivers, and amongst them any one that hath two main branches, if the difference be not great, make choice of that which bendeth most toward the North-West for that way you shall soonest find the other sea.

When you have made choice of the river on which you mean to settle, be not hasty in landing your victuals and munitions; but first let Captain Newport discover how far that river may be found navigable, that you make election of the strongest, most wholesome and fertile place; for if you make many removes, besides the loss of time, you shall greatly spoil your victuals and your caske, and with great pain transport it in small boats.

But if you choose your place so far up as a bark of fifty tuns will float, then you may lay all your provisions ashore with ease, and the better receive the trade of all the countries about you in the land; and such a place you may perchance find a hundred miles from the river’s mouth, and the further up the better. For if you sit down near the entrance, except it be in some island that is strong by nature, an enemy that may approach you on even ground, may easily pull you out; and if he be driven to seek you a hundred miles [in] the land in boats, you shall from both sides of the river where it is narrowest, so beat them with your muskets as they shall never be able to prevail against you.

And to the end that you be not surprised as the French were in Florida by Melindus, and the Spaniard in the same place by the French, you shall do well to make this double provision. First, erect a little stoure at the mouth of the river that may lodge some ten men; with whom you shall leave a light boat, that when any fleet shall be in sight, they may come with speed to give you warning. Secondly, you must in no case suffer any of the native people of the country to inhabit between you and the sea coast; for you cannot carry yourselves so towards them, but they will grow discontented with your habitation, and be ready to guide and assist any nation that shall come to invade you; and if you neglect this, you neglect your safety.

When you have discovered as far up the river as you mean to plant yourselves, and landed your victuals and munitions; to the end that every man may know his charge, you shall do well to divide your six score men into three parts; whereof one party of them you may appoint to fortifie and build, of which your first work must be your storehouse for victuals; the other you may imploy in preparing your ground and sowing your corn and roots; the other ten of these forty you must leave as centinel at the haven’s mouth. The other forty you may imploy for two months in discovery of the river above you, and on the country about you; which charge Captain Newport and Captain Gosnold may undertake of these forty discoverers. When they do espie any high lands or hills, Captain Gosnold may take twenty of the company to cross over the lands, and carrying a half dozen pickaxes to try if they can find any minerals. The other twenty may go on by river, and pitch up boughs upon the bank’s side, by which the other boats shall follow them by the same turnings. You may also take with them a wherry, such as is used here in the Thames; by which you may send back to the President for supply of munition or any other want, that you may not be driven to return for every small defect.

You must observe if you can, whether the river on which you plant doth spring out of mountains or out of lakes. If it be out of any lake, the passage to the other sea will be more easy, and [it] is like enough, that out of the same lake you shall find some spring which run[s] the contrary way towards the East India Sea; for the great and famous rivers of Volga, Tan[a]is and Dwina have three heads near joynd; and yet the one falleth into the Caspian Sea, the other into the Euxine Sea, and the third into the Paelonian Sea.

In all your passages you must have great care not to offend the naturals [natives], if you can eschew it; and imploy some few of your company to trade with them for corn and all other . . . victuals if you have any; and this you must do before that they perceive you mean to plant among them; for not being sure how your own seed corn will prosper the first year, to avoid the danger of famine, use and endeavour to store yourselves of the country corn.

Your discoverers that pass over land with hired guides, must look well to them that they slip not from them: and for more assurance, let them take a compass with them, and write down how far they go upon every point of the compass; for that country having no way nor path, if that your guides run from you in the great woods or desert, you shall hardly ever find a passage back.

And how weary soever your soldiers be, let them never trust the country people with the carriage of their weapons; for if they run from you with your shott, which they only fear, they will easily kill them all with their arrows. And whensoever any of yours shoots before them, be sure they may be chosen out of your best marksmen; for if they see your learners miss what they aim at, they will think the weapon not so terrible, and thereby will be bould to assault you.

Above all things, do not advertize the killing of any of your men, that the country people may know it; if they perceive that they are but common men, and that with the loss of many of theirs they diminish any part of yours, they will make many adventures upon you. If the country be populous, you shall do well also, not to let them see or know of your sick men, if you have any; which may also encourage them to many enterprizes.

You must take especial care that you choose a seat for habitation that shall not be over burthened with woods near your town; for all the men you have, shall not be able to cleanse twenty acres a year; besides that it may serve for a covert for your enemies round about.

Neither must you plant in a low or moist place, because it will prove unhealthfull. You shall judge of the good air by the people; for some part of that coast where the lands are low, have their people blear eyed, and with swollen bellies and legs; but if the naturals be strong and clean made, it is a true sign of a wholesome soil.

You must take order to draw up the pinnace that is left with you, under the fort: and take her sails and anchors ashore, all but a small kedge to ride by; least some ill-dispositioned persons slip away with her.

You must take care that your marriners that go for wages, do not mar your trade; for those that mind not to inhabite, for a little gain will debase the estimation of exchange, and hinder the trade for ever after; and therefore you shall not admit or suffer any person whatsoever, other than such as shall be appointed by the President and Counsel there, to buy any merchandizes or other things whatsoever.

It were necessary that all your carpenters and other such like workmen about building do first build your storehouse and those other rooms of publick and necessary use before any house be set up for any private person: and though the workman may belong to any private persons yet let them all work together first for the company and then for private men.

And seeing order is at the same price with confusion, it shall be adviseably done to set your houses even and by a line, that your street may have a good breadth, and be carried square about your market place and every street’s end opening into it; that from thence, with a few field pieces, you may command every street throughout; which market place you may also fortify if you think it needfull.

You shall do well to send a perfect relation by Captaine Newport of all that is done, what height you are seated, how far into the land, what commodities you find, what soil, woods and their several kinds, and so of all other things else to advertise particularly; and to suffer no man to return but by pasport from the President and Counsel, nor to write any letter of anything that may discourage others.

Lastly and chiefly the way to prosper and achieve good success is to make yourselves all of one mind for the good of your country and your own, and to serve and fear God the Giver of all Goodness, for every plantation which our Heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted out.

After two years of excavations into the cellar located at the corner of James Fort’s 1608 addition, the team finally focused on excavating the well within its walls.

While this well showed similar characteristics of two early wells previously excavated by the team in 2006 and 2009, the story it told was as very different. Similar to the John Smith well in the fort’s center, the well shaft was dug in the bottom of a cellar. Also, because it was identical to the 5 foot by 5 foot square well built in 1611 in the fort’s northcorner,the team also assumed that this well would have a wooden lining. Both of these previously excavated wells held thousands of artifacts. However, this well was almost completely deficient of artifacts and had nothing lining its interior.

Interestingly, the only artifacts that the team recovered from the well fill were in a layer of redeposited prehistoric topsoil. That layer produced beautiful quartzite flakes, related to the production of projectile points, and native pottery dated to hundreds of years before the colonists’ arrival at Jamestown. The remaining layers were a mix of clay and sand subsoil, which were likely gathered during cellar expansion. Only a few historic artifacts were found. It contained one small piece of lead shot and some fragments of brick.

“As we went through the well fill, we were struck by the absence of artifacts. After the well was abandoned, the colonists did not use it to dispose of their trash. As they expanded the cellar, they quickly used the undisturbed topsoil and subsoil they were removing from the side walls to fill in the well shaft,” archaeologist Mary Anna Hartley explained.

The fact that there was no lining to hold back the sandy soil in the walls of the well shaft led senior staff archaeologist Dave Givens to hypothesize that the colonists may have dug the well shaft during a period of drought and felt that a well casing was unnecessary. Without a lining, any rain event that they experienced would have caused heavy erosion to the shaft’s subsoil walls as the water level rose. This is very similar to when you dig a hole in the sand at the beach and the sides slump in at the level you hit water.

The absence of artifacts in the well appears to indicate that it was filled quickly and likely abandoned very soon after it was dug. It also indicates that it was filled very early. So while the well held very little cultural material it still told us a story about the life of the cellar and the early fort-period. For more information on the well, check out the link to our Dig Update video featuring Dave Givens.

Bradford was one of the leaders of the English Puritan Separatists who we now call “The Pilgrims.” This history was his personal journal, completed around 1650, after he had served some 35 years as governor of the colony. The first excerpt describes his feelings as he is on The Mayflower in 1620, on the night before they land to start their puritan colony, the first utopian experiment in the Americas.

On the Mayflower1620
How they sought a place of habitation1620
The Mayflower Compact1620
Treaty with the Indians1621
New governor, first marriage1621
First harvest1621
Private and communal farming1623

On the Mayflower
Being thus arrived in a good harbor, and brought safe to land, they fell upon their knees and blessed the God of Heaven who had brought them over the fast and furious ocean, and delivered them from all the perils and miseries thereof, again to set their feet on the firm and stable earth, their proper element. And no marvel if they were thus joyful, seeing wise Seneca was so affected with sailing a few miles on the coast of his own Italy, as he affirmed, that he had rather remain twenty years on his way by land than pass by sea to any place in a short time, so tedious and dreadful was the same unto him.

But here I cannot but stay and make a pause, and stand half amazed at this poor people’s present condition; and so I think will the reader, too, when he well considers the same. Being thus passed the vast ocean, and a sea of troubles before in their preparation (as may be remembered by that which went before), they had now no friends to welcomethem norinns to entertain or refresh theirweatherbeatenbodies; no houses or much less towns to repair to, to seek for succor. It is recorded in Scripture as a mercy to the Apostle and his shipwrecked company, that the barbarians showed them no small kindness in refreshing them, but these savage barbarians, when they met with them (as after will appear) were readier to fill their sides full of arrows than otherwise. And for the season it was winter, and they know that the winters of that country know them to be sharp and violent, and subject to cruel and fierce storms, dangerous to travel to known places, much more to search an unknown coast. Besides, what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men–and what multitudes there might be of them they knewnot.Neither could they, as it were, go up to the top of Pisgah to view from this wilderness a more goodly country to feed their hopes; for which waysoeverthey turned their eyes (save upward to the heavens) they could have little solace or content in respect of any outward objects. For summer being done, all things stand upon them with aweatherbeatenface, and the whole country, full of woods and thickets, represented a wild and savage hue. If they looked behind them, there was the mighty ocean which they had passed and was now as a main bar and gulf to separate them from all the civil parts of the world. If it be said they had a ship to succor them, it is true; but what heardtheydaily from the master and company? But that with speed they should look out a place (with theirshallop) where they would be, at some near distance; for the season was such that he would not stir from thence till a safe harbor was discovered by them, where they would be, and he might go without danger; and that victuals consumed space but he must and would keep sufficient for themselves and their return. Yea, it was muttered by some that if they got not a place in time, they would turn them and their goods ashore and leave them. Let it also be considered what weak hopes of supply and succor they left behind them, that might bear up their minds in this sad condition and trials they were under; and they could not but be very small. It is true, indeed, the affections and love of their brethren at Leyden was cordial and entire towards them, but they had little power to help them or themselves; and how the case stood between them and the merchants at their coming away hath already been declared.

What could now sustain them but the Spirit of God and His grace? May not and ought not the children of these fathers rightly say: “Our fathers were Englishmen which came over this great ocean, and were ready to perish in this wilderness; but they cried unto the Lord, and He heard their voice and looked on their adversity,” etc. “Let them therefore praise the Lord, because He is good: and his mercies endure forever. Yea, let them which have been redeemed of the Lord, show how He hath delivered them from the hand of the oppressor. When they wandered in the desert wilderness out of the way, and found no city to dwell in, both hungry and thirsty, their soul was overwhelmed in them.” “Let them confess before the Lord His lovingkindness and His wonderful works before the sons of men.”
How they sought a place of habitation(1620)
Being thus arrived at Cape Cod the 11th of November, and necessity calling them to look out a place for habitation (as well as the master’s and mariner’s importunity); they having brought a largeshallopwith them out of England, stowed in quarters in the ship, they now got her out and set their carpenters to work to trim her up; but being much bruised and shattered in the ship with foul weather, they saw she would be long in mending. Whereupon a few of them tendered themselves to go by land and discover those nearest places, whilst theshallopwas in mending; and the rather because as they went into that harbor there seemed to be an opening some two or three leagues off, which the master judged to be a river. It was conceived there might be some danger in the attempt, yet seeing them resolute, they were permitted to go, being sixteen of them well armed under the conduct of Captain Standish, having such instructions given them as was thought meet.

They set forth the 15 of November; and when they had marched about the space of a mile by the seaside, they espied five or six persons with a dog coming towards them, who were savages; but they fled from them and ran up into the woods, and the English followed them, partly to see if they could speak with them, and partly to discover if there might not be more of them lying in ambush. But the Indians seeing themselves thus followed, they again forsook the woods and ran away on the sands as hard as they could, so as they could not come near them but followed them by the track of their feet sundry miles and saw that they had come the same way. So, night coming on, they made their rendezvous and set out their sentinels, and rested in quiet that night; and the next morning followed their track till they had headed a great creek and so left the sands, and turned another way into the woods. But they still followed them by guess, hoping to find their dwellings; but they soon lost both them and themselves, falling into such thickets as were ready to tear their clothes and armor in pieces; but were most distressed for want of drink. But at length they found water and refreshed themselves, being the first New England water they drunk of, and was now in great thirst as pleasant unto them as wine or beer had been in foretimes.

Afterwards, they directed their course to come to the other shore, for they knew it was a neck of land they were to cross over, and so at length got to the seaside and marched to this supposed river, and by the way found a pond of clear, fresh water, and shortly after a good quantity of clear ground where the Indians had formerly set corn, and some of their graves. And proceeding further they saw new stubble where corn had been set the same year; also they found where lately a house had been, where some planks and a great kettle was remaining, and heaps of sand newly paddled with their hands. Which, they digging up, found in them divers fair Indian baskets filled with corn, and some in ears, fair and good, ofdiverscolors, which seemed to them a very goodly sight (having never seen any such before). This was near the place of that supposed river they came to seek, unto which they went and found it to open itself into two arms with a high cliff of sand in the entrance but more like to be creeks of salt water than any fresh, for aught they saw; and that there was good harborage for theirshallop, leaving it further to be discovered by theirshallop, when she was ready. So, their time limited them being expired, they returned to the ship lest they should be in fear of their safety; and took with them part of the corn and buried up the rest. And so, like the men fromEshcol, carried with them of the fruits of the land and showed their brethren; of which, and their return, they were marvelously glad and their hearts encouraged.

After this, theshallopbeing got ready, they set out again for the better discovery of this place, and the master of the ship desired to go himself. So there went some thirty men but found it to be no harbor for ships but only for boats. There was also found two of their houses covered with mats, and sundry of their implements in them, but the people were run away and could not be seen. Also there was found more of their corn and of their beans of various colors; the corn and beans they brought away, purposing to give them full satisfaction when they should meet with any of them as, about some six months afterward they did, to their good content.

And here is to be noted a special providence of God, and a great mercy to this poor people, that here they got seed to plant them corn the next year, or else they might have starved, for they had none nor any likelihood to get any till the season had been past, as the sequel did manifest. Neither is it likely they had had this, if the first voyage had not been made, for the ground was now all covered with snow and hard frozen; but the Lord is never wanting unto His in their greatest needs; let His holy name have all the praise. . . .

The Mayflower Compact(1620)
I shall a little return back, and begin with a combination of made by them before they came ashore; being the first foundation of their government in this place. Occasioned partly by the discontented and mutinous speeches that some of the strangers amongst them had let fall from them in the ship: That when they came ashore they would use their own liberty, for none had power to command them, the patent they had being for Virginia and not for New England, which belonged to another government, with which the Virginia Company had nothing to do. And partly that such an act by them done, this their condition considered, might be as firm as any patent and in some respects more sure.

The form was asfolloweth:
IN THE NAME OF GOD, AMEN.

We whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God of Great Britain, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the faith, etc.

Having undertaken, for the Glory of God and advancement of the Christian Faith and Honor of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the First Colony in the Northern Parts of Virginia, do by these presents solemnly and mutually in the presence of God and one of another, Covenant and Combine ourselves together into a Civil Body Politic, for our better ordering and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute and frame such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions and Offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the Colony, unto which we promise all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof we have hereunder subscribed our names at Cape Cod, thellthof November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France and Ireland the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth. Anno Domini 1620.

After this they chose, or rather confirmed, Mr. John Carver (a man godly and well approved amongst them) their Governor for that year. And after they had provided a place for their goods, or common store (which were long in unlading for want of boats, foulness of the winter weather and sickness of divers) and begun some small cottages for their habitation; as time would admit, they met and consulted of laws and orders, both for their civil and military government as the necessity of their condition did require, still adding thereunto as urgent occasion in several times, and as cases did require.

In these hard and difficult beginnings they found some discontents and murmurings arise amongst some, and mutinous speeches and carriages in other; but they were soon quelled and overcome by the wisdom, patience, and just and equal carriage of things, by the Governor and better part, which clave faithfully together in the main.

Treaty with the Indians(1621)
All this while the Indians came skulking about them, and would sometimes show themselves aloof off, but when any approached near them, they would run away; and once they stole away their tools where they had been at work and were gone to dinner. But about the 16th of March, a certain Indian came boldly amongst them and spoke to them in broken English, which they could well understand but marveled at it. At length they understood by discourse with him, that he was not of these parts, but belonged to the eastern parts where some English ships came to fish, withwhomhe was acquainted and could name sundry of them by their names, amongst whom he had got his language. He became profitable to them in acquainting them with many things concerning the state of the country in the east parts where he lived, which was afterwards profitable unto them; as also of the people here, of their names, number and strength, of their situation and distance from this place, and who was chief amongst them. His name was Samoset. He told them also of another Indian whose name wasSguanto, a native of this place, who had been in England and could speak better English than himself.

Being after some time of entertainment and gifts dismissed, a while after he came again, and five more with him, and they brought again all the tools that were stolen away before, and made way for the coming of their great Sachem, called Massasoit. Who, about four or five days after, came with the chief of his friends and other attendance, with the aforesaidSquanto.With whom, after friendly entertainment and some gifts given him, they made a peace with him (which hath now continuedthis24 years) in these terms:
That neither he nor any of his should injure or do hurt to any of their people.

That if any of his did hurt to any of theirs, he should send the offender,thatthey might punish him.

That if anything were taken away from any of theirs, he should cause it to be restored; and they should do the like to his.

If any did unjustly war against him, they would aid him; if any did war against them, he should aid them.

He should send to hisneighborsconfederates to certify them of this, that they might not wrong them, but might be likewise comprised in the conditions of peace.

That when their men came to them, they should leave their bows and arrows behind them.

Afterthese thinghe returned to his place calledSowams, some 40 miles from this place, but Squanto continued with them and was their interpreter and was a special instrument sent of God for their good beyond their expectation. He directed them how to set their corn, where to take fish, and to procure other commodities, and was also their pilot to bring them to unknown places for their profit, and never left them till he died. He was a native of this place, and scarce any left alive besides himself. He we carried away with divers others by one Hunt, a master of a ship, who thought to sell them for slaves in Spain. But he got away for England and was entertained by a merchant in London, and employed to Newfoundland and other parts, and lastly brought hither into these parts by one Mr. Dermer, a gentleman employed by Sir Ferdinando Gorges and others for discovery and other designs in these parts.

New governor, first marriage(1621)
In this month of April, whilst they were busy about their seed, their Governor (Mr. John Carver) came out of the field very sick, it being a hot day. He complained greatly of his head and lay down, and within a few hours his senses failed, so as he neverspakemore till he died, which was within a few days after. Whose death was much lamented and caused great heaviness amongst them, as there was cause. He was buried in the best manner they could, with some volleys of shot by all that bore arms. And his wife, being a weak woman, died within five or six weeks after him.

Shortly after, William Bradford was chosen Governor in his stead, and being not recovered of his illness, in which he had been near the point of death, Isaac Allerton was chosen to be an assistant unto him who, by renewed election every year, continued sundry years together.Which I here note once for all.

May 12 was the first marriage in this place which, according to the laudable custom of the Low Countries, in which they had lived, was thought most requisite to be performed by the magistrate, as being a civil thing, upon which many questions about inheritances do depend, with other things most proper to their cognizance and most consonant to the Scriptures (Ruth iv) and nowhere found in the Gospel to be laid on the ministers as a part of their office.

First harvest(1621)
They began now to gather in the small harvest they had, and to fit up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered in health and strength and had all things in good plenty. For as some were thus employed in affairs abroad, others were exercised in fishing, about cod and bass and other fish, of which they took good store, of which every family had their portion. All the summer there was no want; and now began to come in store of fowl, as winter approached, of which this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by degrees). And besides waterfowl there was a great store of wild turkeys, of which they took many, besides venison, etc. Besides they had about a peck a meal a week to a person, or now since harvest, Indian corn to the proportion.Which made many afterwards write so largely of their plenty here to their friends in England, which were not feigned but true reports.

Private and communal farming(1623)
All this while no supply was heard of, neither knewtheywhen they might expect any. So they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop than they had done, that they might not still thus languish in misery. At length, after much debate of things, the Governor (with the advice of thechiefestamongst them) gave way that they should set corn every man for his own particular, and in that regard trust tothemselves; in all other thing to go on in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number, for that end, only for present use (but made no division for inheritance) and ranged all boys and youth under some family. This had very good success, for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better content. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.

The experience that was had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years and that amongst godly and sober men, may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato’s and other ancients applauded by some of later times; and that the taking away of property and bringing in community into a commonwealth would make them happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God. For this community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For the young men, that were most able and fit for labor and service, did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children without any recompense. The strong, or man of parts, had no more in division of victuals and clothes than he that was weak and not able to do a quarter the other could; this was thought injustice. The aged and graver men to be ranked and equalized in labors and victuals, clothes etc., with the meaner and younger sort, thought it some indignity and disrespect unto them. And for men’s wives to be commanded to do service for other men, as dressing their meat, washing their clothes, etc., they deemed it a kind of slavery, neither could many husbands well brook it. Upon the point all being to have alike, and all to do alike, they thought themselves in the like condition, and one as good as another; and so, if it did not cut off thoserelationsthat God hath set amongst men, yet it did at least much diminish and take off the mutual respects that should be preserved amongst them.And would have been worse if they had been men of another condition.Let none object this is men’s corruption, and nothing to the course itself. I answer, seeing all men have this corruption inthem,God in His wisdom saw another course fitter for them.

This is Winthrop’s most famous thesis, written on board the Arbella, 1630. We love to imagine the occasion when he personally spoke this oration to some large portion of the Winthrop fleet passengers during or just before their passage.

In an age not long past, when the Puritan founders were still respected by the educational establishment, this was required reading in many courses of American history and literature. However, it was often abridged to just the first and last few paragraphs. This left the overture of the piece sounding unkind and fatalistic, and the finale rather sternly zealous. A common misrepresentation of the Puritan character.

Winthrop’s genius was logical reasoning combined with a sympathetic nature. To remove this work’s central arguments about love and relationships is to completely lose the sense of the whole. Therefore we present it here in its well-balanced entirety. The biblical quotations are as Winthrop wrote them, and remain sometimes at slight variance from the King James version. This editor has corrected the chapter and verse citations to correspond to the King James text, assuming that the modern reader will wish to conveniently refer to that most popular English version of the Bible, as the Governor lays out his argument for charity and decent human behavior in the community.

Winthrop’s intent was to prepare the people for planting a new society in a perilous environment, but his practical wisdom is timeless.

OD ALMIGHTY in His most holy and wise providence, hath so disposed of the condition of mankind, as in all times some must be rich, some poor, some high and eminent in power and dignity; others mean and in submission.

The Reason hereof:
1st Reason.

First to hold conformity with the rest of His world, being delighted to show forth the glory of his wisdom in the variety and difference of the creatures, and the glory of His power in ordering all these differences for the preservation and good of the whole, and the glory of His greatness, that as it is the glory of princes to have many officers, so this great king will have many stewards, counting himself more honored in dispensing his gifts to man by man, than if he did it by his own immediate hands.

2nd Reason.

Secondly, that He might have the more occasion to manifest the work of his Spirit: first upon the wicked in moderating and restraining them, so that the rich and mighty should not eat up the poor, nor the poor and despised rise up against and shake off their yoke. Secondly, in the regenerate, in exercising His graces in them, as in the great ones, their love, mercy, gentleness, temperance etc., and in the poor and inferior sort, their faith, patience, obedience etc.

3rd Reason.

Thirdly, that every man might have need of others, and from hence they might be all knit more nearly together in the bonds of brotherly affection. From hence it appears plainly that no man is made more honorable than another or more wealthy etc., out of any particular and singular respect to himself, but for the glory of his Creator and the common good of the creature, Man. Therefore God still reserves the property of these gifts to Himself as Ezek. 16:17, He there calls wealth, His gold and His silver, and Prov. 3:9, He claims their service as His due, “Honor the Lord with thy riches,” etc. — All men being thus (by divine providence) ranked into two sorts, rich and poor; under the first are comprehended all such as are able to live comfortably by their own means duly improved; and all others are poor according to the former distribution.

There are two rules whereby we are to walk one towards another: Justice and Mercy. These are always distinguished in their act and in their object, yet may they both concur in the same subject in each respect; as sometimes there may be an occasion of showing mercy to a rich man in some sudden danger or distress, and also doing of mere justice to a poor man in regard of some particular contract, etc.

There is likewise a double Law by which we are regulated in our conversation towards another. In both the former respects, the Law of Nature and the Law of Grace (that is, the moral law or the law of the gospel) to omit the rule of justice as not properly belonging to this purpose otherwise than it may fall into consideration in some particular cases. By the first of these laws, Man as he was enabled so withal is commanded to love his neighbor as himself. Upon this ground stands all the precepts of the moral law, which concerns our dealings with men. To apply this to the works of mercy, this law requires two things. First, that every man afford his help to another in every want or distress.

Secondly, that he perform this out of the same affection which makes him careful of his own goods, according to the words of our Savior (from Matthew 7:12), whatsoever ye would that men should do to you. This was practiced by Abraham and Lot in entertaining the angels and the old man of Gibea. The law of Grace or of the Gospel hath some difference from the former (the law of nature), as in these respects: First, the law of nature was given to Man in the estate of innocence. This of the Gospel in the estate of regeneracy. Secondly, the former propounds one man to another, as the same flesh and image of God. This as a brother in Christ also, and in the communion of the same Spirit, and so teacheth to put a difference between Christians and others. Do good to all, especially to the household of faith. Upon this ground the Israelites were to put a difference between the brethren of such as were strangers, though not of the Canaanites.

Thirdly, the Law of Nature would give no rules for dealing with enemies, for all are to be considered as friends in the state of innocence, but the Gospel commands love to an enemy. Proof: If thine enemy hunger, feed him; “Love your enemies… Do good to them that hate you” (Matt. 5:44).

This law of the Gospel propounds likewise a difference of seasons and occasions. There is a time when a Christian must sell all and give to the poor, as they did in the Apostles’ times. There is a time also when Christians (though they give not all yet) must give beyond their ability, as they of Macedonia (2 Cor. 8). Likewise, community of perils calls for extraordinary liberality, and so doth community in some special service for the church.

Lastly, when there is no other means whereby our Christian brother may be relieved in his distress, we must help him beyond our ability rather than tempt God in putting him upon help by miraculous or extraordinary means. This duty of mercy is exercised in the kinds: giving, lending and forgiving (of a debt).

Question: What rule shall a man observe in giving in respect of the measure?
Answer:
If the time and occasion be ordinary he is to give out of his abundance. Let him lay aside as God hath blessed him. If the time and occasion be extraordinary, he must be ruled by them; taking this withal, that then a man cannot likely do too much, especially if he may leave himself and his family under probable means of comfortable subsistence.

Objection:
A man must lay up for posterity, the fathers lay up for posterity and children, and he is worse than an infidel that provideth not for his own.

Answer:
For the first, it is plain that it being spoken by way of comparison, it must be meant of the ordinary and usual course of fathers, and cannot extend to times and occasions extraordinary. For the other place the Apostle speaks against such as walked inordinately, and it is without question, that he is worse than an infidel who through his own sloth and voluptuousness shall neglect to provide for his family.

Objection:
“The wise man’s eyes are in his head,” saith Solomon, “and foreseeth the plague;” therefore he must forecast and lay up against evil times when he or his may stand in need of all he can gather.

Answer:
This very Argument Solomon useth to persuade to liberality (Eccle. 11), “Cast thy bread upon the waters…for thou knowest not what evil may come upon the land.” Luke 16:9, “Make you friends of the riches of iniquity…” You will ask how this shall be? Very well. For first he that gives to the poor, lends to the Lord and He will repay him even in this life an hundredfold to him or his. The righteous is ever merciful and lendeth, and his seed enjoyeth the blessing; and besides we know what advantage it will be to us in the day of account when many such witnesses shall stand forth for us to witness the improvement of our talent. And I would know of those who plead so much for laying up for time to come, whether they hold that to be Gospel Matthew 6:19, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth,” etc. If they acknowledge it, what extent will they allow it? If only to those primitive times, let them consider the reason whereupon our Savior grounds it. The first is that they are subject to the moth, the rust, the thief. Secondly, they will steal away the heart: “where the treasure is there will your heart be also.”
The reasons are of like force at all times. Therefore the exhortation must be general and perpetual, with always in respect of the love and affection to riches and in regard of the things themselves when any special service for the church or particular distress of our brother do call for the use of them; otherwise it is not only lawful but necessary to lay up as Joseph did to have ready upon such occasions, as the Lord (whose stewards we are of them) shall call for them from us. Christ gives us an instance of the first, when he sent his disciples for the donkey, and bids them answer the owner thus, “the Lord hath need of him.” So when the Tabernacle was to be built, He sends to His people to call for their silver and gold, etc., and yields no other reason but that it was for His work. When Elisha comes to the widow of Sareptah and finds her preparing to make ready her pittance for herself and family, he bids her first provide for him, he challenges first God’s part which she must first give before she must serve her own family. All these teach us that the Lord looks that when He is pleased to call for His right in any thing we have, our own interest we have must stand aside till His turn be served. For the other, we need look no further then to that of 1 John 3:17, “He who hath this world’s goods and seeth his brother to need and shuts up his compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?” Which comes punctually to this conclusion: If thy brother be in want and thou canst help him, thou needst not make doubt of what thou shouldst do; if thou lovest God thou must help him.

Question: What rule must we observe in lending?
Answer:
Thou must observe whether thy brother hath present or probable or possible means of repaying thee, if there be none of those, thou must give him according to his necessity, rather then lend him as he requires (requests). If he hath present means of repaying thee, thou art to look at him not as an act of mercy, but by way of commerce, wherein thou art to walk by the rule of justice; but if his means of repaying thee be only probable or possible, then he is an object of thy mercy, thou must lend him, though there be danger of losing it. (Deut. 15:7-8): “If any of thy brethren be poor … thou shalt lend him sufficient.” That men might not shift off this duty by the apparent hazard, He tells them that though the year of Jubilee were at hand (when he must remit it, if he were not able to repay it before), yet he must lend him, and that cheerfully. It may not grieve thee to give him, saith He. And because some might object, why so I should soon impoverish myself and my family, he adds, with all thy work, etc., for our Savior said (Matt. 5:42), “From him that would borrow of thee turn not away.”
Question: What rule must we observe in forgiving (a debt)?
Answer:
Whether thou didst lend by way of commerce or in mercy, if he hath nothing to pay thee, thou must forgive, (except in cause where thou hast a surety or a lawful pledge). Deut. 15:1-2 — Every seventh year the creditor was to quit that which he lent to his brother if he were poor, as appears in verse 4. “Save when there shall be no poor with thee.” In all these and like cases, Christ gives a general rule (Matt. 7:12), “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye the same to them.”
Question: What rule must we observe and walk by in cause of community of peril?
Answer:
The same as before, but with more enlargement towards others and less respect towards ourselves and our own right. Hence it was that in the primitive Church they sold all, had all things in common, neither did any man say that which he possessed was his own. Likewise in their return out of the captivity, because the work was great for the restoring of the church and the danger of enemies was common to all, Nehemiah directs the Jews to liberality and readiness in remitting their debts to their brethren, and disposing liberally to such as wanted, and stand not upon their own dues which they might have demanded of them. Thus did some of our forefathers in times of persecution in England, and so did many of the faithful of other churches, whereof we keep an honorable remembrance of them; and it is to be observed that both in Scriptures and latter stories of the churches that such as have been most bountiful to the poor saints, especially in those extraordinary times and occasions, God hath left them highly commended to posterity, as Zaccheus, Cornelius, Dorcas, Bishop Hooper, the Cutler of Brussels and divers others. Observe again that the Scripture gives no caution to restrain any from being over liberal this way; but all men to the liberal and cheerful practice hereof by the sweeter promises; as to instance one for many (Isaiah 58:6-9) “Is not this the fast I have chosen to loose the bonds of wickedness, to take off the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go free and to break every yoke … to deal thy bread to the hungry and to bring the poor that wander into thy house, when thou seest the naked to cover them … and then shall thy light brake forth as the morning and thy health shall grow speedily, thy righteousness shall go before God, and the glory of the Lord shalt embrace thee; then thou shall call and the Lord shall answer thee,” etc. And from Ch. 2:10 (??) “If thou pour out thy soul to the hungry, then shall thy light spring out in darkness, and the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in draught, and make fat thy bones, thou shalt be like a watered garden, and they shalt be of thee that shall build the old waste places,” etc. On the contrary most heavy curses are laid upon such as are straightened towards the Lord and his people (Judg. 5:23), “Curse ye Meroshe … because they came not to help the Lord.” He who shutteth his ears from hearing the cry of the poor, he shall cry and shall not be heard.” (Matt. 25) “Go ye cursed into everlasting fire,” etc. “I was hungry and ye fed me not.” (2 Cor. 9:6) “He that soweth sparingly shall reap sparingly.”
Having already set forth the practice of mercy according to the rule of God’s law, it will be useful to lay open the grounds of it also, being the other part of the Commandment and that is the affection from which this exercise of mercy must arise, the Apostle tells us that this love is the fulfilling of the law, not that it is enough to love our brother and so no further; but in regard of the excellency of his parts giving any motion to the other as the soul to the body and the power it hath to set all the faculties at work in the outward exercise of this duty; as when we bid one make the clock strike, he doth not lay hand on the hammer, which is the immediate instrument of the sound, but sets on work the first mover or main wheel; knowing that will certainly produce the sound which he intends. So the way to draw men to the works of mercy, is not by force of Argument from the goodness or necessity of the work; for though this cause may enforce, a rational mind to some present act of mercy, as is frequent in experience, yet it cannot work such a habit in a soul, as shall make it prompt upon all occasions to produce the same effect, but by framing these affections of love in the heart which will as naturally bring forth the other, as any cause doth produce the effect.

The definition which the Scripture gives us of love is this: Love is the bond of perfection. First it is a bond or ligament. Secondly, it makes the work perfect. There is no body but consists of parts and that which knits these parts together, gives the body its perfection, because it makes each part so contiguous to others as thereby they do mutually participate with each other, both in strength and infirmity, in pleasure and pain. To instance in the most perfect of all bodies: Christ and his Church make one body. The several parts of this body considered a part before they were united, were as disproportionate and as much disordering as so many contrary qualities or elements, but when Christ comes, and by his spirit and love knits all these parts to himself and each to other, it is become the most perfect and best proportioned body in the world (Eph. 4:15-16). Christ, by whom all the body being knit together by every joint for the furniture thereof, according to the effectual power which is in the measure of every perfection of parts, a glorious body without spot or wrinkle; the ligaments hereof being Christ, or his love, for Christ is love (1 John 4:8). So this definition is right. Love is the bond of perfection.

From hence we may frame these conclusions:
First of all, true Christians are of one body in Christ (1 Cor. 12). Ye are the body of Christ and members of their part. All the parts of this body being thus united are made so contiguous in a special relation as they must needs partake of each other’s strength and infirmity; joy and sorrow, weal and woe. If one member suffers, all suffer with it, if one be in honor, all rejoice with it.

Secondly, the ligaments of this body which knit together are love.

Thirdly, no body can be perfect which wants its proper ligament.

Fourthly, All the parts of this body being thus united are made so contiguous in a special relation as they must needs partake of each other’s strength and infirmity, joy and sorrow, weal and woe. (1 Cor. 12:26) If one member suffers, all suffer with it; if one be in honor, all rejoice with it.

Fifthly, this sensitivity and sympathy of each other’s conditions will necessarily infuse into each part a native desire and endeavor, to strengthen, defend, preserve and comfort the other. To insist a little on this conclusion being the product of all the former, the truth hereof will appear both by precept and pattern. 1 John 3:16, “We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” Gal. 6:2, “Bear ye one another’s burden’s and so fulfill the law of Christ.”
For patterns we have that first of our Savior who, out of his good will in obedience to his father, becoming a part of this body and being knit with it in the bond of love, found such a native sensitivity of our infirmities and sorrows as he willingly yielded himself to death to ease the infirmities of the rest of his body, and so healed their sorrows. From the like sympathy of parts did the Apostles and many thousands of the Saints lay down their lives for Christ. Again the like we may see in the members of this body among themselves. Rom. 9 — Paul could have been contented to have been separated from Christ, that the Jews might not be cut off from the body. It is very observable what he professeth of his affectionate partaking with every member; “Who is weak (saith he) and I am not weak? Who is offended and I burn not?” And again (2 Cor. 7:13), “Therefore we are comforted because ye were comforted.” Of Epaphroditus he speaketh (Phil. 2:25-30) that he regarded not his own life to do him service. So Phoebe and others are called the servants of the church. Now it is apparent that they served not for wages, or by constraint, but out of love. The like we shall find in the histories of the church, in all ages; the sweet sympathy of affections which was in the members of this body one towards another; their cheerfulness in serving and suffering together; how liberal they were without repining, harborers without grudging, and helpful without reproaching; and all from hence, because they had fervent love amongst them; which only makes the practice of mercy constant and easy.

The next consideration is how this love comes to be wrought. Adam in his first estate was a perfect model of mankind in all their generations, and in him this love was perfected in regard of the habit. But Adam, himself rent from his Creator, rent all his posterity also one from another; whence it comes that every man is born with this principle in him to love and seek himself only, and thus a Man continueth till Christ comes and takes possession of the soul and infuseth another principle, love to God and our brother, and this latter having continual supply from Christ, as the head and root by which he is united, gets predominant in the soul, so by little and little expels the former. 1 John 4:7 — Love cometh of God and every one that loveth is born of God, so that this love is the fruit of the new birth, and none can have it but the new creature. Now when this quality is thus formed in the souls of men, it works like the Spirit upon the dry bones. Ezek. 37:7 — “Bone came to bone.” It gathers together the scattered bones, or perfect old man Adam, and knits them into one body again in Christ, whereby a man is become again a living soul.

The third consideration is concerning the exercise of this love, which is twofold, inward or outward. The outward hath been handled in the former preface of this discourse. From unfolding the other we must take in our way that maxim of philosophy, “simile simili gaudet,” or like will to like; for as of things which are turned with disaffection to each other, the ground of it is from a dissimilitude or arising from the contrary or different nature of the things themselves; for the ground of love is an apprehension of some resemblance in the things loved to that which affects it. This is the cause why the Lord loves the creature, so far as it hath any of his Image in it; He loves his elect because they are like Himself, He beholds them in His beloved son.

So a mother loves her child, because she thoroughly conceives a resemblance of herself in it. Thus it is between the members of Christ; each discerns, by the work of the Spirit, his own Image and resemblance in another, and therefore cannot but love him as he loves himself. Now when the soul, which is of a sociable nature, finds anything like to itself, it is like Adam when Eve was brought to him. She must be one with himself. This is flesh of my flesh (saith he) and bone of my bone. So the soul conceives a great delight in it; therefore she desires nearness and familiarity with it. She hath a great propensity to do it good and receives such content in it, as fearing the miscarriage of her beloved, she bestows it in the inmost closet of her heart. She will not endure that it shall want any good which she can give it. If by occasion she be withdrawn from the company of it, she is still looking towards the place where she left her beloved. If she heard it groan, she is with it presently. If she find it sad and disconsolate, she sighs and moans with it. She hath no such joy as to see her beloved merry and thriving. If she see it wronged, she cannot hear it without passion. She sets no bounds to her affections, nor hath any thought of reward. She finds recompense enough in the exercise of her love towards it.

We may see this acted to life in Jonathan and David. Jonathan a valiant man endued with the spirit of love, so soon as he discovered the same spirit in David had presently his heart knit to him by this ligament of love; so that it is said he loved him as his own soul, he takes so great pleasure in him, that he strips himself to adorn his beloved. His father’s kingdom was not so precious to him as his beloved David, David shall have it with all his heart. Himself desires no more but that he may be near to him to rejoice in his good. He chooseth to converse with him in the wilderness even to the hazard of his own life, rather than with the great Courtiers in his father’s Palace. When he sees danger towards him, he spares neither rare pains nor peril to direct it. When injury was offered his beloved David, he would not bear it, though from his own father. And when they must part for a season only, they thought their hearts would have broke for sorrow, had not their affections found vent by abundance of tears. Other instances might be brought to show the nature of this affection; as of Ruth and Naomi, and many others; but this truth is cleared enough. If any shall object that it is not possible that love shall be bred or upheld without hope of requital, it is granted; but that is not our cause; for this love is always under reward. It never gives, but it always receives with advantage:
First in regard that among the members of the same body, love and affection are reciprocal in a most equal and sweet kind of commerce.

Secondly, in regard of the pleasure and content that the exercise of love carries with it, as we may see in the natural body. The mouth is at all the pains to receive and mince the food which serves for the nourishment of all the other parts of the body; yet it hath no cause to complain; for first the other parts send back, by several passages, a due proportion of the same nourishment, in a better form for the strengthening and comforting the mouth. Secondly, the labor of the mouth is accompanied with such pleasure and content as far exceeds the pains it takes. So is it in all the labor of love among Christians. The party loving, reaps love again, as was showed before, which the soul covets more then all the wealth in the world.

Thirdly, nothing yields more pleasure and content to the soul then when it finds that which it may love fervently; for to love and live beloved is the soul’s paradise both here and in heaven. In the State of wedlock there be many comforts to learn out of the troubles of that condition; but let such as have tried the most, say if there be any sweetness in that condition comparable to the exercise of mutual love.

From the former considerations arise these conclusions:
First, this love among Christians is a real thing, not imaginary.

Secondly, this love is as absolutely necessary to the being of the body of Christ, as the sinews and other ligaments of a natural body are to the being of that body.

Thirdly, this love is a divine, spiritual, nature; free, active, strong, courageous, permanent; undervaluing all things beneath its proper object and of all the graces, this makes us nearer to resemble the virtues of our heavenly father.

Fourthly, it rests in the love and welfare of its beloved. For the full certain knowledge of those truths concerning the nature, use, and excellency of this grace, that which the holy ghost hath left recorded, 1 Cor. 13, may give full satisfaction, which is needful for every true member of this lovely body of the Lord Jesus, to work upon their hearts by prayer, meditation continual exercise at least of the special influence of this grace, till Christ be formed in them and they in him, all in each other, knit together by this bond of love.

It rests now to make some application of this discourse, by the present design, which gave the occasion of writing of it. Herein are four things to be propounded; first the persons, secondly, the work, thirdly the end, fourthly the means.

First, for the persons. We are a company professing ourselves fellow members of Christ, in which respect only, though we were absent from each other many miles, and had our employments as far distant, yet we ought to account ourselves knit together by this bond of love and live in the exercise of it, if we would have comfort of our being in Christ. This was notorious in the practice of the Christians in former times; as is testified of the Waldenses, from the mouth of one of the adversaries Aeneas Sylvius “mutuo ament pene antequam norunt” — they use to love any of their own religion even before they were acquainted with them.

Secondly for the work we have in hand. It is by a mutual consent, through a special overvaluing providence and a more than an ordinary approbation of the churches of Christ, to seek out a place of cohabitation and consortship under a due form of government both civil and ecclesiastical. In such cases as this, the care of the public must oversway all private respects, by which, not only conscience, but mere civil policy, doth bind us. For it is a true rule that particular estates cannot subsist in the ruin of the public.

Thirdly, the end is to improve our lives to do more service to the Lord; the comfort and increase of the body of Christ, whereof we are members, that ourselves and posterity may be the better preserved from the common corruptions of this evil world, to serve the Lord and work out our salvation under the power and purity of his holy ordinances.

Fourthly, for the means whereby this must be effected. They are twofold, a conformity with the work and end we aim at. These we see are extraordinary, therefore we must not content ourselves with usual ordinary means. Whatsoever we did, or ought to have done, when we lived in England, the same must we do, and more also, where we go. That which the most in their churches maintain as truth in profession only, we must bring into familiar and constant practice; as in this duty of love, we must love brotherly without dissimulation, we must love one another with a pure heart fervently. We must bear one another’s burdens. We must not look only on our own things, but also on the things of our brethren.

Neither must we think that the Lord will bear with such failings at our hands as he doth from those among whom we have lived; and that for these three reasons:
First, in regard of the more near bond of marriage between Him and us, wherein He hath taken us to be His, after a most strict and peculiar manner, which will make Him the more jealous of our love and obedience. So He tells the people of Israel, you only have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore will I punish you for your transgressions.

Secondly, because the Lord will be sanctified in them that come near Him. We know that there were many that corrupted the service of the Lord; some setting up altars before his own; others offering both strange fire and strange sacrifices also; yet there came no fire from heaven, or other sudden judgment upon them, as did upon Nadab and Abihu, whom yet we may think did not sin presumptuously.

Thirdly, when God gives a special commission He looks to have it strictly observed in every article; When He gave Saul a commission to destroy Amaleck, He indented with him upon certain articles, and because he failed in one of the least, and that upon a fair pretense, it lost him the kingdom, which should have been his reward, if he had observed his commission.

Thus stands the cause between God and us. We are entered into covenant with Him for this work. We have taken out a commission. The Lord hath given us leave to draw our own articles. We have professed to enterprise these and those accounts, upon these and those ends. We have hereupon besought Him of favor and blessing. Now if the Lord shall please to hear us, and bring us in peace to the place we desire, then hath He ratified this covenant and sealed our commission, and will expect a strict performance of the articles contained in it; but if we shall neglect the observation of these articles which are the ends we have propounded, and, dissembling with our God, shall fall to embrace this present world and prosecute our carnal intentions, seeking great things for ourselves and our posterity, the Lord will surely break out in wrath against us, and be revenged of such a people, and make us know the price of the breach of such a covenant.

Now the only way to avoid this shipwreck, and to provide for our posterity, is to follow the counsel of Micah, to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. For this end, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities. We must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality. We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body. So shall we keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as His own people, and will command a blessing upon us in all our ways, so that we shall see much more of His wisdom, power, goodness and truth, than formerly we have been acquainted with. We shall find that the God of Israel is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies; when He shall make us a praise and glory that men shall say of succeeding plantations, “may the Lord make it like that of New England.” For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world. We shall open the mouths of enemies to speak evil of the ways of God, and all professors for God’s sake. We shall shame the faces of many of God’s worthy servants, and cause their prayers to be turned into curses upon us till we be consumed out of the good land whither we are going.

And to shut this discourse with that exhortation of Moses, that faithful servant of the Lord, in his last farewell to Israel, Deut. 30. “Beloved, there is now set before us life and death, good and evil,” in that we are commanded this day to love the Lord our God, and to love one another, to walk in his ways and to keep his Commandments and his ordinance and his laws, and the articles of our Covenant with Him, that we may live and be multiplied, and that the Lord our God may bless us in the land whither we go to possess it. But if our hearts shall turn away, so that we will not obey, but shall be seduced, and worship other Gods, our pleasure and profits, and serve them; it is propounded unto us this day, we shall surely perish out of the good land whither we pass over this vast sea to possess it.

Therefore let us choose life,
that we and our seed may live,
by obeying His voice and cleaving to Him,
for He is our life and our prosperity.

I want to welcome you all to the Jamestown settlement here in Virginia, who’ve been gracious enough to allow us to film here today. If you’re ever down in this area, please come by and visit. I think you’ll be enriched by it.

Jamestown is actually settled by the Virginia Company of London in 1607. It’s chartered in 1606 as a joint-stock company, which means that people can invest in this endeavor to go across the ocean and settle. You spread the risk by spreading out this kind of investment. So peace with Spain means that there’s no privateering, but it’s a tenuous peace, which means that England needs a place that could be protected if they need it. And they choose a site just down the river: Jamestown Island. And it has a deep water port where they can almost moor the ships at the back door of the fort. And it’s safe and easily defensible should Spanish attack ever come. There are problems. Jamestown Island is in a swamp. It’s unhealthy, there’s brackish water, insects, disease. If any of you have ever been to a swamp, you know what those are like. But it’s about more than just the poor location. It’s poor timing. They had come in the worst drought in 300 years. It makes the conditions even worse. And they had planned to trade with the natives for food, but drought means you can’t grow as much food. So it makes it even more tense with the native population.

Recent evidence does suggest that the Jamestown settlers actually tried to plant their own crops, but again, the drought makes it more difficult. Initially, there are lots of problems for the settlement. In 1607, there are 104 settlers. By the next year, only 38 survive. Between 1610 and 1624, there are 10,000 immigrants to Virginia. But by 1624, only 1,200 of them are still alive.

As we know from what we have done in this class, tobacco is the saving grace of the Virginia colony. Tobacco is introduced in Virginia in 1612 by John Rolfe, who later, as we know, married the Christianized Indian princess, Pocahontas, who became Rebecca. By 1630, tobacco exports had totaled one and a half million pounds. It meant two things. Number one, the king was getting rich from tobacco taxes. And it also meant people in Virginia were getting rich. And they were expanding. Tobacco depletes the soil, which means you need very large tracks of land in order to rotate crops. And people began to move inland in Virginia. It also means that you need a large labor force. It’s very important to have people to work this tobacco. So they institute what they call the headright system. 50 acres of land for every paid settler who came to Virginia. This brings in a large class of elites. It’s expensive to come to Virginia, so if you pay for somebody to come, you get 50 acres of land. That even accounts for indentured servants. Indentured servants usually served 5-7 years. They’re usually young, single men. They’re poorly treated. They’re poorly housed. They’re poorly clothed. And many don’t outlive their contract. Problems with the indentured servants, who are really a disenfranchised segment of society, actually contribute to the rise of slavery in Virginia across the 17th century.

But with economic security in Virginia, they need some government. In 1619 just down the river, the first Virginia House of Burgesses and the Virginia General Assembly meet. They only meet for a short time, but it’s important because it’s the first representative assembly in the New World, and it establishes a form of English government here in America. There are tensions that remain with the Native American population. In 1622, there’s an Indianmassacre led byOpenchancanough, who is the brother of Powhatan. He kills 347 people in this massacre. More would have died had they not been warned by a Native American young man living with an English family. In 1644, there’s a second massacre, which kills another 400 colonists. This time, there’s no early warning.

Meanwhile, religious issues drive another group across the Atlantic. There’s a move in England to purify the Church of England from the Roman Catholic influences that have remained since the time of Henry VIII. In 1608, Puritan separatists who are being persecuted actually leave for the Netherlands. They decide that they can’t purify the church from England, so they have to separate from it. TheScroobycongregation actually remains in the Netherlands until about 1618 or 1619. And they leave Holland for really two reasons. First, the one we’re most familiar with. They’re afraid of the corrupting influences of the Dutch on their children. The second, in 1619 a contract, a treaty with Spain was supposed to expire. What that meant was, if Spain could come into the Netherlands, they would also bring the Spanish Inquisition with them, and we all know what that meant for anyone that did not agree with the Catholic Church. They were also a joint-stock company, which means other non-separatists came with theirgroup. But their purpose was to establish a place where Puritans could worship where they saw fit, and as long as you obeyed the rules of the colony, they didn’t care who came.

Well, we’re all familiar with the story. 1620 the Mayflower comes over, but they’re blown off course. Edwin Sandys, the leader of Virginia colony, actually had given the land at the far northern section of the Virginia Grant, near the mouth of the Hudson River. They’re blown off course. They land in Plymouth, and the first thing they do is set up a government. They do that with the Mayflower Compact. It’s very interesting. The Mayflower Compact actually does several things, but one of the most important things it does is let the king know they are not trying to start their own country. Independence is not in their mindset. They say, “King, we love you. We’re still British citizens. It’s just we want to set up our civil government according to the laws of God and our covenanted relationship with Him.” Plymouth doesn’t prosper. They have many of the same problems as Jamestown settlers. They also have the additional problem that separatism is not exactly the most popular religious view. They’re eventually swallowed up by the neighbor: Massachusetts Bay.

So, what brought the Puritans to Massachusetts Bay? Between 1629 and 1640, Charles I is trying to eliminate all Puritan members of the Anglican Church. There’s also a period of economic crisis and widespread disease. So, Massachusetts Bay becomes a haven. There’s also a pull factor to the New World. Puritans have a drive to convert the natives, and they wanted to trade with the natives for goods. In 1630, the Puritans arrive aboard the Arabella. Now, there are many ships in the flotilla. It’s a large group of colonists, and when they come, these are carefully chosen people. Some had to actually send letters of recommendation, if they weren’t known, in order to win the other leaders.

This was to be their city on a hill.The problem-how to live godly values in an evil world.They believe the government is a covenant with God, which means there are legal issues, as well. Applicants for church members had to give long conversion narratives in the Puritan world, and that was the only way you had the right to vote. You also had a group of people who were strong students of the Bible. They knew the Bible. And if they were overzealous, there could be legal problems as well as religious ones. And there’s great diversity. I was brought up in a world of Baptists. There’s a running joke in our family. If you get five Baptists in a room, you have five opinions. This was kind of what was going on in Massachusetts Bay. There’s an emphasis there on biblical authority, but among “so many earnest students of the Bible,” there was always one to discover a new and heretical meaning in a familiar passage and demand everyone else accept it.

After they arrived, misfits are actually banished to England or sent to other colonies. This leads to one of the most important things in American history. It’s the Massachusetts Body of Liberties. This is a written legal code; it’s a Bill of Rights.A hundred provisions including things like no taxation without representation, the right to a trial by jury, and the right to due process.Now, they find it necessary there also to place an authority figure to mediate religious and political disputes. They unify church and state, but the unification doesn’t come under a minister; it comes under an elected official. So, there are changes going on in what they do between the English and the new American colonial system. And these are going to play out as we continue to study.