2.2

• Spanish colonies in the Americas

  Established to extract wealth, primarily through agriculture and mining of gold and silver
• Encomienda system


  Spanish subjugated native population to do the farming and mining
• Caste system


  Introduced by the Spanish, fundamentally reshaped society into hierarchical levels based on racial ancestry
• Mission system


  Spanish attempt to convert natives to Christianity, met with mixed success
• The French were interested in finding a water route through the Americas to access trade in Asia
• First French interest in sailing west and establishing presence in the Americas

  1524
• French colonial policies


  Greater interest in trade than conquest, especially the fish and fur trade
• French trading settlements


  • Established throughout North America
• French traders married native American women

  To have kinship ties to trading networks
• Dutch goals


  Mainly economic, establishment of New Amsterdam as a trading hub
• The Dutch had no interest in converting natives to their beliefs
• English motivations for colonization

  Economics, religious freedom, and land for the peasantry
• The English colonizers set out to the Americas as family groups to establish new homes
• English settlers encroached on native lands

  Tension and violence ensued, unlike the Spanish subjugation of natives