Facing East from Indian Country: A Native History of Early America

In the 18th century, Indigenous and European colonial histories “moved in parallel, rather than opposing, directions” (151), with both groups becoming part of a single transatlantic imperial world. This perspective dispels the myth that the relationship between Indigenous and Euro-Americans solely consisted of “European advance and Indian retreat” (151).

In the late 17th and early 18th centuries, European powers contested their rights to the North American continent. A series of wars, including “King William’s War” and “Queen Anne’s War,” ended in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht that ushered in a 30-year “Long Peace.” During this period, British America achieved political stability and economic prosperity that contrasted with the harsh power politics of 17th-century New England and Virginia. Immigration from the British Isles and Germany enriched the American population, and the “Great Awakening” increased the diversity of religious expression. Although Indigenous communities benefited politically and economically from the Long Peace, the diversifying of the American population led to a “hardening definition of racial categories” (154). This period of peace ended only when, after the British victory in the Seven Years’ War (1754-1763), Britain’s newly expanded imperial power began to seem oppressive to many in North America, and an independence movement began.