Exploration and Enlightenment Vocabulary

An intellectual and philosophical movement in Europe during the 1600 & 1700s that shaped our modern ideas of government, governmental power, and human rights.

• Renaissance

• Reformation

• Enlightenment

• Empiricism

Belief that the authority of a government comes from the consent of the people; i.e. leaders have power because the people agree to it

• Popular Sovereignty

• Geocentric Theory

• Social Contract

• Rationalism

The activity of determining your position and following a route

• Transatlantic

• Columbian Exchange

• Navigation

• Commercial

A leader (usually a monarch) who rules according the the principles of the Enlightenment

• Enlightenment

• Capitalism

• Enlightened Despot

• mercantilism

Astronomical model that states the Sun is the center of the universe and that the planets revolve around the Sun. Developed by Nicolaus Copernicus in the 1500s and it replaced the Geocentric Theory.

• Heliocentric Theory

• Geocentric Theory

• Scientific Method

• Natural Rights

Theory that knowledge is derived through rational thinking; e.g. you determine what is true and false through using reason and logic.

• empiricism

• rationalism

• Enlightened Despot

• Social Contact

the sea journey undertaken by slave ships from West Africa to the West Indies

• Columbian Exchange

• Transatlantic

• Navigation

• Middle Passage

An economic system that is designed to maximize the exports and minimize the imports for an economy. The basis for the colonial system

• mercantilism

• capitalism

• communism

• democracy

Dealing with trade/business.

• capitalism

• conquistador

• mercantilism

• commercial

Human rights that people are born with, so they cannot be taken away by the government. In the U.S. today, our natural rights are “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

• Social Contract

• Natural Rights

• Rationalism

• Popular Sovereignty