Colonization

ВFollowing the travelers-discoverers, thousands of citizens of European countries located along the Atlantic coast headed to America in search for happiness. The colonization of the east of the continent by the French and the English began in the end of the 16th century. In the beginning of the 17th century European settlements began to appear on the territory of modern USA and Canada. In the 17th century Spain gradually broadened the area of its influence in the South-West – from central California to Texas. 

In the middle of the 18th century Russia also joined in the process of exploration and development of North America. Russian travelers, merchants and missionaries rarely penetrated deep into the continent from Alaska and mostly communicated with coastal Eskimos and Aleuts. The Tlingit and the Athabaskan Indians most actively interacted with the Russians, as their territories were located along the coast. In California in fort Ross the Russians mostly communicated with the Pomo and Miwok people. 

In the 16th – 17th centuries the Europeans did not bother much about preserving the native culture. The situation began to change in the 18th century, especially towards its end, when people appeared who collected rarities and curiosities, and later proper ethnographical collections, and who made records of unfamiliar peoples. The Russians did not stand apart from this process. The “Russian America”, i.e. the Aleut Islands, the southern coast of Alaska and Fort Ross in the north of California served as sources for the enrichment of the first Russian museum – the Kunstkamera. 

Map of Indian tribes expansion in North America by 1775.	Map of the USA territory expansion.