Timeline of the European colonization of North America

This is a chronology and timeline of the colonization of North America, with founding dates of selected European settlements. See also European colonization of the Americas.^[1][2][3]

Before Columbus

• 986: Norsemen settle Greenland and Bjarni Herjólfsson sights coast of North America, but doesn't land (see also Norse colonization of the Americas).
• c. 1000: Norse settle briefly in L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland.^[4]
• c. 1450: Norse colony in Greenland dies out.
• 1473: João Vaz Corte-Real perhaps reaches Newfoundland; writes about the "Land of Cod fish" in his journal.

Late Fifteenth century

• 1492: Columbus reaches The Bahamas,^[5] Cuba and Hispaniola.
• 1492: the colony of La Isabela is established on the island of Hispaniola.^[6]
• 1496: Santo Domingo, the first European permanent settlement is built.^[7]
• 1497: John Cabot reached Newfoundland.^[8]
• 1498: in his third voyage, Columbus reaches what is now Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago
• 1498: La Isabela is abandoned by the Spanish.
• 1499: João Fernandes Lavrador maps Labrador and Newfoundland

Sixteenth century

• 1500: Pedro Álvares Cabral reaches the coast of present-day Brazil
• 1501: Corte-Real brothers explored the today Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador
• 1502: Columbus sails along the mainland coast south of Yucatán, and reaches present-day Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama
• 1503: Las Tortugas noted by Columbus in passage through the Western Caribbean present-day Cayman Islands
• 1508: Ponce de Leon founds Caparra on San Juan Bautista (now Puerto Rico)
• 1511: Conquest of Cuba begins
• 1513: Ponce de Leon in Florida
• 1515: Conquest of Cuba completed
• 1517: Francisco Hernández de Córdoba lands on the Yucatán Peninsula
• 1519: Founding of Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz (Veracruz)
• 1521: Hernán Cortés completes the conquest of Mexico.
• 1521: Juan Ponce de León tries and fails to settle in Florida
• 1524: Pedro de Alvarado conquests present-day Guatemala and El Salvador
• 1524: Giovanni da Verrazzano sails along most of the east coast
• 1525: Estêvão Gomes enters Upper New York Bay^[9][10]
• 1526: Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón tries to settle in South Carolina
• 1527: Fishermen are using the harbor at St. John's, Newfoundland and other places on the coast
• 1535: Jacques Cartier reaches Quebec
• 1536: Cabeza de Vaca reaches Mexico City after wandering through North America.
• 1538: Failed Huguenot settlement on St. Kitts in the Caribbean (destroyed by the Spanish)
• 1539: Hernando de Soto explores the interior from Florida to Arkansas.
• 1540: Coronado travels from Mexico to eastern Kansas.
• 1540: Spanish reach the Grand Canyon (the area is ignored for the next 200 years)
• 1541: Failed French settlement at Charlesbourg-Royal (Quebec City) by Cartier and Roberval
• 1542: Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo on the California coast.
• 1555: France Antarctique founded on the island of Serigipe in the Guanabara Bay in Brazil
• 1559: Failed Spanish settlement at Pensacola, Florida
• 1562: Failed Huguenot settlement in South Carolina (Charlesfort-Santa Elena site)
• 1564: French Huguenots at Jacksonville, Florida (Fort Caroline)
• 1565: Spanish slaughter French 'heretics' at Fort Caroline.
• 1565: Spanish found Saint Augustine, Florida
• 1566–87: Spanish in South Carolina (Charlesfort-Santa Elena site)
• 1567: France Antarctique destroyed by Portuguese
• 1568: Dutch revolt against Spain. The economic model developed in Holland would define colonial policies in the next two centuries
• 1570: Failed Spanish settlement on Chesapeake Bay (Ajacán Mission)
• 1576: Martin Frobisher on the coast of Labrador and Baffin Island
• 1579: Sir Francis Drake claims New Albion.
• 1583: England formally claims Newfoundland (Humphrey Gilbert)
• 1585: Failed English settlement on Roanoke Island, North Carolina (Lost Colony).
• 1598: Failed French settlement on Sable Island off Nova Scotia
• 1598: Spanish reach Northern New Mexico
• 1600: By 1600 Spain and Portugal were still the only significant colonial powers. North of Mexico the only settlements were Saint Augustine and the isolated outpost in northern New Mexico. Exploration of the interior was largely abandoned after the 1540s. Around Newfoundland 500 or more boats annually were fishing for cod and some fishermen were trading for furs, especially at Tadoussac on the Saint Lawrence.

Seventeenth Century

• 1604 – Acadia – French
• 1605 – Port Royal – French
• 1607 – Jamestown – English
• 1607 – Popham Colony – English
• 1608 – Quebec – French
• 1610 – Cuper's Cove – English
• 1610 – Kecoughtan, Virginia – English
• 1610 – Santa Fe – Spanish
• 1611 – Henricus – English
• 1612 – Bermuda - English
• 1615 – Fort Nassau – Dutch
• 1615 – Renews, Newfoundland – English
• 1618 – Bristol's Hope – English
• 1620 – St. John's, Newfoundland – English
• 1620 – Plymouth Colony – English
• 1621 – Nova Scotia – Scottish
• 1622 – Province of Maine – English
• 1623 – Portsmouth – English
• 1623 – Stage Point – English
• 1623 – Dover – English
• 1623 – Pannaway – English
• 1623 – New Castle – English
• 1623 – Fort Nassau – Dutch
• 1624 – Governors Island – Dutch
• 1625 – Cape Breton – Scottish
• 1625 – New Amsterdam – Dutch
• 1626 – Salem – English
• 1630 – Massachusetts Bay Colony – English
• 1630 – Pavonia – Dutch
• 1631 – Saint John, New Brunswick – English
• 1632 – Williamsburgh – English
• 1633 – Fort Hoop – Dutch
• 1633 – Windsor, Connecticut – English
• 1634 – Maryland Colony – English
• 1634 – Wethersfield – English
• 1635 – Territory of Sagadahock – English
• 1635 – Saybrook Colony - English
• 1636 – Providence Plantations – English
• 1636 – Connecticut Colony – English
• 1638 – New Haven Colony – English
• 1638 – Fort Christina – Swedish
• 1638 – Exeter – English
• 1638 – Hampton, New Hampshire - English^[11]
• 1639 – Bridgeport, Connecticut – English
• 1639 – Newport – English
• 1639 – San Marcos – Spanish
• 1640 – New Stockholm – Swedish
• 1640 – Swedesboro- Swedish
• 1642 – Montreal – French
• 1651 – Fort Casimir – Dutch
• 1660 – Bergen – Dutch
• 1665 – Elizabethtown – English
• 1666 – Newark- English
• 1668 – Sault Ste. Marie (Michigan) - French,
• 1669 – English Neighborhood – Dutch, English,
• 1670 – Charleston – English
• 1678 – New Paltz, New York – French
• 1679 – Dundee Island - New Jersey – Dutch^[12][13]
• 1680 – Fort Crevecoeur (Peoria, IL) – French
• 1682 – Pennsylvania – English
• 1683? – Fort Saint Louis (Illinois)- French
• 1683 – East New Jersey – Scottish
• 1684 – Stuarts Town, Carolina – Scottish
• 1685 – Fort Saint Louis (Texas)- French
• 1686 – Arkansas Post - French
• 1691 – Fort Pimiteoui (Fort Crevecoeur, Peoria, IL) – French
• 1698 – Pensacola, Florida – Spanish
• 1699 – Louisiana – French

Eighteenth Century

• 1701 – Cornwallis - French
• 1702 – Mobile - French
• 1704 – Delaware separated from PA
• 1714 – Germanna, VA - Germans from Hessen-Nassau
• 1717 – Germanna, VA - Germans from Baden-Wurttemberg
• 1718 – New Orleans – French
• 1718 – San Antonio – Spanish
• 1721 – Germanna, VA - Germans
• 1721 – Greenland – Danish
• 1729 – Baltimore - British
• 1733 – Province of Georgia – British
• 1734 – Culpeper, VA - Germans
• 1738 – Culpeper, VA; some to Bethlehem, PA -Germans
• 1763 – St. Louis (Missouri) - French
• 1769 – San Diego – Spanish
• 1770 – Monterey – Spanish
• 1775 – Tucson – Spanish
• 1776 – San Francisco – Spanish
• 1777 – San Jose – Spanish
• 1781 – Los Angeles – Spanish
• 1784 – Kodiak Island – Russian
• 1787 – US constitution written - American
• 1791 – Santa Cruz – Spanish

See also

• British colonization of the Americas
• French colonization of the Americas
• Spanish colonization of the Americas
• List of North American cities by year of foundation
• New Netherland settlements
• List of French possessions and colonies
• Former colonies and territories in Canada
• Chronology of Western colonialism
• Timeline of imperialism

References