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native Anadjective describing a person or
some other living thing who is associated
with a particular place by reason of birth.
naturalist Aperson knowledgeable in and
dedicated to several scientific disciplines,
especially botany and zoology and often
others such as geology or oceanography. It
is a term more commonly used before the
20th century, when advances in the sci-
ences required specialization.
nautical Anything pertaining to ships, sail-
ing, or sailors.
navigator The person who decides the
direction of a ship.
New Spain (Nueva España) A Spanish
viceroyalty, or collection of colonies, cre-
ated in 1535. New Spain, whose capital was
Mexico City, included the Caribbean,
Venezuela, the Philippine Islands, and all
territories north of Panama. The Viceroy-
alty of Peru was created in 1542 and
included all Spanish territories in South
America except Venezuela.
pilot Inseamanship, a sailor with specific
knowledge of a waterway who is qualified
to guide vessels through that region.
porter Aperson employed to carry gear or
burdens of any kind.
portolan From the Italian portolani,mean-
ing sailing directions, this is a chart drawn
to scale and showing the location of ports,
harbors, river mouths, and other land-
marks visible from the sea. Portolans, how-
ever, did not depict latitude and longitude.
prairie Any large, basically flat, essentially
treeless stretch of often arid grassland;
often used specifically of the Great Plains in
the interior of the United States.
presidio A Spanish military fort.
privateer A privately owned ship or its cap-
tain licensed by royal authority or any gov-
ernment to attack enemy ships. The
privateer’s crew was then allowed to retain
a proportion of the profits from any ships
captured.
pueblo A multistory stone or adobe Ameri-
can Indian dwelling or the community liv-
ing in such dwellings. Pueblo, which
means “village” in Spanish, is also used to
collectively describe tribes who live in
pueblos.
quadrant An early nautical instrument that,
when sighted on the North Star, was used to
find the altitude of stars and thus roughly
determine latitude.
scurvy A disease common to early sailors
caused by a deficiency in vitamin C in ship-
board diets, which often lacked fresh fruits
and vegetables.
settlement A small group of people (set-
tlers) and their homes and other buildings;
often used of such communities on the
frontier, or in newly colonized land,
although it can also be used of small com-
munities of the original inhabitants in a
land undergoing settlement by immigrants.
sextant An instrument used to measure the
altitude of celestial bodies and thus deter-
mine latitude. Sextants replaced astrolabes
and quadrants as navigational tools.
smallpox A highly contagious disease
caused by a virus, whose consequences
include pustules and often death. Smallpox
claimed the lives of millions of Native
Americans, who had little or no resistance
to the disease when it was transported to
the Americas by European explorers, con-
quistadores, and settlers.
sovereign As a noun, it refers to the person
or persons (such as a king and/or queen)
who exercise total authority. As an adjec-
tive, it indicates complete authority.
speculator A person who invests in projects
and/or engages in the buying and selling of(^186) B Discovery of the Americas, 1492–1800
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