ABSTRACT
History records the migrations, conquests, and shifting of peoples and cultures along with the creation of successive empires such as the Babylonian, Egyptian, Persian, Athenian, and Roman and such later empires as the Portuguese, French, Spanish, and English. One of the Europeans' most important relationships with the Indians was trade—especially for furs. Uniform practices were difficult to apply by the several English colonies, and their trade was not well controlled. Encroachments on Indian land resulted in periodic attacks on English settlements. As tensions between the colonists and the crown grew stronger, the British reminded the Indians that the crown had tried to regulate trade and treat the Indians fairly but that the colonists often abused the trade relationship and encroached on Indian land. Allotment of land to individuals began in the early part of the eighteenth century, and by 1885 over 11,000 patents had been issued to individual Indians under the authority of various treaties and laws.
