HISTORY
In 1629, George
Calvert, 1st Lord Baltimore in the Irish House of Lords, fresh from
his failure further north with Newfoundland's Avalon colony, applied
to Charles I for a new royal charter for what was to become the Province
of Maryland. Calvert's interest in creating a colony derived from his
Catholicism and his desire for the creation of a haven for Catholics
in the new world. In addition, he was familiar with the fortunes that
had been made in tobacco in Virginia, and hoped to recoup some of the
financial losses he had sustained in his earlier colonial venture in
Newfoundland. George Calvert died in April 1632, but a charter for "Maryland
Colony" (in Latin, "Terra Maria") was granted to his son, Cęcilius Calvert,
2nd Lord Baltimore, on June 20, 1632. The new colony was named in honor
of Henrietta Maria, wife of Charles I of England. The specific name
given in the charter was phrased "Terra Mariae, anglice, Maryland".
The English name was preferred over the Latin due in part to the undesired
association of "Mariae" with the Spanish Jesuit Juan de Mariana. Leonard,
Cęcilius' younger brother, was put in charge of the expedition because
Cęcilius did not want to go.
The first settlers to Maryland arrived in 1634. Although
many of the arrivals were Protestant, many of the highest positions
were held by Catholics. Tens of thousands of British convicts were also
sent to Maryland. In 1649, Maryland
Toleration Act was passed with ordered religious tolerance of all
Trinitarian Christians.
In 1681 a dispute arose between the settlers of Pennsylvania
and the settlers of Maryland over the border, the 40th parallel. The
dispute might have ended with a compromise in 1682, however, Pennsylvania
then received a charter for Delaware, which had previously been considered
part of Maryland. For the next century, the Penn family and Calvert
family continued to feud. The outcome of the feud defined the border
with what we know as the Mason-Dixon
Line.
Maryland is surrounded by the
District
of Columbia, Virginia,
West Virginia,
Pennsylvania
and Delaware.
