Initially, English rule also strengthened the position of the Iroquois Confederacy of upstate New York. The English briefly held an alliance with the Five Nations known as the Covenant Chain, but by the end of the century the Five Nations adopted a policy of neutrality. By 1700, nearly 2 million acres of land were owned by only five New York families who intermarried regularly, exerted considerable political influence, and formed one of colonial America's most tightly knit landed elites. The duke of York and his appointed governors continued the Dutch practice of awarding immense land grants to favorites, including 160,000 acres to Robert Livingston and 90,000 to Frederick Philipse. Others benefited enormously from English rule. But the English, in a reversal of Dutch practice, expelled free blacks from many skilled jobs. In colonial New York City, as in New Amsterdam, those residents who enjoyed the status of "freeman," obtained by birth in the city or by an act of local authorities, enjoyed special privileges compared to others, including the right to work in various trades. The English also introduced more restrictive attitudes toward blacks. There had been many female traders in New Amsterdam (often widows who had inherited a deceased husband's property), but few remained by the end of the seventeenth century. As colonists of Dutch origin adapted to English rule, their wills directed more attention to advancing the fortunes of their sons than providing for their wives and daughters. But English law ended the Dutch tradition by which married women conducted business in their own name and inherited some of the property acquired during marriage. The terms of surrender guaranteed that the English would respect the religious toleration and property holdings of the colony's many ethnic communities. English rule expanded the freedom of some New Yorkers, while reducing that of others.
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