The Carolina Colony was an English proprietary colony established in the eastern portion of North America, encompassing territory that would eventually become the modern states of North Carolina and South Carolina. Chartered by King Charles II in 1663, the colony was granted to eight Lord Proprietors - English nobles who had supported the Stuart Restoration - and encompassed a vast, loosely defined territory; the 1663 charter specified approximately 31° to 36° north latitude, with the 1665 revised charter extending the northern boundary to 36°30'. The colony's history spans from its founding through 1729, when the Crown purchased the proprietors' shares and divided the region into the separate royal colonies of North Carolina and South Carolina.

English interest in the Carolina region predated the 1663 charter. The Roanoke Colony, attempted in the 1580s under a patent issued to Sir Walter Raleigh, was established on the northeastern coast of what is now North Carolina and resulted in the famous “Lost Colony” of 1590. Sporadic settlement pressure from Virginia colonists moving southward into the Albemarle Sound region preceded formal proprietary organization by decades.

The Lords Proprietors who received the 1663 charter were: Edward Hyde (Earl of Clarendon), George Monck (Duke of Albemarle), William Craven (Earl of Craven), John Berkeley (Baron Berkeley of Stratton), Anthony Ashley Cooper (later Earl of Shaftesbury), Sir George Carteret, Sir William Berkeley, and Sir John Colleton. The political philosopher John Locke assisted Ashley Cooper in drafting the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina (1669), an elaborate governance document that was never fully implemented.

Early settlement concentrated in two geographically distinct areas that evolved along separate trajectories. The Albemarle Sound region in the north was settled primarily by Virginia colonists and developed a tobacco-based, small-farm economy with dispersed settlement patterns. The southern settlements, centered on Charles Town (founded 1670, present-day Charleston, South Carolina), developed a plantation economy oriented toward Atlantic trade.

The southern colony's economy shifted significantly in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries with the development of rice cultivation, which proved well-suited to the coastal lowcountry. Indigo became a major cash crop in the mid-eighteenth century. The plantation economy of the south relied heavily on enslaved labor, and the African-descended population came to outnumber the European-descended population in the southern settlements. The northern settlements remained more economically modest, with naval stores (tar, pitch, and turpentine) supplementing tobacco.

Relations with indigenous peoples were a persistent feature of colonial life. The Tuscarora War (1711-1715) devastated the northern settlements, and the Yamasee War (1715-1717) posed an existential threat to the southern colony. These conflicts accelerated the collapse of the proprietary system and contributed to the Crown's decision to assume direct governance.

The proprietary government faced chronic instability, including Culpeper's Rebellion (1677-1678) in the Albemarle region and factional conflict in the south. By the early eighteenth century, the proprietors were widely regarded as having failed to defend and govern the colony adequately. In 1719, the southern settlers revolted and petitioned the Crown for royal governance. The formal division and royalization was completed in 1729.

A full account of the colony's political, economic, and social development is provided on the Carolina Colony - History page.

Historians and scholars have approached the Carolina Colony from several distinct perspectives:

• Proprietary governance and colonial development - Some historians emphasize the structural failures of proprietary governance as the primary driver of the colony's instability, while others stress geographic and demographic factors. See Proprietary Failure Viewpoint.
• Slavery and the plantation economy - The origins, character, and legacy of enslaved labor in Carolina have been analyzed through economic, social, and moral frameworks that differ substantially in emphasis and conclusion. See Slavery Origins Viewpoint.
• Indigenous relations - The causes and consequences of the Tuscarora and Yamasee Wars are interpreted variously as colonial aggression, defensive response, or complex multi-party conflict. See Indigenous Relations Viewpoint.
• The Fundamental Constitutions - The intent, practicability, and significance of Locke's involvement in the Fundamental Constitutions remains a subject of scholarly debate. See Fundamental Constitutions Viewpoint.

• Carolina Colony - History
• Carolina Colony - Debate
• North Carolina
• South Carolina
• Roanoke Colony
• Lords Proprietors
• Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina
• Tuscarora War
• Yamasee War
• United States of America - History

1. Mattson, Jon. The Lords Proprietors of Carolina. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1963.
2. Sirmans, M. Eugene. Colonial South Carolina: A Political History, 1663-1763. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1966.
3. Lefler, Hugh T., and William S. Powell. Colonial North Carolina: A History. New York: Scribner, 1973.
4. Merrell, James H. The Indians' New World: Catawbas and Their Neighbors from European Contact through the Era of Removal. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989.
5. Weir, Robert M. “The Harmony We Were Famous For”: An Interpretation of Pre-Revolutionary South Carolina Politics. The William and Mary Quarterly 26, no. 4 (1969): 473-501.
6. Roper, L.H. Conceiving Carolina: Proprietors, Planters, and Plots, 1662-1729. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.