Really?  Capitalism has fuckall to do with a barter economy?  You mind explaining that one to me?  Why can "none of them" be called capitalism until recent centuries?

There was investment of capital.  That's how they got over there.  In turn, they had to come up with goods to send BACK to England to cover that debt. 

So, in a sense, they had investors who had hired the labor willing to relocate the new world.  You can think of the settlement as building an off shore manufacturing plant.

The Pilgrims were not very good businessmen in that sense and took years to pay off the original debt to the company.  Likewise, the Mass colony was much better economically for a variety of reasons.

Hence the need to divvy up responsibilities as they had other tasks to perform. They also had other "specialists" tasked with different elements such as defense.  Not that they had standing armies, but they did, indeed have officials and the like paid in exchange for the services.

I don't think you are at all correct saying capitalism had fuckall to do with it.  I also do not think a barter economy is "fuck all" to do with capitalism.  There's specialization.  There's assigned values for goods or services, and there's payment of same.

That it happens to be wampum or three bushels of corn for every goat doesn't matter that much at all.

That historians argue it didn't appear until the 17th=18th centuries seems a little narrow viewed.  That it did not dominate until then is most certainly an apt description, but Mercantilism was around for a very long time and there were various exploratory endeavors that had to have backers.  There was currency, hired hands, etc, etc.

Agrarian economies, or subsistence living is one thing, but there was still bartering, suppliers and the like.  There were currencies in Roman times.  Sure, it was not until we inched towards industrialization that the "capitalist elements" became dominant.  Indeed, it was the reaction to some of the rigors of the industrial economy that drove some folks to seek alternatives, be it communism, central planning, government intervention, or whatever the hell else you want to call it.

I know you love to be argumentative, but I really think you are nitting a gnat here.  The move to private ownership and the gains/benefits associated thereto in an entity with financiers expecting returns would certainly have more in common with capitalism than "fuckall."  It certainly looks like an example of early elements of capitalism that were a precursor to that which you argue Historians said appeared in 17th and 18th century.

So no, it is not unforgivably lazy or intentionally obfuscating.  To limit the thinking to such absolutes would seem intentionally pedantic and narrow viewed.  Economic evolution is not at all binary or black and white.  There's little about economics that is so simplistic.  Sure it is taught that way by invoking ceteris parabis to drill down on isolated components, but they inter-relate.

The example was of a switch from communal to private property.  The privatization spurred incentive to product, freeing up resource to move to other pressing matters.  One of those pressing matters was delivering the return to the investors ... those who fronted the capital, for the experiment.

Firms alter their reporting and measurement structures all the time.  Matrixed management limits ownership for a problem.  You untangle the fishing lines of accountability and reporting with specific P&Ls and charge backs.  You hire out this or that thing sometimes mandating the use of corporate resource, sometimes letting them compare to the outside.

Well, the Pilgrims, an entity with shareholders expecting returns went through a few reorganizations.  The example is but one of the first steps they undertook to organize themselves more along the lines of a way a public corporation does.  Overtime, even in those first 50 years, all sorts of elements took hold beyond this.   

Is it right to argue it isn't capitalism?

If the impetus is the notion of investment, resources, and hired labor you can argue Eden was capitalistic.  I mean, the whole thing got going based on the investment of an apple, right?

Of course there are grayscale economies.  That was my whole point about discussing the ways in which economics get taught.  I really do not have much dispute with the notion that "full blown" capitalism didn't hit til we creapt into industrialization.  It also doesn't mean prior economies were bereft of capitalistic motivations.  Hell, you can argue the whole discovery of the so-called Free World was driven by capitalism.  Columbus was out looking for trade routes which was a state sanctioned endeavor.  Some of the later attempts were done by private investors funding folks willing to head over for different reasons.

The Pilgrims were lousy businessmen.  They wanted to establish their little religious "commune" for a lack of a better word, but did have to sell their soul to the economic devil to get the funding to get over here.  In 20 years' time a more economic oriented group settled around Boston with far superior landscape for economic commerce, and Plymouth's influence dropped like the rock on which the stepped to get there.  Still both operations survived on trade with the mother land.  Plymouth ultimately just dragged their stuff to Boston and sold it there, rather than work directly with London.