Study Guide

Study Terms and Test Guide

World to 1500 (Fall 2012)

These terms will be an important component of our daily discussions. They will also, perhaps more importantly, be the list from which the tests are drawn. Not all of the terms are covered in the textbook: some will be dealt with only in lecture.

Each test will present 12-15 terms from the appropriate chapters, from which you will select 10 terms on which to write answers. You will have to answer at least 1 or 2 terms from each chapter covered by the test (look closely at the test: it will tell you whether 1 or 2 terms is required; as a general rule of thumb, chapters with longer lists of terms will require 2).

The answers I’m looking for have three important components:

  • Definition: Basic information about what the person did or what the event involved or what the term means.
  • Context: What country or region, what time period does this fit into? What else is happening around this term that’s important to know? What other people or events or concepts play a role?
  • Significance: Why is this an important person or event or concept? What does this change about the world, and what comes after this that couldn’t have happened without it?

Definition alone, which is what you get if you memorize a sentence or two from the text (don’t even bother with the glossary definitions: they are usually inadequate, and often don’t cover the right material), gets you up to about a C, maybe. Context or Significance gets you to B-range. You need all three to make an A-quality answer. (All of this assumes that you’re getting it right, of course.) You can most of that from the textbook, if you read it carefully, but it’s a lot easier if you listen to the lectures, too; however, some terms, mostly historical terminology, will not be in the textbook at all, because I am planning to discuss them in lecture. Your answer need not be limited to the material in a single chapter: many names and terms and processes will appear in multiple chapters. Not all the terms will be discussed directly in lecture, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t connections to be made.

Test 1 (9/12)

Chap. 1bronze
cities
domestication
Neolithic Revolution
pastoralism
tools

Chap. 2

animism
Babylonia
Epic of Gilgamesh
Hammurabi’s Code
Instructions of Ptah-Hotep
literacy
monotheism
pharaoh

Chap. 3Aryan
Harappa & Mohenjo Daro
Mandate of Heaven
Shang
varnas
Vedas

Chap. 4

Confucius
Daoism
eunuchs
The Great Learning
Han dynasty
iron
Legalism
Qin dynasty

Test 2 (10/8)

Chap. 5 Alexander the Great
Athens
drama
Funeral Oration of Pericles
Melian Dialogue
Peloponnesian War
philosophy
Royal Road
Zoroastrianism

Chap. 6

Brahman
Buddha’s First Sermon
Chandragupta Maurya
dharma
Emperor Ashoka
Gupta Empire
karma
Mahabharata
Upanishads
Vow of the Bodhisattva

Chap. 7 Augustus Caesar
Carthage
Cicero
Colosseum
Gospels
Jesus of Nazareth
mystery religions
plebians
Senate
Stoics
syncretic

Test 3 (10/24)

Chap. 9 Axum
Bantu
Germans
Ghana
maori
migration
pastoral nomads
Polynesians
taboo
Yamato

Chap. 10

Attila the Hun
Constantine
heresy

Chap. 11 Abbasids
dhimmi
Five Pillars
jihad
Mecca
Muhammad
Omar Khayyam
Qur’an
Shi’a
Sunni
Surahs 1 and 2
Thousand And One Nights
Umayyads

Test 4 (11/12)

Chap. 12 Bhakti
Crusades
Delhi Sultanate
dhows
Harun al-Rashid
Seljuk Turks
Sufi

Chap. 13

Ethiopia
Mansa Musa
slave trade
stateless society
Sundiata
Swahili

Chap. 14 Crusades
Cyril
icons
Justinian
Kievan Rus’
schism

Chap. 15

Charlemagne
chivalry
Guilds
Magna Carta
Manorialism
serfs
Thomas Aquinas
vassals

Test 5 (12/7)

Chap. 8 and Chap. 16 Anasazi
Aztecs
Cahokia
Incas
maize
Maya
Olmec
Toltec

Chap. 17

bureaucracy
flying money
footbinding
Grand Canal
gunpowder
junks
Neo-Confucianism
Sui dynasty
Yang Guifei

Chap. 18 samurai
Shoguns
Shotoku’s 17 Article Constitution
Silla
Sinification
Tale of Genji
Trinh and Nguyen

Chap. 19

Chinggis Khan
Khanates
Kubilai Khan
Timur-i-lang

Chap. 20

Black Death
Ottoman Empire
Renaissance
Vasco de Gama
Zheng He

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