1-100 Flashcards
Identify two revolutionary innovations in human societies during the Neolithic period?
Farming, domestication of animals, cities, pastoralism
What was the primary economic activity of human subsistence during the Paleolithic era?
Hunting and gathering
Describe the division of labor between men and women in Paleolithic societies.
Men: hunting and fishing, toolmakers.
Women: gathering, medicine
What materials did Paleolithic people in central Russia use for dwellings?
Mammoth bones
Name the first Neolithic settlements whose economy was based upon agriculture.
Catal Huyuk, Jericho
What was the greatest threat to settled communitites?
Nomadic peoples raiding them
What were some of the specialized occupations that first came into existence in the Neolithic era?
Artisan, priest
Name one way in which the history of Harappa differed from Sumerian or Egyptian societies.
It did not survive the natural catastrophes or nomadic invasions and disappeared.
What form of economic activity characterized Aryan society?
Pastoralism
Along which river were Harappa and Mohenjodaro located?
Indus River
What is the name given to the seasonal winds that bring moisture to India?
Monsoons
What river basin system did Aryans settle and develop a new Indian civilization?
Ganges River Basin
What were the three main social groups of Aryan bands on the Indian subcontinent?
Warriors, priests, and commoners - slaves/serfs
Indian society is divided into rigid castes or Varnas. What are they?
Priests [Brahmins], Warriors [Kshatriyas], Merchants, Farmers/peasants, Untouchables/Dasas
Identify two world religions that emerged from Indian civilizations.
Hinduism and Buddhism
What is the name given to the fine-grained yellow-brown soil deposited by powerful winds from Central Asia?
Loess
What activity related to agriculture contributed to the rise of China’s first civilizations and rulers?
Irrigation and flood control projects along the yellow river
Identify the key features of Shang Chinese civilization.
Tripod cooking vessels, divination bones, domestication of silkworms, ancestor worship
Identify two areas of diffusion for Chinese culture.
Japan, Korea, Vietnam
Identify two categories of nomads besides horse nomads.
Reindeer herding, camel, cattle herders
What would most likely cause a change in the migratory pattern if nomadic people?
Change in climate, drought
Identify key inventions of nomadic peoples.
Stirrups, mouth bits, reins, and saddles, trousers, hats with ear flaps
What different roles have pastoral people played with regard to sedentary civilizations?
Traders, mercenaries, raiders
What environments were suitable for pastoral nomadism, but not agriculture?
Steppe, savannah, desert
Who was the famous Islamic historian who invented the theory of the 3-4 generation cycle for dynasties founded by nomadic warriors?
Ibn Khaldun
What things were transmitted across Eurasia on the silk roads with the help of nomadic pastoralists?
Buddhism, Islam, artistic motifs, paper, saddles, bits, bow an arrow, chariots, crops/plants, diseases
Describe the “shi”.
Scholar-bureaucrat, educated-enlightened administrator
What was Confucius’ occupation?
Teacher, social philosopher
What was Confucius’ collected sayings?
Analects
According the the Confucius’ philosophy, society was held together by bonds of loyalty and obedience between…
Father and son, elder brother and younger brother, husband and wife, ruler and subject, friend and friend
Which dynasty reunified china following the Zhou?
Qin
Who was the first emperor of china?
Shi Huangdi
What book did Sunzi write?
The art of war
What became the dominant ideology of Han China?
Confucianism
What social class wS created when the shi and local landlord families became linked through marriage and promotion?
Scholar-gentry
Name the Chinese inventions that were developed during the Han dynasty.
Shoulder collar, wheelbarrow, improved iron tools, brush and paper, water mills, rudders and compasses
Besides silk, what luxury products did the Chinese develop during the Han dynasty that figured prominently in trade?
Lacquerware and porcelain
What is an eunuch?
A castrated male who were guardians if the emperors wives and concubines
What new social group gained power in the later Han?
Eunuchs
What was the name of the elite class of Romans that made up the senate, and who did they elect?
Patricians -consuls
What was the name of the class of ordinary roman citizens and who did the elect?
Plebeians - tribunes
What city [colony] was Rome’s main rival in the 2nd century BCE?
Carthage
Who was the famous general who invaded Italy with an at that included war elephants, and where was he from?
Hannibal - Carthage
What was the key theme in roman history in the 2nd century BCE?
Political expansion
Which roman ruler effectively ended the roman republic?
Julius Caesar
Who was the roman poet who wrote an epic poem that linked roman history and mythology with the great stories from Homer’s Iliad and odyssey - and what was the name of his work?
Vergil - Aeneid
How did Rome’s administration of it’s empire differ from that of Han China?
No bureaucracy or professional civil service; development of codes of law
What were the secrets of success to Rome’s imperial administration?
Systematic law, military organization, tolerance for local autonomy
How did the oppression of women in roman society compare to Greece or China?
Less oppression
Why institution differentiated labor in the Mediterranean world from that in china or India?
Slavery
What was one of the negative consequences of Rome’s reliance on slave labor?
Lack of technological innovation in manufacturing and agriculture
What religions were the Mauryan and Gupta empires associated with?
Buddhist and Hindu respectively
Which river system was the post-Harrapan Indian civilization centered on?
Ganges
What was the name of the class of priests who held power and high status in Indian society?
Brahmins
What is the name of the sacred texts of Hinduism recorded by Brahmin priests in the last centuries BCE?
Vedas
What is the Hindu concept that defined a persons duty to his caste and life path?
Dharma
Name two distinguishing characteristics if the early human inhabitants of the Americas.
Genetic and linguistic similarities; physical isolation from afroeurasia, isolation from afroeurasian disease pools
Name three crops that were first domesticated in the Americas.
Maize, squash, beans, peppers, potatoes, manioc, avocados
Where are the two major cultural hearths in the Americas?
Mesoamerica and Peru
What is the name of the “mother civilization” of mesoamerica that is best known for it’s large stone sculptures of heads?
Olmec
What is the name of the first major urban center in the valley of Mexico?
Teotihuacan
What were the two major achievements of Mayan civilization?
Calendar and writing
Name two North American cultures that were identified by the construction of large mounds.
Adena, Hopewell, Mississippian
What was the name the Navajo have to the ancient pueblo peoples who inhabited the four corners region of the south west?
Anasazi
What region is given for the sudden disappearance of the ancient pueblo peoples in the southwest?
Prolonged drought
Historian David Landes writhe about a ‘revolution in time’ caused by the development and spread of accurate clocks and time keeping in Europe. What did he relate this development of timekeeping to?
Work discipline
Identify pre-Incan highland cultures if the Andes.
Chavin, Tihuabaco, Hauri
Identify pre Colombian costal cultures in the Andes.
Nazca, Moche, Chimu
What was the name of the basic kinship groups in Andean society?
Ayllu
Define “convergence”.
People in different places often work out similar solutions to similar problems - parallel invention without diffusion
What was the name of the African people who migrated and settled throughout most of sub-Saharan Africa?
Bantu
Identify two sub-Saharan African kingdoms.
Ghana and Mali, Songhay, Kanem-Bornu
What is the name of the African kingdom that existed in present day Ethiopia and adopted Christianity?
Axum
What was the source of wealth in west African sub-Saharan kingdoms?
Gold
What are the three tests that Stearns proposes for determining a new period in world history?
The world map much be changed significantly, new contacts must be established between civilizations, new parallelisms must arise in pattern displayed by major civilizations
By whom and over what route was Buddhism introduced into China?
Silk merchants, missionaries, from the Silk Road
Following the fall if the Han dynasty, what was the next dynasty to reunite china?
Sui
What was the name of the northern regional princes in India?
Rajputs
What were some of the unique problems associated with the decline of the Roman Empire?
Dependence on expansion, slave labor, weak leadership/succession
Identify the two most distinctive cultural features of Islamic civilization.
Belief in Islam/teachings of Muhammad, Arabic language [of the Koran]
What was the name given to the camel and goat warding people of the Arabian desert?
Bedouin
What was the most artistic achievement of Bedouin culture?
Poetry
What was Muhammad’s occupation before his revelations?
Caravan trader
Which clan ruled Mecca?
Umayyad
To which city did Muhammad flee in 622 CE?
Medina
What is the word that describes the community of the faithful in Islam?
Umma
List the five pillars of Islam.
1-confession of faith in Allah and Muhammad as his prophet
2-to pray five times a day
3-fast during the month of Ramadan
4-pay zakat, a charity of the poor
5-make a pilgrimage to hajj to Mecca once in a life time
What is the term given to the political and religious leader of the Islamic community or state?
Caliph
Why were the two empires that the Arab armies invaded and took territory from?
Sassanian [persian], and Byzantine
Identify the two major factions within the Islamic religion.
Sunnis and Shi’is
What was the term for Muslim converts during the Umayyad dynasty?
Mawali
What was the term given to Jews and Christians who were nonmuslim, but still considered “people of the book”?
Dhimmis
What was the head tax that nonmuslims had to pay?
Jizya
What are the traditions and sayings of the prophet Muhammad called?
Hadith
What causes does Stearns offer for the relatively strong position of women in Bedouin and Islamic society?
Where authority is decentralized and social organization is not highly stratified, women tend to enjoy more rights; their immediate connection with agriculture and stock raising is central to survival, their prominent roles in fertility rituals and religious cults. Civilization tends to work against women’s rights.
What was the name of the dynasty that succeeded the Umayyad dynasty?
Abbasid
Where did the Umayyad clan flee and find the only surviving Umayyad caliphate?
Spain/Andalusia
What city was the capital of the Abbasid caliphate?
Baghdad
What was the term/title given to the chief administrator of the caliph?
Wazir/vizier
Which ethnic/linguistic group soon came to dominate the imperial administration of the Abbasid empire?
Persians
