World History Flashcards
Chilean president (1970-73)
Socialist
Overthrown by Pinochet’s military & died in 1973
Uncle of author Isabel
SALVADOR ALLENDE
Chilean dictator & general
Overthrew Allende with military junta in 1973 coup
AUGUSTO PINOCHET
Chilean president 2006-2010
1st elected female leader in South America
Previously imprisoned by Pinochet
Socialist
MICHELLE BACHELET
1552-1605
First czar after the Rurik dynasty (he was “up to the task”)
Overthrown by “false Dmitry”, after which begins the Time of Troubles
Depicted in a Pushkin drama & Mussorgsky opera
BORIS GODUNOV
Political crisis following the death of Fyodor I (son of Ivan IV “the Terrible”) & the overthrow of his regent Boris Godunov
Pretenders to the throne arose, claiming Ivan as their father (known as the “False Dmitrys”)
Ended when Michael, the first Romanov, became tsar
TIME OF TROUBLES
SMUTA
WWI flying ace
Head of the Luftwaffe in WWII
Reichsmarschall, & Hitler’s chosen “successor”
Convicted at Nuremberg, but took a poison pill before he could be executed
HERMANN GOERING
WWI General
German president (1925-34)
Appointer of Hitler as Chancellor
PAUL VON HINDENBURG
Germain air force during WWII
Means “air weapon”
LUFTWAFFE
1783-1830
Born in Caracas, educated in Europe
“The Liberator” / “El Libertador” - of Venezuela, Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Peru, & an eponymous country from Spanish rule
Dictator of Peru
Depicted in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “The General in His Labyrinth”
Namesake of Venezuela’s currency & tallest “Pico” (peak)
SIMON BOLIVAR
South American historical country
Its first president was Simon Bolivar
Included Venezuela, Panama, & Ecuador
GRAN COLOMBIA
Led unsuccessful coup in 1992
Venezuelan president from 1999 to his 2013 death
Target of coup in 2002
Fan of Bolivar, & led a “Bolivarian Revolution” for the “Bolivarion Republic of Venezuela”
Compatriot of Castro
HUGO CHAVEZ
President of Peru 1990-2000
ALBERTO FUJIMORI
President of Venezuela (2013-present)
NICOLAS MADURO
President of Brazil 2019-present
Bad for the rainforest
JAIR BOLSONARO
Babylonian ruler (500s BCE)
Credited with the Hanging Gardens
Burned Jerusalem’s temple
NEBUCHADNEZZAR
Bronze Age civilization on Crete (~3000-1000 BCE)
Named for their legendary king
MINOAN
(from MINOS)
Fought for Trojans in the war
Appears in the Iliad
Subject of a Euripedes play
Also a monkey
RHESUS
Michael Ventris “deciphered” this ancient Minoan script
LINEAR B
In 1879, based on the Iliad, discovered what may be the ruins of Troy at Hisarlik in Turkey
Also discovered “Agamemnon’s” gold mask earlier
HEINRICH SCHLIEMANN
Pre-Roman Italians (~900-500 BCE; assimilated to Rome by ~30 BCE)
Lived in Tuscany & Umbria, between Arno & Tiber Rivers
Originators of the wishbone custom
ETRUSCANS
Spanish conquistador 1465-1524
1st Governor of Cuba
Founded Havana
DIEGO VELAZQUEZ DE CUÉLLAR
Liberia’s longest-serving president
1944-1971
WILLIAM TUBMAN
“Father of Zionism”
Austro-hungarian journalist
Covered the Dreyfus Affair
In 1897 founded World Zionist Congress
THEODOR HERZL
Prime Minister of Israel 1983-84
Again 1986-92
3rd-longest serving
YITZHAK SHAMIR
Austrian socialite
Spouce of Gustav Mahler, Walter Gropius, and Franz Werfel
ALMA SCHINDLER
Daughter of Rodrigo, aka Pope Alexander VI
1480-1519
Sister of Cesare
Believed to have poisoned husbands
LUCREZIA BORGIA
3rd wife of Henry VIII
Only one buried with him
JANE SEYMOUR
Anne Boleyn’s lady-in-waiting (and replacement)
JANE SEYMOUR
Died giving birth to Edward VI
JANE SEYMOUR
African party founded in 1962
Upon independence from Portugal in 1975, became ruling party in Maputo
FRELIMO (Mozambique Liberation Front)
Name for French Protestants from the mid-16th century
HUGUENOTS
Club founded by Robespierre (later its president)
Existed 1789-1794
Responsible for the “Reign of Terror”
JACOBIN CLUB
Irish party of democratic Christians since 1933
Name means “Irish Family”
FINE GAEL
Irish democratic-socialist party founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffin
Name means “[We] Ourselves”
Associated with the IRA
Led by Gerry Adams during the Troubles (he resigned in 2018)
SINN FEIN
French minister (1754-1838)
Served Louis XVI, XVIII, & Napoleon
Subject of the XYZ affair
TALLEYRAND
French lawyer
Member of Jacobin Club
Led Committee of Public Safety
Involved in Reign of Terror
Urged 1792 execution of Louis XVI
Was executed himself in 1794
MAXIMILIEN ROBESPIERRE
“Flowery” revolution in Tunisia, 2011
Ousted president Ben Ali
JASMINE REVOLUTION
From French, “knife”
Broad curved blade
Common in the age of sail
Also an Oldsmobile
CUTLASS
Walking stick or club/cudgel named for an Irish town
SHILLELAGH
President of Uganda before & after Idi Amin
1966-1971, and again 1980-1985
MILTON OBOTE
Communist president of Serbia (1991-1997) and Yugoslavia (1997-2000)
SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC
Egyptian president (2012-2013)
Ousted by El-Sisi following protests
Convicted for ties to Islamist extremists
MOHAMED MORSI
Egyptian president since 2014
Field Marshal & former general
Ousted Mohamed Morsi in 2013 coup
ABDEL EL-SISI
“Seasonal” pro-democracy uprisings in 2010-2012
Primarily in North Africa and the Middle East
Began with Tunisia’s “Jasmine Revolution”
ARAB SPRING
Soviet nuclear physicist
Worked on H-Bomb
Won 1975 Nobel Peace Prize for activism
A European prize for human rights is now named for him
ANDREI SAKHAROV
Soviet foreign minister from 1957-1985
ANDREI GROMYKO
Considered Britain’s first prime minister
1721-1742 (Whig)
1st to live at 10 Downing St.
Called “Cock Robin” with a “Robinocracy”
ROBERT WALPOLE
Israel’s prime minister (1977-1983)
Part of Camp David accords with Sadat & Carter
Shared 1979 Nobel Peace Prize with Sadat
Buried on Mt. of Olives, not Mt. Herzl like most PMs
MENACHEM BEGIN
President of Afghanistan (2002-2014)
Interim in 2002 - elected in 2004
Fought with the Mujahideen
HAMID KARZAI
British explorer
Tried to cross Antarctica in a 1914 expedition
Ship Endurance got trapped in pack ice & sank, but crew escaped
Died in 1922 on South Georgia Island where he is now buried
SIR ERNEST SHACKLETON
Welsh privateer in the Caribbean
Attacked Panama in 1671
Knighted by Charles II
Lieutenant Governor of Jamaica
Subject of Steinbeck’s “Cup of Gold” (1929)
Namesake of a rum brand
SIR HENRY MORGAN
Carthaginian queen, ~800 BCE
Sister of Pygmalion of Tyre
Lover of Aeneas, and killed herself when he left (made famous in a Purcell opera)
DIDO
A trojan warrior or prince, sometimes son of Aphrodite
After Trojan War, travels Mediterranean, loves Dido in Carthage, founds Rome
Subject of a famous Virgil work
AENEAS
German-born English royal
Nicknamed the “Flanders Mare”
Henry VIII’s 4th wife
Shortest tenure (Jan-July of 1540)
Outlived the rest
ANNE OF CLEVES
Ruler of Egypt (51-30 BCE)
Last of the Ptolemaic dynasty
Father Ptolemy XII, brothers XIII & XIV
Son Ptolemy XV Caesarion (with Julius)
Lost at Actium
CLEOPATRA
Namesake of emerald mines (found in 1818)
Namesake of 2 “needles” (obelisks) in NYC’s Central Park & London
Shaw play recounts Caesar & her
1963 Elizabeth Taylor film
Samuel Barber opera & Shakespeare play recount Antony & her
CLEOPATRA
“Queen of Queens”
“Serpent of the Nile”
Name means “Glory of her father”
Ruled from Alexandria
Met Julius in a carpet
Killed self with asp
Had a barge
CLEOPATRA
Born in Norway
Settled in Iceland before being banished
Settled Greenland
Father of Thorvald & Leif
Wife Thjoldhildur founded Greenland’s 1st Christian church
ERIK THE RED
Norse Christian missionary & explorer
Son of Erik, called “the Lucky”
Found “Vinland” (North America) at L’Anse Aux Meadows, Newfoundland
Brother Thorvald was one of the first Europeans to die in North America
Honoured with a statue at Iceland’s Hallgrimskirkja
His “Day” is celebrated October 9
LEIF “THE LUCKY” ERIKSON
Historical region of England
Ruled by Alfred the Great
Also a semi-fictional region featured in Thomas Hardy’s novels
WESSEX
Friar of Florence
Anti-papal and anti-Medici
Held “Pyres” or “Bonfires of the Vanities”
Hanged in 1498, then his body burnt
GIROLAMA SAVONAROLA
Series of church meetings
1st (1123) confirmed the Concordat of Worms
2nd (1139) declared clerical marriages invalid and the crossbow an unethical weapon for use on Christians
5th (1512) concerned church reform
LATERAN COUNCILS
1929 agreement between Mussolini & Pope Pius XI
Roman Catholicism established as religion of Italy
Vatican City is created as a state, but cedes Papal States to Italy
LATERAN TREATY
Position in the Roman Republic
2 were elected to lead together
Now a general term for a kind of diplomat
Napoleon declared himself “First” this
CONSUL
Israeli Prime Minister (2021-2022)
Succeeded Netenyahu
NAFTALI BENNETT
Boat with an external stabilizing hull
Common in the Pacific
Namesake of a Hawai’i resort chain
OUTRIGGER (CANOE)
Historical name for sailing boats of the Indian Ocean & Red Sea
From Arabic
DHOW
“Kiss me, Hardy” (referring to Captain Thomas Hardy) were his last words spoken at Trafalgar
ADMIRAL HORATIO NELSON
Acronym for an organisation of Russian/Soviet labour camps where Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn did time
GULAG
Acronym for “Secret State Police”
Created 1933 under Goring
In 1934 became part of the SS
GESTAPO
(GEHEIME STAATSPOLIZEI)
Policy of concession to avoid war
Especially towards Nazi Germany in the 1930s
Exemplified by Neville Chamberlain at Munich in 1938
APPEASEMENT
202 BCE battle in what is now Tunisia
Ended 2nd Punic War
Scipio of Rome defeats Hannibal of Carthage and earns epithet “Africanus”
BATTLE OF ZAMA
1916 battle near Denmark in the North Sea
WWI’s biggest naval battle
British vs. German fleets
BATTLE OF JUTLAND
31 BCE naval battle near a Greek promontory
Cleopatra & Mark Antony lose to Octavian & Agrippa
BATTLE OF ACTIUM
1938 pact signed by UK (Chamberlain), France, Italy (Mussolini), & Germany (Hitler)
Allowed Germany to annex Czech land
MUNICH AGREEMENT
Mediterranean sailors
Peaked ~1100-200 BCE
Conquered by Alexander ~330 BCE
Lived around what is now Lebanon
Cities included Tyre, Sidon, & Byblos
Founders of Palermo (Sicily) & Carthage (Tunisia)
Biblically, a branch of the Canaanites
PHOENICIANS
Prime Minister of Israel, 1974-77 and 1992-95
1st PM born in Israel
In 1993 signed Oslo Accord I with Arafat (Palestine) & Clinton (U.S.)
Shared 1994 Nobel Peace Prize with Peres & Arafat
Signed 1994 treaty with King Hussein of Jordan
Assassinated in 1995 by Yigal Amir in a Tel Aviv square now named for him
YITZHAK RABIN
Prime Minister of Israel (1984-86, 1995-96)
Took over after Rabin’s 1995 assassination
Shared 1994 Nobel Peace Prize with Yasser Arafat & Yitzhak Rabin
SHIMON PERES
President of Egypt (1970-1981)
Signed 1978 Camp David Accords with Israel’s Menachem Begin
Granted asylum to Shah of Iran
Assassinated in 1981 by military, eventually replaced by his VP Hosni Mubarak
ANWAR SADAT
1st Prime Minister of South Africa (1910-1919)
LOUIS BOTHA
Prime Minister of South Africa (1978-1984) & President (1984-89)
(PIETER WILLEM) P.W. BOTHA
Famed British highwayman
Rode a horse named Black Bess
Hanged at York in 1739
DICK TURPIN
French egyptologist
Deciphered Rosetta Stone in the 1820s
JEAN-FRANCOIS CHAMPOLLION
“Butcher of Lyon”
Gestapo agent
Fled to Bolivia
Arrested 1983 and extradited to France
Died 1992
KLAUS BARBIE
William Augustus was Duke of this
Nicknamed “The Butcher” for suppression of Scots rebels in 1740s
CUMBERLAND
Italian cruise ship
Hijacked by Palestinian Liberation Front (PLF) in 1985
Jewish-American Leon Klinghoffer killed
ACHILLE LAURO
Portuguese sailor & explorer
1st known European to sail around Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, which he also knew as the Cape of Storms
BARTOLOMEU DIAS
British Navy man
Explored Antarctica in 1841
Discovered Erebus on island now named for him
Also namesake of a sea & an ice shelf
JAMES CLARK ROSS
