Motives & Tech of Exploration
What religious motivation drove Spanish monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella to sponsor oceanic exploration?
They sought to expand Catholic influence due to concerns over the rise of Islam and the presence of Judaism
Who was the Portuguese navigator who became the first European to round the southern tip of Africa (Cape of Good Hope)?
Bartolomeu Dias
What term describes the biological transfer of plants, animals, culture, and pathogens between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres?
The Columbian Exchange
Ghana, Mali, and Songhai.
What massive 11-million-character literary work was commissioned under the Ming Dynasty?
The Yongle Encyclopedia
What economic system dictates that colonies exist to extract raw goods for the mother nation and buy back manufactured goods at a marked-up price?
Mercantilism
Which explorer demonstrated that the Americas were a distinct continent separate from Asia?
Amerigo Vespucci
What phrase refers to the catastrophic 80% to 95% population decline among Indigenous Americans due to European diseases?
The Great Dying
Name two West African coastal kingdoms that grew powerful during the Atlantic trade by exchange of captives for European firearms.
Any two of Asante, Oyo, Benin, or the Kingdom of Kongo
Who was the prominent Ming naval admiral and eunuch who commanded grand maritime fleets across Asia and Africa?
Zheng He
Which two ship designs transformed oceanic navigation by combining triangular lateen sails with square sails or expanding cargo capacity?
The Caravel and the Galleon
What 1494 agreement mediated by Pope Alexander VI established a line of demarcation dividing non-Christian land claims between Spain and Portugal?
The Treaty of Tordesillas
Which Spanish coercive labor framework granted conquerors rights to forced Indigenous labor in exchange for protection and religious instruction?
The Encomienda system
What isolationist policy (Sakoku) was implemented by the Tokugawa Shogunate to restrict foreign trade and Christian influence in Japan?
The Closed Country Policy.
What 1842 unequal treaty ended the First Opium War, ceding Hong Kong and granting extraterritorial rights to Britain?
The Treaty of Nanjing
Name two navigational instruments—one originating in China and the other refined by Arab scholars—that enabled accurate ocean travel.
The magnetic compass and the astrolabe
Which French explorer established the fur trade in North America and is credited with naming Canada?
Jacques Cartier
What rigid colonial social structure determined legal rights, taxation, and status in Spanish America based on blood lineage?
Las Castas System
Which single Chinese port was kept open under the Qing Dynasty to strictly regulate foreign maritime commerce under taxes and rules?
Canton (Guangzhou)
What political theory posits an implicit agreement between citizens and their ruler to maintain an orderly society?
Social Contract Theory
What major geopolitical event cut off direct European land routes to Asian trade, prompting a search for ocean routes?
The Ottoman conquest of Constantinople.
What mandatory license system did the Portuguese enforce to exact duties and maintain a trade monopoly in the Indian Ocean?
The Cartaz system
What brutal 80-day ocean passage transported enslaved Africans under horrific chattel conditions to American plantations?
The Middle Passage
Which Mughal ruler attempted to bring universal harmony by creating the syncretic Divine Faith (Din-i-Ilahi)?
Emperor Akbar
Which group in pre-revolutionary France paid the vast majority of taxes while being excluded from royal privileges like the Palace of Versailles?
The Third Estate