Africa, Islamic World
This was an important and very wealthy trading city in the Mali empire.
What is Timbuktu?
This leader had a reputation for brutality and controlled the largest contiguous land empire in history.
Who is Genghis Khan?
This was series of religiously motivated campaigns wherein a mixture of European kingdoms attempted to capture Jerusalem.
What are the Crusades?
This Genoese (Italian) navigator made contact with the Americas in 1492, and made three more voyages to the region after that.
Who is Christopher Columbus?
This English king joined the Third Crusade and fought against the Muslim commander Saladin.
Who is King Richard? ("the Lionheart")
This king of Mali was one of the wealthiest people in history.
Who is Mansa Musa?
This was the largest and most prosperous of the three Muslim "gunpowder empires." It lasted from the 1200s to 1922!
What is the Ottoman empire?
This religious institution provided unity (albeit imperfectly) to European kingdoms, as well as giving rulers' legitimacy and fostering education.
What is the Catholic Church?
The Mexica people migrated into central Mexico and became this warlike empire, building their capital on a lake.
What is the Aztec empire?
This Spanish military leader allied with indigenous groups to defeat the Aztec empire.
Who is Hernan Cortes?
This Muslim sect was more oriented toward meditation and mysticism, less focused on firm doctrinal rules. As a result, they made very good missionaries.
Who are the Sufi?
This disease spread widely in the 1300s, in some places killing 70% of the people it infected.
What is the Bubonic Plague, or the Black Plague?
The name used for this time-span of European history means "re-birth" and was in some ways a time of greater stability, scientific advancement, and cultural production than in the Middle Ages.
What is the "Renaissance"?
This irrigation system enabled greater crop yields in marshy areas by piling up fertile soil into plateaus.
What is the chinampa system?
Who is Michelangelo?
This was a kingdom in Ethiopia. The rulers of the kingdom converted to Christianity in the 300s AD, shortly after the Roman emperor Constantine.
What is Axum?
This group migrated from central Asia into the Middle-East and Asia Minor (Anatolia), conquering much land from other Islamic groups as well as the Byzantines.
Who are the Seljuq Turks?
These documents were granted by lords in Europe to allow greater independence for cities. They granted rights ranging from freedom of movement for certain merchants to independent city self-governance.
What are charters?
This ruler greatly expanded Inca territory through military conquest, developed Cuzco into the huge city that it became, and commissioned the construction of Machu Picchu for his own use.
Who is Pachacuti?
This Viking ruler made contact with the Americas before Columbus.
Who is Lief Erickson?
This revolt of African slaves took control of the city of Basra and established a government there for more than 10 years.
What is the Zanj Revolt?
This Chinese explorer sailed with over 300 gigantic ships, visiting many ports on the Indian Ocean and opening up new areas to trade.
Who is Zheng He?
This is the more specific term for peasants at the bottom of the feudal hierarchy. They were not allowed to leave their land, swore loyalty to a baron or lord, and gave them a portion of their crop.
What are serfs?
This was a city in north America (in the area of what is now Illinois) that thrived before contact with Europeans. The structures were pyramidal mounds, and it was home to approximately 30,000 people at its most prosperous period.
What is Cahokia?
This Muslim empire ruled India while the Ottoman empire was at its height farther west.
What is the Mughal Empire?