Peoples of the Americas
These Indigenous people built cliff dwellings in what is now the Southwest United States.
Who were the Ancestral Puebloans (Anasazi)?
This African kingdom became wealthy by trading gold and salt across the Sahara.
What is Ghana?
In 1492, this explorer sailed west from Spain and reached the islands of the Caribbean.
Who is Christopher Columbus?
This Spanish conquistador defeated the Aztec Empire in the early 1500s.
Who is Hernán Cortés?
This river, the longest in North America, was home to Indigenous peoples such as the Mississippians who built large mound cities along its banks.
What is the Mississippi River?
This empire, centered in present-day Mexico, built their capital Tenochtitlán on a lake.
What is the Aztec Empire?
Mansa Musa, one of the richest rulers in history, ruled this powerful West African empire.
What is Mali?
Europeans originally searched for this type of route when they set out west across the Atlantic.
What is a water route to Asia?
This conquistador defeated the Inca Empire in present-day Peru.
Who is Francisco Pizarro?
The Ancestral Puebloans (Anasazi) built their cliff dwellings in this arid region of present-day Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado.
What is the Four Corners region?
This major South American empire built thousands of miles of roads through the Andes Mountains.
What is the Inca Empire?
This city in Mali became a great center of learning and trade.
What is Timbuktu?
This term describes the widespread exchange of plants, animals, and diseases between Europe and the Americas.
What is the Columbian Exchange?
This system gave Spanish settlers the right to demand labor or tribute from Native Americans.
What is the encomienda system?
This great inland body of water system, made up of five massive lakes, served as trade and travel routes for Indigenous peoples long before Europeans arrived.
What are the Great Lakes?
This type of crop, also called maize, became the staple food of many Native American cultures.
What is corn?
The West African empire of Songhai controlled trade along this major river.
What is the Niger River?
The Vikings, led by Leif Erikson, reached this part of North America around the year 1000.
What is Newfoundland?
The French established their first permanent settlement in North America here in 1608.
What is Quebec?
Known as “Tenochtitlan,” this Aztec capital city was built on an island in the middle of this large Mexican lake.
What is Lake Texcoco?
This group, known for mound-building, created large earthworks such as Cahokia near present-day St. Louis.
Who were the Mississippians?
This trade network linked West Africa with Europe and the Americas, often transporting enslaved Africans.
What is the Triangular Trade?
This treaty, signed in 1494, divided new lands in the Americas between Spain and Portugal.
What is the Treaty of Tordesillas?
This French explorer traveled the Mississippi River and claimed the Louisiana Territory for France.
Who is Robert de La Salle?
his grassland region stretching from modern-day Canada to Texas was home to nomadic groups who relied on the buffalo for food, tools, and shelter.
What are the Great Plains?