Question	Answer
a branch of Mahayana Buddhism holding that all believers can be reborn into a place of salvation, the Pure Land	Pure Land Buddhism
a building style of the early American Southwest that relied on stone or wooden frames covered in adobe clay	Pueblo architecture
a centuries-long effort by the church to impose religious homogeneity on Western Europe through torture and execution, if necessary	Inquisition
a Chinese religion that emphasized veneration of nature, the cosmos, and mysticism	Daoism
a Chinese school of philosophical thought shaping morality, governance, education, and family life	Confucianism
a city-state in Ancient Greece	polis
a class of religious clerics and scholars who act as the primary interpreters of Islamic law	ulama
a code of ideal conduct meant to validate the practices of noble warriors by Christianizing knightly violence and behavior	chivalry
a collection of life-size clay statues of soldiers, officials, servants, and horses of the Qin emperor and buried in his tomb near Xi’an	Terracotta Army
a collection of practices that bound lesser lords to greater lords through land and privileges given in return for personal and military support	feudalism
a community of vegetation and wildlife adapted to a particular climate	biome
a complex writing system developed around 3000 BCE in which written symbols represented both sounds and ideas	hieroglyphics
a construction method that uses interlocking stones rather than mortar	drystone
a crescent-shaped geographical area in the Middle East where agriculture first flourished	Fertile Crescent
a culture consisting of mobile bands of hunter-gatherers who camped at resource-rich locations in modest populations across North America	Clovis culture
a description of Greek history, language, and culture in the period 323–31 BCE	Hellenistic
a document initiated by the emperor Theodosius II compiling laws from around the empire that had been issued since the early fourth century	Theodosian Code
a document issued by the Holy Roman emperor Charles IV in 1356 that recognized the role of seven princes in electing Holy Roman emperors	Golden Bull
a document, object, or other source material from the time period under study	primary source
a document, object, or other source material written or created after the time period under study	secondary source
a field of history that looks at all classes and categories of people, not just elites	social history
a form of Mahayana Buddhism that emphasizes meditation; it is widely practiced in Japan where it is known as Zen Buddhism	Chan Buddhism
a form of slavery in which one person is owned by another as a piece of property	chattel slavery
a grassy plain with scattered trees found to the north and south of the tropical African rainforest	savanna
a group of geoglyphs made on the desert floor in southern Peru representing both geometric patterns and images of animals	Nazca Lines
a high regard for the cultural institutions of Greece including its religion, philosophy, and system of education	Hellenism
a Hindu concept emphasizing the influence of good deeds and moral behavior on a person’s status in life and rebirth after death	karma
a Hindu concept explaining the continuance of the soul after death and its transformation	samsara
a historical geographical term referring to an area in the eastern Mediterranean consisting roughly of modern Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria	Levant
a Japanese military commander-in-chief	shogun
a Kushite title that roughly translates to “queen mother” and was a powerful position in Meroitic Kush	kentake
a large structure in Rome that was the site of gladiatorial matches and other entertainments	Colosseum
a legal project carried out by Emperor Justinian to compile and edit Roman edicts issued from the second to the sixth century CE	Code of Justinian
a list of judicial decisions that the Babylonian king Hammurabi had inscribed on stone pillars throughout his kingdom	Code of Hammurabi
a medieval economic system of agricultural production directed by a lord and carried out by serfs or other varieties of unfree laborers	manorialism
a member of the elite warrior class of Japan, governed by a strict code of behavior	samurai
a member of the genus Homo who emerged in East Africa around two million years ago, living entirely on the ground and walking exclusively in an upright position	Homo erectus
a movement born in fourteenth-century Italy that focused on the study of human beings, human nature, and human achievements rather than the study of God	humanism
a movement that aimed to limit the influence of aristocrats in church matters	Cluniac reform
a Mycenaean script developed from Linear A that was used to write an early form of the Greek language	Linear B
a pandemic of the plague caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis with far-reaching economic, political, social, and cultural effects that transformed Asia, Europe, and North Africa in the fourteenth century	Black Death
a period in the early fourteenth century during which global mean temperatures dropped an average of 0.6°C, resulting in droughts and decreased agricultural productivity	Little Ice Age
a period of intellectual and artistic rebirth inspired by the cultural achievements of ancient Greece and Rome	Renaissance
a person who sees themselves as responsible to a world community rather than only a national one	global citizen
a phonetic writing system based on the sounds of words and invented by the Sumerians in about 3000 BCE	cuneiform
a place in a river where the otherwise placid flow is upset by a waterfall, a shallow portion, or the presence of boulders	cataract
a political contest during the first centuries of the Republic in which Rome’s commoners sought equal rights with elites	Struggle of the Orders
a proto-democratic gathering of a Mongol leader’s followers, called to reach agreement on major political decisions	kurultai
a religiously infused conflict waged on behalf of Islam, or any struggle a Muslim undertakes in the name of Allah	jihad
a right granted to subjects of the Ottoman sultan to collect taxes in a given area	timar
a Roman Republican office with absolute authority over the state for a limited time during emergencies	dictator
a ruler who claims authority over the Islamic community but not necessarily the title of caliph	sultan
a school of philosophical thought that helped dynasties such as the Qin use uniform laws and codes to reform and strengthen rulers	Legalism
a school of thought that views history as a straight line to a specific and more democratic destination	progressive history
a script developed by the Minoans but not yet deciphered by modern scholars	Linear A
a secret peasant society that rose up against Mongol rule during the Yuan dynasty	Red Turbans
a section of low-lying land between modern Alaska and Russia, now underwater, that once served as a land bridge between continents	Beringia
a series of trade routes circulating luxury goods to and from China and parts of central Asia, India, and the Middle East	Silk Roads
a simplified form of hieroglyphics employed by Egyptian scribes for recording everyday documents such as receipts and contracts	hieratic
a small group of several families that shared an encampment and herded or hunted together and formed the basic social unit of the seminomadic peoples of Eurasia	clan
a societal characteristic in which people perform specific tasks, such as farming (farmer) or producing tools and clothing (artisan), that contribute to the well-being of the community	specialization
a state in Egypt and the Levant administered and defended by educated, formerly enslaved men called mamluks	Mamluk Sultanate
a state or kingdom that is nominally independent in the running of its internal affairs but must submit to the demands of a dominating empire and usually provide tribute to it	vassal state
a subspecies of Homo erectus identified by fossil remains found in northern China	Peking Man
a system wherein groups or individuals are granted the right to trade in another’s territory	cabotage
a taxonomic rank that includes several similar and related species	genus
a term describing the ancient Indus valley civilization, named for one of its largest cities and the first to be discovered by archaeologists	Harappan
a term meaning “rightly guided” that describes the first four caliphs after Muhammad’s death: Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Ali	Rashidun
a time of more temperate climate across the globe from the tenth through the thirteenth century	Medieval Warm Period
a title claimed by warrior-kings to unite various tribes into powerful confederations and empires	khan
a transitional period between the ancient and medieval worlds that occurred from roughly 150 to 750 CE	Late Antiquity
a type of monumental mud-brick structure unique to Nubian civilization and believed to have served a religious function	deffufa
a type of paper Egyptians made from a common reed plant growing along the Nile	papyrus
a very distant ancestor of modern humans who lived in eastern and southern Africa between 2.5 and 4 million years ago	Australopithecus
a walled complex of palaces, temples, and gardens built by the Ming dynasty emperors in the center of Beijing	Forbidden City
a wealthy Roman aristocrat sought by clients in need of assistance	patron
a widely dispersed mound-building tradition that created a number of urban settlements linked by trading networks in the southeastern United States around 700	Mississippian tradition
a widely dispersed mound-building tradition that emerged in the Eastern Woodlands around 200 BCE, linked by a network of trade routes	Hopewell tradition
all the ways in which members of a human society interact with one another and with their environment and pass these ways from generation to generation	culture
an alliance formed in 1428 between the Aztecs and two neighboring city-states, Texcoco and Tlacopan	Triple Alliance
an approach to history that follows a timeline from ancient to modern	chronological approach
an Arabic term meaning “emigration” that describes a defining moment for early Muslims as they fled Mecca for Medina in 622 CE	hijra
an area under the control of a Muslim ruler called a caliph	caliphate
an early gun that was large and difficult to maneuver	arquebus
an east–west belt of semiarid grassland that forms a transitional zone between the Sahara to the north and the equatorial rainforest to the south	Sahel
an English document that reiterated existing rights of vassals, confirmed the papal position that the church is above the state, and spelled out some basic rights of commoners	Magna Carta
an enslaved professional fighter paid to battle before an audience, sometimes to the death	gladiator
an immense stepped tower with a flat top built of mud-brick that served as a temple in Sumerian cities	ziggurat
an independent political entity consisting of a city and surrounding territory that it controls	city-state
an inn funded by the state or wealthy individuals where travelers could spend the night and store their goods securely	caravansary
an Islamic title designating a spiritual and secular leader	caliph
Chinggis Khan’s law code, designed to eliminate the sources of conflict in steppe society and bring harmony to his people	yassa
educated, formerly enslaved men who served as soldiers and administrators in Islamic societies beginning in the ninth century	mamluks
foreign states and tribes that were given semiautonomy as Roman allies in exchange for pledging military service to the Roman Empire	foederati
horse relay stations established by Chinggis Khan for long-distance communication on military campaigns; they were later expanded into rest areas and supply depots	yam
ideas such as class and gender created and accepted by the people in a society that influence the way they think and behave	social constructs
Islamic religious law	sharia
large agricultural estates in the countryside, worked by enslaved people to produce profit for the owner	latifundia
less well-off Romans who relied on a patron’s gifts for subsistence	clients
meetings organized by emperors that gathered Christian bishops from around the empire to settle matters of doctrine within the Church	ecumenical councils
members of the Byzantine elite who often compromised imperial authority	dynatoi
members of the genus Homo who evolved from Homo erectus and lived in Europe and western Asia between 30,000 and 200,000 years ago	Neanderthals
modern humans, members of the genus Homo who emerged in Africa first and later migrated to other areas	Homo sapiens
nomadic people who rely on herds of domesticated animals for subsistence	pastoralists
non-Arab converts to Islam in the early Islamic period who had to be adopted by an Arab tribe as part of the conversion process	mawali
one of the two umbrella sects of Islam, whose members believe leadership of the Muslim community should reside in the family of Muhammad only through his son-in-law Ali	Shia
one of twenty governing districts in Persia administered by royal governors called satraps, who answered directly to the king	satrapy
penitents who ritually flogged themselves in response to the Black Death as a means of appeasing God and mitigating the spread of the disease	flagellants
people who survive by employing the strategies of hunting animals and gathering wild plants rather than by planting crops and raising livestock	hunter-gatherers
people who worship multiple gods, usually associated with different aspects of the natural world	polytheists
politicians who sought the political support of discontented groups in Roman society	populares
politicians who supported the old order and the traditional leadership of elites	optimates
provincial contractors who bid for the right to collect taxes and profited from the excess money they gathered	publicani
regional governors in ancient Egypt	nomarchs
religious cults that featured secret rituals (the so-called mysteries) and became popular in Hellenistic cities	mystery religions
sharpened stones used until about 1.7 million years ago for a variety of cutting, scraping, and chopping purposes	Oldowan tools
stone tools and hand-axes made beginning around 250,000 years ago and consisting of flakes rather than cores	Mousterian tools
stone tools made by carefully chipping away flakes of the stone core to make them into teardrop-shaped implements that replaced the cruder Oldowan hand-axes	Acheulean tools
Temujin’s name for his ethnically and linguistically diverse followers	People of the Felt Walls
the ability to see the past on its own terms, without judgment or the imposition of our own modern-day attitudes	historical empathy
the basic unit of the Roman army, made up of around five thousand soldiers	legion
the belief that a degree of spirituality exists not only in people but also in plants, inanimate objects, and natural phenomena	animism
the boundary line of a zone of intense seismic activity in the Pacific Ocean	Ring of Fire
the Christian schism in North Africa springing from the belief that church leaders who had renounced their faith to avoid persecution held no authority to perform sacraments	Donatist controversy
the community of Muslims	ummah
the conflict that solidified the separation of the eastern and western Christian churches	Great Schism of 1054
the culture of partially settled agricultural communities in the Andes region; also known as the Caral civilization	Norte Chico
the deportation of Judeans to Babylon after the fall of Jerusalem	Babylonian exile
the dispersion of the Jewish people beyond their ancestral homeland of Israel/Palestine following the Romans’ destruction of the Second Temple	Jewish diaspora
the earliest member of the genus Homo, appearing in the archaeological record about two to three million years ago	Homo habilis
the eastern half of the Eurasian Steppe that stretches into Mongolia and runs along the northern border of China	Inner Asian Steppe
the elite enslaved infantry corps of the Ottoman army	Janissaries
the favor of the gods that conferred a right to rule but could be lost by those less worthy	“Mandate of Heaven”
the final phase of the Paleolithic Age, beginning around twelve thousand years ago when human populations began growing crops and domesticating animals	Neolithic Age
the first set of written laws in Rome, from about 450 BCE	Twelve Tables
the French name for the four Crusader States created after the First Crusade, the County of Edessa, the Principality of Antioch, the County of Tripoli, and the Kingdom of Jerusalem	Outremer
the hierarchical order of society in which people sharing the same level of wealth and status make up a distinct class or strata	social stratification
the Hindu concept of the right way of living as defined by cosmic law	dharma
the history of ideas, which looks at the philosophies that drive people to make certain choices	intellectual history
the holy book that, according to Jewish tradition, tells the history of the Hebrew people	Hebrew Bible
the holy scripture of Islam, which Muslims believe was given to humanity by God through Muhammad	Quran
the interconnectedness of societies and economies throughout the world as a result of trade, technology, and the adoption and sharing of various aspects of culture	globalization
the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca	hajj
the landless working class	proletariat
the larger of the two umbrella sects of Islam, whose adherents did not require leadership of the community to come specifically from the descendants of Muhammad through Ali	Sunni
the line of kings that ruled New Kingdom Egypt following the reign of Ramses I	Ramesside kings
the mass migration of Hebrews out of Egypt under the leadership of Moses	Exodus
the millennia-long expansion of Bantu-speaking peoples southward from West and Central Africa, spreading a common cultural foundation that included language, farming, and ironworking	Bantu migrations
the Mongol group that ruled over portions of central Asia, the former lands of the Rus, and northwest Asia	Golden Horde
the most immediate reason an event occurred	primary cause
the mystical expression of Islamic faith	Sufism
the name Egyptians gave to the expansive area south of the first cataract and extending into sub-Saharan Africa; it included the Kingdom of Kush	Nubia
the name for a typical Roman house, as well as the family unit	domus
the name given to nomadic tribes of Arabia	Bedouin
the name used by Carthaginians, Greeks, and Romans to describe the native peoples of the Maghreb; today, this population generally self-identifies as Amazigh, or Imazighen	Berbers
the oldest surviving written constitution in the world, which increased the power of the monarch of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies by replacing vassals and church officials with royal bureaucrats	Constitutions of Melfi
the patriarch of an extended Roman family, with authority over his wife, children, and any other dependents	paterfamilias
the period beginning around 1200 BCE when iron became the preferred material for manufacturing tools and weapons	Iron Age
the period from 1378 to 1417 during which three men simultaneously served as pope of the Roman Catholic Church in western Europe	Great Western Schism
the period from 3500 to 1110 BCE when bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, was the preferred material for manufacturing tools and weapons	Bronze Age
the period of time beginning as early as 3.3 million years ago until nearly twelve thousand years ago, when our distant pre-human ancestors began using stone tools for a variety of purposes	Paleolithic Age
the political system established by Augustus Caesar after 27 BCE, which relied on Rome’s traditional institutions and practices to legitimize a military dictatorship	principate
the practice of self-denial and rejection of pleasures as a way to express religious devotion	asceticism
the priesthood of six women who took a vow of chastity and maintained the sacred fire in Rome	vestal virgins
the private household of the Ottoman sultan	harem
the process of altering our interpretation of historical events by adding new elements and perspectives	revisionism
the process of releasing a person from slavery, usually in front of a magistrate or via a slaveholder’s will, or through a person’s purchasing their own freedom	manumission
the release from samsara and the karmic cycle together with the attainment of a complete understanding of the world	moksha
the religion of the ancient Persians, named for its founder Zarathustra, pronounced Zoroaster in Greek	Zoroastrianism
the religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which all trace their origins through a common ancestor, the prophet Abraham	Abrahamic faiths
the religious and cultural conversion of those living under Islamic rule	Islamization
the religious cult that venerated the Roman emperors as gods	imperial cult
the religious leader of Shia Muslims	imam
the Roman government’s distribution of grain to the population, which was also a political tool for the emperor	annona
the Roman practice of dividing land into a grid in preparation for development and agriculture	centuriation
the rule of four emperors, two senior and two junior, established by the emperor Diocletian to quell the Crisis of the Third Century	tetrarchy
the seasonal pattern of wind and rainfall across South Asia	monsoon
the set of administrative structures associated with the government of the Catholic Church primarily—but not exclusively—linked with the city of Rome	papacy
the shift from hunting and gathering to a life based primarily on agriculture	Neolithic Revolution
the study of historical temperature and climate changes and their effects on human society	historical climatology
the study of how historians have already interpreted the past	historiography
the Sumerians’ term for their ruler	lugal
the system of acquiring Christian boys from the Balkans to be enslaved, converted to Islam, and trained to serve the Ottoman sultan	devshirme
the three groups (the Mahan, Jinhan, and Byeonhan) in southern Korea that were among the earliest with tribal chieftains	Three Han
the title of the Egyptian ruler, translated as “big house”	pharaoh
the trainer and manager of a group of gladiators	lanista
the use of images and symbols in art	iconography
the view that it is enough to study the deeds and impact of important leaders to paint an accurate picture of the past	great man theory
the way words are used and put together in speaking or writing	rhetoric
the western half of North Africa, including most of present-day Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya	Maghreb
the words and actions of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and his immediate successors that, along with the Quran, form the fundamental basis for Islamic law	hadith
top officials in the Imperial Chinese bureaucracy, selected by a series of exams on Confucian texts	mandarins
unfree peasants who owed labor to a feudal lord and lived under the lord’s authority	serfs