AP World History: Unit 3 - Land-Based Empires and State Expansion (1450–1750)

Comprehensive practice flashcards defining essential vocabulary, historical figures, imperial institutions, and military developments of early modern land-based empires and European states from 1450 to 1750.

Gunpowder Empires

Large multiethnic states in Southwest, Central, and South Asia that relied on firearms, artillery, and armed trade to conquer, control, and expand territories.

Gutenberg Printing Press

Movable type printing machine created in the mid-1400s that sparked a rapid increase in European literacy, economic development, and the mass dissemination of ideas.

Ivan IV ("Ivan the Terrible")

Russian ruler crowned tsar in 1547 who expanded Russia eastward to the Pacific by conquering the Mongol-held khanates of Kazan, Astrakhan, and Siberia with gunpowder weapons.

Ivan III

Grand Prince of Moscow who ceased paying tribute to the Mongol khan in 1480, annexed Novgorod, and established a centralized Russian state centered in Moscow using the title "tsar."

Ming Dynasty

Chinese dynasty (1368–1644) founded by Hongwu after the collapse of the Mongol Yuan dynasty; restored native Chinese rule, reinforced the Great Wall, and reestablished civil service exams.

Manchu

Pastoral nomadic people originating from Manchuria northeast of the Great Wall who defeated rebel forces in Beijing in 1644 and founded the Qing Dynasty.

Qing Dynasty

The final imperial dynasty of China (1644–1911), established by Manchu invaders, which maintained strict ethnic identity while adopting Confucian administrative practices.

Emperor Kangxi

Long-reigning Qing emperor (1661–1722) and Confucian scholar who pacified southern China, annexed Taiwan, pushed borders into Central Asia and Mongolia, and established a protectorate over Tibet.

Emperor Qianlong

Qing emperor whose prosperous reign marked the peak of the empire; known for his patronage of the arts, annexation of Xinjiang, and making Vietnam, Burma, and Nepal tributary states.

Tamerlane (Timur the Lame)

Mongol-Turkic conqueror from Samarkand who relied on gunpowder technology to make ruthless conquests across Central Asia, Persia, and India between 1370 and 1405.

Ghazi Ideal

A model for warrior life emerging from the Eurasian steppes that fused the cooperative, fierce values of nomadic culture with devotion to fight as a holy warrior for Islam.

Ottoman Empire

Sunni Islamic gunpowder empire founded in northwestern Anatolia around 1299 by Osman Bey that endured until 1922, encompassing Southeastern Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.

Mehmed II ("The Conqueror")

Ottoman sultan who besieged and captured Constantinople in 1453 using massive gunpowder cannons, renaming the city Istanbul and making it the Ottoman imperial capital.

Devshirme

Ottoman tribute system requiring conquered Christian communities in the Balkans to provide young boys to be converted to Islam, educated, and trained as imperial administrators or soldiers.

Janissaries

Elite corps of Ottoman infantry troops raised through the devshirme system, renowned for their intense loyalty to the sultan and early mastery of firearms.

Suleiman I ("The Magnificent" / "The Lawgiver")

Ottoman ruler (r. 1520–1566) under whom the empire reached its territorial and cultural zenith, expanding into Hungary, besieging Vienna, and harmonizing secular and religious laws.

Harem Politics

Internal factional struggles within imperial Islamic palaces where mothers and concubines vied to secure succession and political influence for their respective sons.

Battle of Lepanto (1571)

Decisive Mediterranean naval engagement in which a Spanish and Italian Holy League coalition defeated the Ottoman fleet, stemming Ottoman maritime dominance.

Safavid Empire

Shi'a gunpowder empire founded in 1501 in Azerbaijan by Shah Ismail; established Twelver Shiism as its state religion and engaged in sustained geopolitical conflict with the Sunni Ottomans.

Shah Ismail I

Founder of the Safavid Empire who conquered Tabriz and Iran by age 15, mandated Twelver Shiism for his Sunni subjects, and was revered by the qizilbash as a divine leader.

Twelver Shiism

A form of Shi'a Islam asserting that twelve infallible imams succeeded Muhammad, the last of whom entered hiding in 874 C.E. and will return as the messiah.

Qizilbash ("Red Heads")

Turkic nomadic military cavalry who wore distinctive twelve-pleated red turbans honoring the Shi'a imams and served as the fanatical core of early Safavid armies.

Battle of Chaldiran (1514)

Crucial military clash in which the Ottoman Empire used superior artillery and Janissary firearms to shatter the Safavid qizilbash cavalry and briefly occupy Tabriz.

Shah Abbas I ("Abbas the Great")

Safavid shah (r. 1588–1629) who revitalized the empire by moving the capital to Isfahan, creating an army of enslaved Christian youths, importing European armaments, and driving out Portuguese and Ottoman forces.

Mughal Empire

Vast, wealthy gunpowder empire in the Indian subcontinent founded in 1526 by Babur and lasting until the 19th century, characterized by Indo-Islamic architecture, cotton textile trade, and administrative centralization.

Babur ("The Tiger")

Chaghatai Turk and descendant of Tamerlane and Genghis Khan who captured Delhi in 1526 using artillery and firearms, establishing the Mughal Dynasty.

Akbar

Mughal emperor (r. 1556–1605) who centralized administration, pursued religious tolerance, repealed the jizya tax, and synthesized the ecumenical "Divine Faith."

Divine Faith (Din-i Ilahi)

A syncretic religion formulated by Akbar that drew heavily from Islam, Hinduism, Jainism, and Zoroastrianism, placing the emperor as the common divine arbiter of all Indian communities.

Shah Jahan

Mughal emperor who reigned during the architectural peak of the empire and commissioned the Taj Mahal as a white marble mausoleum for his deceased wife Mumtaz Mahal.

Aurangzeb

Mughal emperor (r. 1658–1707) who expanded the empire into southern India but reversed Akbar's policies of religious tolerance, reinstated the jizya, demolished Hindu temples, and sparked pervasive rebellions.

Caste System

A rigid hereditary social hierarchy in India dividing society into Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras, with Dalits ("untouchables") positioned outside the framework.

Dhimmi

Non-Muslim monotheistic religious subjects living in an Islamic empire who were granted legal protection, religious freedom, and property rights in exchange for paying the jizya tax.

Jizya

A special tax levied by Islamic states on non-Muslim subjects (dhimmi) who did not convert to Islam.

Millet System

An autonomous administrative arrangement in the Ottoman Empire allowing distinct religious communities to manage their own civil laws, languages, and religious institutions.

Charles V

Habsburg emperor crowned in 1519 who held authority over Spain, the Low Countries, Austria, and Spanish America, but abdicated in 1556 due to internal Lutheran resistance and Ottoman expansion.

Spanish Inquisition

Ecclesiastical royal tribunal established in 1478 by Ferdinand and Isabella that used state authority to detect and punish secret practitioners of Judaism, Islam, and Protestantism throughout the Spanish realm.

Peace of Westphalia (1648)

Diplomatic treaties ending the Thirty Years' War that established the modern system of sovereign, independent, and competing European states with autonomy over internal and religious affairs.

Balance of Power

European diplomatic principle whereby coalitions were formed against any single power that threatened to achieve hegemony across the continent.

Glorious Revolution (1688)

The bloodless deposition of English King James II and accession of Mary and William of Orange, confirming a permanent constitutional monarchy governed in cooperation with Parliament.

Louis XIV ("The Sun King")

French absolute monarch (r. 1643–1715) who declared "l’état, c’est moi," centralized royal authority, maintained a large standing army, and subjugated the nobility at the Palace of Versailles.

Peter I ("Peter the Great")

Russian Romanov tsar (r. 1682–1725) who modernized Russia's military and state administration along Western European models, reformed social customs, and constructed St. Petersburg as a naval port.

Catherine II ("Catherine the Great")

Russian empress (r. 1762–1796) who streamlined administrative provinces and participated in the partitions of Poland, but preserved autocracy and entrenched serfdom following Pugachev's Rebellion.

Pugachev's Rebellion (1773–1774)

Massive peasant and Cossack insurrection led by Yemelian Pugachev in the Caspian steppe that killed thousands of nobles before being suppressed by Catherine II's imperial army.

Scholar-Bureaucrats (Scholar-Gentry)

Civil servants in imperial China who obtained degrees by passing competitive civil service exams and managed the day-to-day administrative, legal, and economic affairs of the state.

Civil Service Examinations

A rigorous, multi-tiered testing system in imperial China based on Confucian classics and commentaries, serving as the primary avenue for social mobility and government appointments.

Filial Piety

Core Confucian moral virtue emphasizing deep respect, obedience, and duty toward parents and elders, serving as the cultural foundation for subject loyalty toward the emperor.

Matteo Ricci

Italian Jesuit missionary who mastered Chinese language and Confucian texts to introduce Western science, mathematics, maps, and Catholic Christianity to the Ming imperial court.

Tokugawa Bakufu

The hereditary military government established in Japan in 1600 by Tokugawa Ieyasu that imposed political stability, controlled the daimyo, and isolated the country until 1867.

Daimyo

Powerful hereditary territorial warlords who ruled feudal domains in pre-modern Japan, subjected to alternate-year residence requirements under the Tokugawa shogunate.

Ukiyo ("Floating Worlds")

Secular, vibrant urban entertainment quarters in Tokugawa Japanese cities offering teahouses, kabuki theaters, and pleasure quarters for the rising merchant class.