WHAP Midterm Review

Phoenicians

A smaller regional culture which devised a greatly simplified alphabet with 22 letters around 1,300 BCE; this in turn was the ancestor of the Greek and Latin alphabets. Seafaring civilization located on the shores of the eastern Mediterranean; established colonies throughout the Mediterranean.

Harrappa/Mohenjo Darjo

The largest city to develop along the Indus River.

mummification

The act of preserving the bodies of the dead; practiced in Egypt to preserve the body for enjoyment of the afterlife.

hieroglyphs

The form of writing developed in ancient Egypt; more pictorial than Mesopotamian cuneiform.

Jericho

Early walled urban culture based on sedentary agriculture; located in modern Israel-occupied West Bank near Jordan River.

chiefdom

Widely diffused patterns of social organization in the Americas; featured chieftains who ruled from central towns over a large territory including smaller towns or villages that paid tribute; predominant town often featured temples and priest class.

Anasazi

"The Ancient Ones"; culture located in southwestern United States; flourished from 200 to 1,200 CE; featured large multistory adobe and stone buildings built in protected canyons or cliffs.

city-state

An independent, self-governing city; a form of political organization typical of Mesopotamian civilizations; consisted of agricultural hinterlands ruled by an urban-based king.

totalitarian state

A new kind of government in the 20th century that exercised massive, direct control over virtually all the activities of its subjects; existed in Germany, Italy, and the Soviet Union.

horizon

Archeological term for a period when a broad central authority seems to have integrated a widely dispersed region.

Neolithic Age

The New Stone Age; period in which adaptation of sedentary agriculture occurred; domestication of plants and animals accomplished.

polis

City-state form of government; typical of Greek political organization from 800 to 400 BCE (pl. poleis).

matrilineal

Family descent and inheritance traced through the female line.

potter's wheel

A technological advance in potterymaking; invented circa 6,000 BCE; encouraged faster and higher-quality ceramic pottery production.

Chavin culture

Appeared in highlands of Andes between 1,800 and 1,200 BCE; typified by ceremonial centers with large stone buildings; greatest ceremonial center was Chavin de Huantar; characterized by artistic motifs.

culture

Combinations of the ideas, objects, and patterns of behavior that result from human social interaction.

Narmer

First pharaoh of Egyptian Old Kingdom; ruled circa 3,100 BCE

polyandry

Marriage practice in which one woman had several husbands; recounted in Aryan epics.

Jomon culture

Created by early migrants to Japan after 3,000 BCE; hunting-and-gathering people, produced distinctive pottery form.

hunting and gathering

Means of obtaining subsistence by human species prior to the adaptation of sedentary agriculture; normally typical of brand social organization.

Homo sapiens

The humanoid species that emerged as most successful at the end of the Paleolithic period.

Paleolithic Age

The Old Stone Age (ending in 12,000 BCE); typified by use of crude stone tools and hunting and gathering for subsistence.

polygamy

Marriage practice in which one husband had several wives; practiced in Aryan society.

pyramids

Monumental architecture typical of Old Kingdom Egypt; used as burial sites for pharaohs.

Minoan

A civilization that developed on the island of Crete circa 1,600 BCE; capital at the palace complex of Knossos.

Aztecs

The Mexica; one of the nomadic tribes that used political anarchy after fall of Toltecs to penetrate into the sedentary agricultural zone of Mesoamerican plateau; established empire after 1325 around shores of Lake Texcoco.

Chichén Itzá

Originally a Mayan city; conquered by Toltecs circa 1000 and ruled by Toltec dynasties; architecture featured pyramid of Feathered Serpent (Quetzacoatl).

Natufian complex

Preagriculture culture; located in present-day Israel, Jordan, and Lebanon; practiced the collection of naturally present barley and wheat to supplement game; typified by large settlement sites.

Çatal Hoyuk

Early urban culture based on sedentary agriculture; located in modern southern Turkey; was larger in population than Jericho, had greater degree of social stratification.

Hammurabi

The most important ruler of the Babylonian empire; responsible for codification of law.

animism

A religious outlook that sees gods in many aspects of nature and propitiates them to help control and explain nature; typical of Mesopotamian religions.

Neanderthals

Species of genus Homo that disappeared at the end of the Paleolithic period.

archaic cultures

Hunting-and-gathering groups dispersed over the American continents by 9,000 BCE.

ziggurats

Massive towers usually associated with Mesopotamian temple complexes.

Chimu state

Regional Andean chiefdom that flourished from 800 to 1,465 CE; fell to Incas.

band

A level of social organization normally consisting of 20 to 30 people; nomadic hunters and gatherers; labor divided on a gender basis.

Babylonian empire

Unified all of Mesopotamia circa 1,800 BCE; collapsed due to foreign invasion circa 1,600 BCE

shifting cultivation

An intermediate form of ecological adaptation in which temporary forms of cultivation are carried out with little impact on the natural ecology; typical of rainforest cultivators.

agrarian revolution

Occured between 8,000 and 5,000 BCE; transition from hunting and gathering to sedentary agriculture.

ayllus

Households in Andean socities that recognized some form of kinship; traced descent from some common, sometimes mythical ancestor.

Mesopotamia

Literally "between the rivers"; the civilization that arose in the alluvial plain of the Tigris-Euphrates river valleys.

nomads

Cattle- and sheep-herding societies normally found on the fringes of civilized societies; commonly referred to as "barbarian" by civilized societies.

pharaoh

Title of kings of ancient Egypt.

Akhenaton

Egyptian pharaoh of the New Kingdom; attempted to establish a one-god religion, replacing the traditional Egyptian pantheon of gods.

ball games

Ritual elements of many American cultures; played on formal courts; religious significance required that losing teams pay penalty of forfeiture of goods or their lives.

Axum

Kingdom located in Ethiopian highlands; replaced Mero' in first century CE; received strong influence from Arabian peninsula; eventually converted to Christianity.

Bronze Age

From about 4,000 BCE, when bronze tools were first introduced in the Middle East, to about 1,500 BCE, when iron began to replace it.

patriarchal

Societies in which women defer to men; societies run by men and based on the assumption that men naturally directed political, economic, and cultural life.

Chichimecs

American hunting-and-gathering groups; largely responsible for the disruption of early civilizations in Mesoamerica.

Neolithic revolution

The succession of technological innovations and changes in human organization that led to development of agriculture, 8,500-3,500 BCE.

cuneiform

A form of writing developed by the Sumerians using a wedge-shaped stylus and clay tablets; emerged in the Middle East around 3500 BCE.

civilization

Societies distinguished by reliance on sedentary agriculture, ability to produce food surpluses, and existence of nonfarming elites, as well as merchant and manufacturing groups.

matrilocal

A culture in which young men upon marriage go to live with the brides of families.

Hittites

An Indo-European people who entered Mesopotamia circa 1,750 BCE; destroyed the Babylonian empire; swept away circa 1,200 BCE

Kush

An African state that developed along the upper reaches of the Nule circa 1,000 BCE; conquered Egypt and ruled it for several centuries.

Sumerians

People who migrated into Mesopotamia circa 4,000 BCE; created first civilization within region; organized area into city-states.

pastoralism

A nomadic agricultural lifestyle based on herding domesticated animals; tended to produce independent people capable of challenging sedentary agricultural societies.

savages

Societies engaged in either hunting and gathering for subsistence or in migratory cultivation; not as stratified or specialized as civilized and nomadic societies.

loess

Fine grained soil deposited in Ordos region in China bent by winds from central Asia; created fertile soil for sedentary agricultural communities.

Zhou

1029-258 BCE; Originally a vassal family of the Shang China; possibly Turkic in origin; overthrew Shang and established second historical Chinese dynasty.

Mandate of Heaven

The divine source for political legitimacy of Chinese rulers; established by Zhou to justify overthrow of Shang.

Shang

First Chinese dynasty for which archeological evidence exists; capital located in Ordos bend.

feudalism

The social organization created by exchanging grants of land or fiefs in return for formal oaths of allegiance and promises of loyal service; typical of Zhou dynasty and European Middle Ages; greater lords provided protection and aid to lesser lords in return for military service.

Wang Mang

Member of one of the powerful families related to the Han emperors through marriage; temporarily overthrew the Han between 9 and 23 CE.

Xia

China's first—possibly mythical—kingdom; no archeological sites have been connected to it; ruled by Yu.

Liu Bang

Founder of the Han dynasty in 202 BCE.

Wu

First of the Zhou to be recognized as king, 1122 BCE.

nuclear families

Consisted of husband and wife, their children, and perhaps a grandmother or orphaned cousin; typical of Chinese peasantry.

Han dynasty

202 BCE-220; Chinese dynasty that succeeded the Qin in 202 BCE; ruled for the next 400 years.

Ordos bulge

Located on the Huanghe River; region of fertile soil; site of Yangshao and Longshan cultures.

Yu

A possibly mythical Chinese ruler revered for the construction of an effective system of flood control along the Huanghe River valley; founder of Xia kingdom.

scholar-gentry

Chinese class created by the marital linkage of the local land-holding aristocracy with the office-holding shi; superseded shi as governors of China.

Xian

Along with the Loyang, capital of the Zhou dynasty.

Confucius

Also known as Kung Fuzi; major Chinese philosopher; born in 6th century BCE; author of Analects; philosophy based on need for restoration of order through advice of superior men to be found among the shi.

Mencius

Also known as Meng Ko; follower of Confucius; stressed consent of the common people.

Tian

Heaven; an abstract conception in early Chinese religion; possibly the combined spirits of all male ancestors; first appeared during Zhou dynasty.

Sunzi

A 4th century BCE advisor to Chinese monarch, who wrote the classic treatise The Art of War.

ideographic writing

Pictographic characters grouped together to create new concepts; typical of Chinese writing.

patrilineal

Family descent and inheritance traced through the male line.

Shi Huangdi

Founder of the brief Qin dynasty in 221 BCE.

Qin dynasty

221-202 BCE; Established in 221 BCE by Shi Huangdi at the end of the Warring States period following the decline of the Zhou dynasty; fell in 207 BCE.

Loyang

Along with Xian, capital of the Zhou dynasty.

oracles

Shamans or priests in Chinese society who foretold the future through interpretations of animal bones cracked by heat; inscriptions on bone led to Chinese writing.

Hsiung-nu

Also known as the Huns; horse nomads responsible for the disruption of Chinese, Gupta, and Roman civilizations.

secret societies

Chinese peasant organizations; provided financial support in hard times and physical protection in case of disputes with local aristocracy.

forbidden city

Imperial precinct within the capital cities of China; only imperial family, advisors, and household were permitted to enter.

Yellow River

Also known as the Huanghe; site of development of sedentary agriculture in China.

Laozi

Also known as Lao Tsu; major Chinese philosopher; recommended retreat from society into nature; individual should seek to become attuned with Dao.

Daoism

Philosophy associated with Laozi; stressed need for alignment with Dao or cosmic force.

extended families

Consisted of several generations, including the patriach's sons and grandsons with their wives and children; typical of Shang China elites.

vassal retainers

Members of former ruling families granted control over peasant and artisan populations of areas throughout Shang kingdom; indirectly exploited wealth of their territories.

Great Wall

Chinese defensive fortification intended to keep out the nomadic invaders from the north; initiated during Qin dynasty and reign of Shi Huangdi.

eunuchs

Castrated males used within households of Chinese emperors, usually to guard his concubines; became a political counterbalance to powerful marital relatives during Later Han.

Mauryas

Dynasty established in Indian subcontinent in 4th century BCE following invasion by Alexander the Great

Buddha

Creator of major Indian and Asian religion; born in the 6th century BCE as son of local ruler among Aryan tribes located near Himalayas; became an ascetic; found enlightenment under bo tree; taught that enlightenment could be achieved only by abandoning desires for earthly things

Vedas

Aryan hymns originally transmitted orally but written down in sacred books from the 6th century BCE

monsoons

Seasonal winds crossing Indian subcontinent and southeast Asia; during summer bring rains

Signet Ring of Rakshasa

One of great Sanskrit dramas produced during the Gupta Empire; dramatized authority of Brahmans

caste system

Rigid system of social classification first introduced into Indian subcontinent by Aryans

Skanda Gupta

Last of the able rulers of the Gupta dynasty; following his reign the empire dissolved under the pressure of nomadic invasions