AP World Summer Vocabulary

Absolutism

_____ is a political system where a monarch holds total, centralized power over a state, claiming authority through Divine Right. Some major _____ monarchs were: Louis XIV of France, Peter the Great of Russia, and Frederick the Great of Prussia.

Agriculture

_____ has been around since the Neolithic Revolution that occurred around 10,000 BCE, and since then, there have been major developments made to make it easier. _____ serves as a way for people to grow their own food, and it has been the foundation for human survival and economic stability. 

Aristocracy

_____ is the highest class in certain societies, especially those holding hereditary titles or offices, and it was used to enforce social order and governance. _____ could be found in Ancient Greece and Rome, Medieval and Early Modern Europe, and Imperial China.

Bias

A _____ is a specific point of view from which an author of a source is leaning towards one side of an argument instead of being neutral and not favoring one side over the other. _____ shape history by distorting how past events are recorded, selected, and interpreted, so when there is a bias present, it can affect primary sources.

Bureaucracy

_____ is a system of government in which most of the important decisions are made by state officials rather than by elected representatives, thus, it ensures that everyone is treated fairly. _____ is used in healthcare, educational institutions, and government agencies.

Chiefdom

A _____ is a regional political unit, or territory that is run under one permanent, central leader, or paramount chief. This leader holds power over multiple communities found on the territory. _____ are found historically and globally across Africa, Oceania, the Americas, Europe, and Asia.

City-States

_____ are small, independent countries that consist of a single city and the land around it. They each have their own government, and do not answer to a larger country. Places known to have _____ are: Europe and Southeast Asia, however, other places have had them throughout ancient and medieval history. They were important as they served as early building blocks of human civilization, and allowed for self-governance to surface.

Civilization

_____ refers to mostly complex human societies, but it can also mean a society that shares a set of cultural traits and skills. _____ created a structured framework where humans can come together and share their ideas, therefore, it helped build cumulative knowledge. _____ include: Mesopotamia (Modern Iraq), Ancient Egypt, the Indus Valley (Pakistan and India), Ancient China, and early centers in Peru and Mexico.

Commercial

_____ means anything that is related to business, trade, or making a profit. In history, even though commerce has been around for ages, it became big during the _____ Revolution which was a major economic shift driven by global trade, colonialism, and new financial practices around roughly 1450 to 1750.

Demography

_____ is the statistical study of human populations that focuses on tracking the changes in size, growth or decline, density, and distribution over time. The first time scientific _____ was used was in 1662 when John Graunt analyzed London’s birth and death records, however, even before then, ancient places held censuses to get a headcount of the amount of people living in a place at one time.

Divination

_____ is the practice of seeking hidden knowledge, future events, or the will of the gods through supernatural or ritualistic means. Some common methods that were used were: reading tarot cards, casting stones, reading tea leaves, or looking for crystal balls. People have been practicing divination for thousands of years.

Dynasty

A _____ is ruled by a sequence of rulers from the same family and has no set size. A single _____, or family, can rule over a kingdom or an empire for generations. Some _____ include: the Han _____ in China, the House of Tudor in England, the Ptolemaic _____ in Egypt, and the Medici family in Italy.

Empire

An _____ is run by an emperor or an empress and is often very large, made up of many conquered territories, nations, or smaller kingdoms. In an _____, a central power rules over many diverse groups of people. Some empires include: the Roman _____ in Europe, the British _____ globally, and the Mongol _____ in Asia.

Epidemic

An _____ is a sudden, fast spread of a disease in a specific town, city, or region that affects many people at the same time and goes well past normal expectations. A lot of times an _____ can be the start of a pandemic, just like The Colombian Exchange or the 2019 Coronavirus Outbreak.

Forager

A _____, or a hunter-gatherer, is a person who gets food by hunting animals, fishing, and gathering wild plants and insects rather than by farming. Hunter-Gatherers live a nomadic lifestyle, and are still in existence today thousands of years later.

Globalization

_____ is the process by which people, money, goods, information, and ideas become more connected and dependent on each other across national borders. _____ helps grow the world economy, lowers prices for everyday items, spreads new inventions quickly, and gives people access to products and cultures from all over the planet.

Indentured Servant

An _____ _____ was a poor worker who signed a legal contract agreeing to labor for an employer for a fixed term, usually four to seven years. In exchange, they received passage across the Atlantic Ocean, food, and shelter. _____ _____ were vital in history because they provided the primary labor force that built the early American colonies.

Interregional

_____ means activities, connections, or exchanges that happen between two or more different major geographic regions, like between East Asia and the Middle East, or Europe and West Africa, rather than just within a single local area. _____ links are important because they drive the exchange of ideas, technologies, and goods, transforming isolated societies into globally linked civilizations.

Kingdom

A _____ is ruled by a king or a queen and is usually smaller, typically dealing with one main group of people or culture. It is governed as a single, unified country. Some _____ include: the _____ of Prussia, the _____ of England, and Ancient Egypt as a whole.

Medieval

The _____ times, also referred to as the post-classical era and the Middle Ages, took place roughly from 500 to 1500 AD, and it was the bridge in European history between the fall of the Roman Empire, or the ancient world, and the Renaissance, or the early version of a modern world.

Merchant

A _____ is a person or a company that is involved in wholesale trade, especially one dealing with foreign countries or supplying merchandise to a particular trade. _____ were extremely useful as they allowed for goods to be sent around the world, and they even modernized financial systems throughout human history. It is said that _____ have been around since the Mesopotamia, Ancient Egypt, and the Indus Valley era.

Monotheism

_____ is the belief in only one god. Some religions who practice _____ include: Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism, Islam, and Zoroastrianism.

Nation

A _____ is a group of people who share a common geographic area, culture, language, history, or identity. Trade, war, and shifts in governments can cause a change in or to a nation. A _____ can be a term referring to a group of people from a certain state or territory, but it could also be a community created through religions or identities over the world.

Neolithic

The _____, or New Stone Age, took place from 10,000 BCE to 3,000 BCE, and marks the turning point when humans shifted from nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyles to settled agricultural societies. A big part of this time period was agriculture, domestication, and sedentary lifestyle. This change was highly beneficial because it allowed for a food surplus, specialization of labor, social hierarchy, patriarchy, and new technology.

Nobility

_____ refers to the hereditary upper class that holds high social status, land, and political influence. _____ kept peace in rural areas, ran local courts, and collected taxes when kings could not reach every town.

Nomad

A _____ lifestyle consists of a group of people who endlessly move around. Different types of _____ include: hunter-gatherers, pastoralists, traders, tinker groups, and digital or modern _____. Many older _____ groups use the environment around them wherever they are as a source of food.

Ocean

An _____ is a very large body of salt water. The _____ itself is broken down into five distinct _____: the Pacific _____, Atlantic _____, Indian _____, Southern _____, and the Arctic _____. _____ are very important as they serve as a major maritime network that allows communication and traded goods to go to different parts of the world.

Pandemic

_____ are outbreaks of diseases that affect a massive number of people and spread across a large region, whether that be multiple countries, continents, or even the entire world. Some key historical _____ include: The Black Plague, The Colombian Exchange, The 1918 Influenza _____, and the 2019 Coronavirus Outbreak.

Papacy

The _____ is the office and central governing institution of the Pope, the head of the Roman Catholic Church. It provides a single, visible center of unity, spiritual authority, and leadership for over a billion Roman Catholics worldwide.

Pastoral

A _____ lifestyle is a mobile lifestyle centered around herding domesticated animals like horses, sheep, goats, camels, and cattle across dry steppes, deserts, or sub-arctic lands where farming crops is nearly impossible.

Patriarchal

A _____ describes a social, political, and economic system where men hold primary power, dominant leadership roles, and control over property, while women face restricted autonomy, legal standing, and public influence. However, one thing to note is that the intensity of _____ can vary depending on the place. Some examples of _____ are: Ancient Greece, Ancient Mesopotamia, and Afghanistan today.

Periodization

_____ is the way historians divide the past into distinct, manageable blocks of time or eras based on major turning points. A lot of times, textbooks do this to organize global trends, make sense of massive shifts in human society, and anchor historical reasoning.

Polytheism

_____ is the belief in more than one god. Some religions who practice _____ include: Hinduism, Shinto, and Chinese Folk Religion and Taoism.

Prehistoric

_____ times was the long period of time before humans had written records of history. It lasted from the earliest use of stone tools around 2.5 million years ago until the creation of writing systems around 3600-3000 BCE.

Primary Source

A _____ _____ is an original, firsthand record or object created by someone who lived through or participated in a historical event. These sources are sometimes biased as it is told from a person’s point of view.

Revolution

A _____ is a fundamental and often violent shift in power, authority, or societal structures that replaces an old ruling order with a new political, economic, or ideological system. Some revolutions include: the American _____, the French _____, the Haitian _____, and the Latin American _____.

Rural

A _____ area is described as the countryside with open land, small towns, and a low number of people living close together. In _____ places, people work on farms to raise animals and grow crops. _____ areas are essential for food production and have been a necessity throughout human history.

Scribe

A _____ was a professional writer and record-keeper in early and pre-industrial civilizations. They underwent specialized, lengthy training to master complex writing systems like cuneiform and hieroglyphics. _____ were vital to state administration since they helped the government collect taxes, organize laws, and manage trade.

Secondary Source

A _____ _____ is a work created after a historical event by someone who did not experience a historical event firsthand. Typically textbooks and documentaries are considered a _____ _____. _____ _____ can also be biased depending on the author.

Serf

A _____ is an agricultural laborer legally bound to a lord’s property under the manorial system. _____ could not be bought or sold independently from the land, and they required the lord’s permission to marry, leave the estate, or change occupations.

Slave

A _____ is a human being treated as legal property and forced to perform labor without personal freedom or pay. Many slaves in history were of African ancestry from the Transatlantic _____ Trade. _____ were officially given emancipation, or freed, due the Emancipation Proclamation Act drawn up by Abraham Lincoln.

State

A _____ is an organized political community living under a single, unified government with defined territory and sovereignty. It holds the power to make laws, collect taxes, maintain a military or police force, and exert political control over a population. Examples of _____ are: The United _____ of America, Mexico, and Canada.

Steppes

_____ refer to vast, dry, and treeless grassland plains of Eurasia. It served as a historical highway for ancient trade and migration, birthed powerful equestrian cultures like the Mongol Empire, and provided vital grazing lands for nomadic pastoralism and created unique biodiversity today.