Ap World vocab 2.1-2.3

Caravans

A group of merchants and their pack animals, such as camels, traveling together across vast and often treacherous terrains like deserts to ensure safety and efficiency during long-distance trade.

Camel saddles

A specialized riding apparatus for camels that, through its design and features, significantly improved rider comfort, stability, and cargo capacity, thereby facilitating long-distance trade and cultural exchange across harsh desert environments like the Trans-Saharan trade routes.

Magnetic compass

A navigational instrument that uses a magnetized needle to align with Earth's magnetic poles, indicating direction and aiding in sea navigation.

Rudder

A steering device, usually a hinged vertical blade attached to the stern of a ship, is used for controlling the vessel. Allows for greater maneuverability/control.

Junk Ship

A type of ancient Chinese sailing ship known for its flat-bottomed design, multiple masts with square sails, and sturdy, partitioned hull.

Kashgar

A crucial Silk Road city located in western China, where northern and southern routes converged, serving as a vital trading hub for goods, cultural exchange, and information. Travelers on the Silk Roads depended on this city for its abundance of food/water.

• A crucial oasis city in Western China, famous as a major, diverse trading hub where the northern and southern Silk Roads converged, connecting China with Central Asia, India, and Persia; it served as a vital stop for rest, resupply, and cultural exchange.

Samarkand

A major, ancient city in modern-day Uzbekistan that served as a crucial Silk Road trading hub, facilitating cultural exchange and the spread of ideas, religions, and technologies between the East and West. Known for its wealth, centers of Islamic learning, and architecture.

• Crucial Central Asian city (modern Uzbekistan) known as a major Silk Road oasis hub, flourishing under the Timurid Empire as a wealthy capital for trade, culture, Islamic art (like the Registan), and scholarship, showcasing the exchange between East and West before and during the Age of Exploration

Money Economy

An economic system where a standardized currency/token is used as a medium of exchange for goods and services, rather than bartering.

Flying cash

An early Chinese system of paper credit/money transfer, which allowed merchants to deposit funds in one location and withdraw them elsewhere.

Diffusion

The spread of cultural beliefs, ideas, technologies, languages, and other practices from one group or society to another.

Hanseatic league

A powerful commercial and defensive alliance of merchant guilds and towns in Northern Europe that existed from the 12th to the 17th centuries. Controlling trade in the North and Baltic Seas, member cities of the league were able to drive out pirates and monopolize trade in goods.

Pastoral nomadism

Groups that depend on herding domesticated animals for their livelihood, moving their animals seasonally to find fresh pasture and water.

Gobi Desert

A vast, arid region located in northern China and southern Mongolia, known for its extreme temperature variations and unique landscape.

Stirrup

A device attached to a saddle that allows a rider to secure their feet, providing stability and balance while riding a horse.

Khan

A title for a Mongol ruler or the leader of a Khanate.

Siege Weapons/Cannon

Specialized large machines or devices, such as portable towers, catapults, and cannons, used to attack and breach fortified structures, such as castles and walled cities, during siege warfare.

Pax Mongolica

The period of relative peace and stability across Eurasia during the 13th and 14th centuries under the rule of the Mongol Empire. This "Mongol Peace" facilitated unprecedented trade, cultural exchange, and communication along the revitalized Silk Roads and other routes.

Yuan Dynasty

The first foreign-ruled dynasty of China, established by Mongol leader Kublai Khan in 1271 and lasting until 1368.

ll-Khanate

A Mongol state established in the 13th century by Hulegu Khan that ruled over Persia and parts of the Middle East, emerging from the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire. Fostered a blend of Mongol and Persian cultures, eventually seeing its rulers convert to Islam.

Golden Horde

One of the four major Khanates of the Mongol Empire, established by Batu Khan. Centered in Central Asia, it ruled over much of modern-day Russia and Eastern Europe. Conquered small Russian kingdoms and forced them to pay tributes. Destroyed the capital city of Kiev.

While Lotus Society

Secret religious society dedicated to the overthrow of the Yuan dynasty in China; typical of peasant resistance to Mongol rule.

A significant Chinese secret religious and political organization that emerged during the late Song Dynasty and played a key role in peasant resistance, notably against the Mongol Yuan Dynasty and later in the White Lotus Rebellion of the Qing Dynasty

Mongol Yoke

The period of ruthless Mongol rule over the Slavs, particularly the various principalities that would later become Russia. The period of Mongol domination over the Rus' principalities (the precursor to modern Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus) from the 13th to the 15th century

Spice Islands

Modern-day Malaysia and Indonesia became known as the Spice Islands because of the fragrant nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, and cardamom they exported.

Monsoons

A seasonal reversal of prevailing winds, most notably in the Indian Ocean region, that causes distinct wet and dry seasons. Drove maritime trade networks like the Indian Ocean trade, facilitating cultural diffusion as merchants and ideas traveled with the winds.

Diasporic communities

Groups of people who have spread or been dispersed from their homeland to other regions while maintaining connections to their culture and identity, often forming distinct communities in their new locations.

• Groups of people who have dispersed from their original homeland to different parts of the world, but who maintain a strong cultural, social, or political connection to that homeland, often due to migration from conflict, trade, or economic opportunity, creating vibrant cultural exchanges and unique hybrid identities

Lateen sails

A triangular sail that is mounted at an angle on a mast, allowing ships to sail efficiently against the wind. Triangular shape could catch winds coming from many different directions.

Stern rudder

A steering device mounted at the rear (stern) of a ship, providing enhanced control and maneuverability. Chinese sailors during the classical period invented this.

Astrolabe

An ancient astronomical instrument used to determine latitude, time, and the position of celestial bodies like the Sun and stars. Improved by Muslim navigators in the 12th century.

Malacca/Melaka

Refers to the Malacca Sultanate, a major maritime trading empire and commercial hub in Southeast Asia that flourished from the 15th-16th centuries. Its strategic location on the Strait of Malacca allowed it to control important trade routes, making it a vital center for the exchange of goods, culture, and Islam.

Calicut

A bustling port city for merchants in search of spices from southern India. Foreign merchants from Arabia and China met here to exchange goods from the west and east.

A major port city on India's Malabar Coast known for its central role in the Indian Ocean trade network, especially for its abundant spices like pepper

Indian Ocean slave trade

A centuries-long forced migration of people, primarily from East Africa, across the Indian Ocean to the Middle East, India, and Southeast Asia.

• A centuries-long trade route that moved enslaved people from East Africa to the Middle East, India, and Southeast Asia, primarily for domestic work, concubinage, and military roles, often involving a higher ratio of women and children compared to the Atlantic trade