Focus Questions for Unit 3, Second Semester Post-Classical Period: 500 CE – 1450 CE Chapters 8-13 plus the Americas

Compelling Unit III Questions: How was order achieved after the fall of Classical Civilizations? To what extent were the old ways

restored, or new ways innovated?

What CHANGED and why?? What stayed the same and why? Consider the role of religions of salvation, the role of the masses and the rulers, and whether gender or class systems changed…and

why. What was the role of new technologies and learning in this period? Where were these the most

important, and why?

UNIT INTRODUCTION: An Age of Accelerating Connections, 500-1500 Q: Why this Periodization? Read the Introduction and Time Line for Unit 3, pages 324-331. What changed and what stayed the same from the classical period to the end of this period? What are the BIG IDEAS?

Chapter 11: Worlds of Islam: Afro-Eurasian Connections, 600 - 1500

Over Arching Questions: How did so many traditional societies and family groups unite and become a leading world power in such a short time? Specifically what fueled the rise of this impressive culture to the status of a Golden Age?

Directions: Read the Chapter and the Documents, pp. 502-511. There may be a Socratic Circle or a class discussion over the documents. We will view part of the video, “Inside Islam,” and you will be responsible for the information in the video. Fill out a PERSIART-ME chart and a Belief System chart. Read your Princeton Guide and look for information that we did not discuss in class, and was not in your text- it could be on the AP Exam. Prepare for a Quiz on Terms, Names, Concepts in Chapter 11.

Document Questions:

1. Defining differences within Islam: In what different ways do the various voices of Islam represented in these documents understand and express the common religious tradition of which they are all a part? What

grounds for debate or controversy can you identify with or among them? (Compare & Contrast)

2. Comparing religious traditions: How would you compare Islamic religious ideas and practices with those of other traditions such as Hinduism, Buddhism, and Christianity? (Compare & Contrast)

3. Considering gender and Islam: How do these documents represent the roles of men and women in Islamic

society? Pay particular attention to differences in emphasis. (Comparison, POV)

4. Seeking additional sources: Notice that all of these documents derive from literate elites, and each suggests or prescribes appropriate behavior. What additional documents would you need if you were to assess the impact of these prescriptions on the lives of ordinary people? What specific questions might you want to

pose to such a document? (POV, missing voice, context)

Important Names & Terms: Quran Pillars of Islam sakk Delhi Sultanate

Umma Umayyad Caliphate Ibn Battuta Ottoman Empire Ulama Abbasid Caliphate Al-Andaluz Guru Kabir & Nanak Hijra Al-Ghazali Harun al Rashid cotton, sugarcane… Sharia Sikhism Sonni Ali Omar Khayyam Jizya Timbuktu Seal of the Prophets Cordoba

Bedouin “Muslim” People of the Book mozarabs Mecca Islam Social Conversion Reconquista, 1220 -1492

Kaaba ghazi Sunni / Shia / Sufi Ferdinand & Isabella Muhammad jihad Damascus / Baghdad shaykh

Prophet Medina Persian miniatures impact of paper technology Hajj imam sultan / sultanate moors

Sharia mullah Mansa Musa Ottoman Empire Timbuktu madrassa polymath scholar Dar al Islam

Chapter 11 Focus Questions:

1. How was the first century of Islamic history different than the early history of Christianity and Buddhism?

2. What historical similarities and differences characterized the religious outlooks of these three great world religions?

3. Why was Islam so tremendously successful militarily and politically in its early centuries?

4. To what extent might Islamic civilization be described as cosmopolitan, international, or global during this period? Are there other societies that could be similarly characterized during this period?

5. “Islam was simultaneously about a single world of shared meaning and interaction, and a series of separate and distinct communities, often in conflict with one another.” What evidence could you provide to

support both sides of this argument?

6. What changes did Islamic expansion generate in those societies that encountered it, and how was Islam itself transformed by those encounters? In other words, how did change happen? Is there anything that did NOT change in the area touched by Islam during this period?

7. What were the most important contributions/innovations to world history that came from this society during this period?

Chapter 10: The Worlds of European Christendom- Connected and Divided, 500-1300 -Read the Chapter. -DO NOT READ the DOCUMENTS and VISUAL SOURCES in the book, but instead read the document handout. SOAPSTone and answer the questions for the Socratic Circle/HW. -Add the Byzantine Empire and Western Europe to PERSIART-ME charts. -Look at the picture at the beginning of the chapter – what does it say about this period in European history?

Chapter 10 Terms: Byzantine Empire Kievan Rus Charlemagne Crusades, 1095

Constantinople Prince Vladimir of Kiev Holy Roman Empire Aristotelian Reason Justinian Sts. Cyril & Methodius Pope Urban Classical Greek learning Caesaropapism Cyrillic Alphabet Roman Catholic Church System of Competing States icon / iconoclasm St. Basil’s Church Western Christendom Renaissance Eastern Orthodox Onion Dome European Cities Dark Ages / Medieval

syncretism heresy / heretic Great Schism, 1054 celibacy monasticism bezant Germanic Barbarians Feudalism/ Manorialism

pagan lord, vassal, serf Investiture Conflict Viking invasions Guilds Hanseatic League Champagne Fairs women’s work

pillar saints Hildegard of Bingen Beguines, anchoress, nuns Benedict & Scholastica chivalry Chrystallized sugar “City Air Makes You Free” City Charters

Three Estates Universities Faith and Reason Gothic Cathedral

Focus Questions 1. How and WHY did the histories of the Byzantine Empire and Western Europe differ during the Post Classical Period (also called the Era of Third-Wave Civilizations)? How did Eastern and Western Europe

“get along” during this period?

2. How does the history of the Christian world compare with the history of the Tang / Song dynasties in China during this period?

3. Comparison: How did the spread of Christianity to China differ from its introduction to Western Europe?

How might you describe and explain the very different outcomes of those two processes?

Chapter 12: Pastoral Peoples on the Global Stage: The Mongol Moment, 1200 – 1500 - Read the chapter. Yep. - Read the Documents and Visual Sources, and be prepared for class discussion.

- Read my online Power Point on pastoral peoples in general.

Chapter 12 Terms: Pastoralism Temujin / Chenggis Khan Khoumiss Nomad

Xiongnu Yuan Dynasty of China Anda Black Death Kubilai Khan Kipchak Khanate/ Golden Horde Bubonic Plague Turks Masai Primary Herding Animals Yurt age grade/age set Karakorum “Mongols of the Seas” “Fictive kinship”

Focus Questions 1. Familiarize yourself with the map of the Pax Mongolica. How far west and east, north and south did they rule? What stopped them from expanding farther in each direction? 2. Be familiar with the Circuit of World Trade map on page 543. What does it mean? Who traded with whom? Which cultures were affected by which others? What items would you expect to have been traded in each “circuit?” 3. What accounts for the often negative attitudes of settled societies toward the pastoral peoples living on their borders during this period? Why have historians often neglected pastoral peoples’ role in world

history up to now?

4. In what ways did the Mongol Empire resemble other empires, and in what ways did it differ from them?

Why did it last a relatively short time?

5. How did Mongol rule affect the Islamic world, Russia, China, and Europe?

6. How would you define both the immediate and the long-term significance of the Mongols to world history? Document Questions: 1. Assessing sources: What are the strengths and limitations of these documents for understanding the Mongols? What exaggerations, biases, or misunderstanding can you identify? What information seems credible and what should be viewed more skeptically?

2. Characterizing the Mongols: How do your own values affect your understanding of the Mongol

moment? Support the argument t that the Mongols were not just destructive barbarians. Now support the opposite argument.

3. Considering self-perception and practice: Describe the core values of Mongol culture. How were those values undermined or eroded as that empire took shape?

Visuals Questions: 1. Assessing motives: Do you think that the artists who created these visuals were trying to reinforce traditional Christian teachings or to challenge them? What was their motivation, do you think?

2. Using Art as evidence: What do these sources tell you about the impact of and responses to the plague in

14th & 15th century Western Europe?

3. Connecting past & present: Considering the various ways that people sought to avert, cope with, or

explain the plague in these visual sources, what parallels can you identify to the human responses to crises or catastrophes in more recent centuries or in our own time?

Chapter 13: The Worlds of the Fifteenth Century - Read the chapter, except for pages 588-594 about the Americas. - Do Renaissance Project if not done yet. Read Documents, but not Visuals.

- Put together your PERSIART-ME charts for Western Europe, Islamic World (Ottomans, Safavids, Mughals, Songhay) .

Chapter 13 Terms: Paleolithic persistence Benin, Igbo Mughal Empire Safavid Empire Ming dynasty of China Yongle Encyclopedia Timbuktu Ottoman Empire European Renaissance Timur Songhay Empire Hundred Years’ War Constantinople / Istanbul, 1453 Zheng He Sonni Ali Malacca (p. 588) Treasure Junk / Dhow / Caravel/ Middle Kingdom Holy Roman Empire Italian City States

Galleon Humanism

Maps - Familiarize yourself with the map on page 576 – Asian Empires and the Route of Zheng He. - Familiarize yourself with the map on page 596 – Religion and Commerce in AfroEurAsia in 15th Century. - Familiarize yourself with the World Population Growth Chart, 1000 – 2000. Wow. Big Picture Questions, for general class discussion p. 600:

1. What if the Chinese had NOT ended their maritime voyages in 1433. How might the subsequent development of world history have been different? What value is there in asking “what if” questions?

2. How does this chapter distinguish among the various kinds of societies that comprised the world of the 15th

century? How does it categorize them? What other ways of categorizing the world’s peoples might work as well, or even better?

3. Continuity and Change: What would surprise a knowledgeable observer from 500 CE, about the world in the 1400’s? What early features endured that he might still recognize? 4. What predictions about the future might a global traveler of the 15th century reasonably have made? To

what extent would it depend on precisely when and where those predictions were made?

The Americas on the Eve of… Destruction? - Read about the indigenous peoples of the Americas in Chapters 7 and 8. - Read about the indigenous peoples in the Americas in the Princeton Guide. - Put together PERSIART-ME charts for the Maya, Aztec, and Inca - With your group, you will create a Venn Diagram showing the similarities and differences between

these three civilizations.

Socratic Circle: Visual Sources for Chapter 7, pp. 316-323 1. Considering Art as Evidence: What can you learn from these visual sources about the values,

preoccupations, and outlook of the Maya elite? What are the strengths and limitations of art as a source of evidence? What other kinds of evidence would you want to discover to further your understanding of the

Maya elite? 2. Assessing Gender Roles: In what ways are women and men depicted in these visual sources? What might this suggest about their respective roles in the elite circles of Maya society?

3. Making comparisons: How might you compare the life of the Maya elite depicted with that of the Roman elite of Pompeii on pages 272-79?

4. Considering the values of the historian: What feelings or judgments do these visual sources evoke in you?

Which of your values might get in the way of a sympathetic understanding of the Maya elite?

Create Your Own Essay Assignment: Generalizations about civilizations in the Americas: - Your group will be assigned a PERSIART-ME theme, and you are to create a Compare and Contrast

essay on that theme, and answer it.