Download World History and Geography Study List

World History and Geography Study List
NATION DEVELOPMENT
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1. Nationalism/Patriotism - It is a spirit among people that began to emerge during the
Hundred Years’ War during the 15th century. It is the feeling of loyalty by people to
their country over all others. Their culture and interests is above all others.
2. Nation - It is a group of people in a geographic area who have the same strong
government and usually speak the same language, have the same religion, traditions
and ways of life.
3. Bourgeoisie - They were “people of the town.” They were people who gained wealth
through business rather than war or farming. They ranked higher than serfs but lower
than the nobility on the social scale. They were middle class.
4. Causes of Improved Government - They are the dislike of the bourgeoisies for the
lack of law and order during the later Middle Ages; citizens became unhappy with
feudal obligations and the many differing legal systems of nobles and Church; and
they desire wanted trade and commerce to be consistently safeguarded.
5. Nation Building Practices of Strong Kings - They are the ways kings extended their
powers and built nations. First the king gained power at the expense of the Church
and nobles. Then the king would collect taxes from the growing merchant class in
exchange for providing protection and at the same time got their support & more
independence from the nobles. As kings gained power, they strengthened their
governments and extended the stretch of their influence.
Video: “The Vikings: King Harold is Killed”
6. Harold II - He was the Earl of Wessex who was crowned King of England in 1066
after Edward the Confessor died in 1066. Two other rulers who said they had a
greater inheritance right challenged him for his throne. He defeated one and was
killed by the other.
7. Harold Hardraada - When he was a teenager he fought for Olaf and managed to
escape the defeat and find refuge in Russia. He fought as a mercenary soldier for the
Byzantine Empire before returning to Norway where he became king. In 1066 he
invaded England in his effort to claim the throne of that kingdom, but he was killed at
the Battle of Stamford Bridge and his army defeated.
8. William the Conqueror - He was the Duke of Normandy and a descendant of
Vikings. He also claimed the English throne in 1066. The Bayeux Tapestry records
his preparation of a 700-ship fleet and invasion of England. He defeated the AngloSaxon army at the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and became the King of England since
both his rivals were now dead.
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9. The Importance of William the Conqueror - It was what William did after he
conquered England. He centralized feudalism, making all the nobles his directs
vassals and giving them fiefs, he required all freemen to bear arms for the king so he
didn’t have to depend on his nobles’ armies, and he gained control over revenue from
the taxable wealth through his census and record keeping in the Domesday Book.
10. Henry II - He was one of the most important early kings of England. He founded the
Plantagenet dynasty. He set his goal of uniting all England under his rule and being
the source of justice and protection. He reformed the legal system to do this. His fight
with the Church and the murder of Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, over
this prevented his goal of unity from being achieved.
11. Common Law - It is the name given to England’s King Henry II’s royal law that was
applied equally to all people in England. It is law based on custom, court decisions
and is the basis of law used today in England, United States, etc.
12. Circuit Courts - They were the sending of judges on regular tours all over the
country. Henry II did this and his traveling judges made the law fairer by using the
royal law combined with local custom to improve the quality of judicial decisions.
These judges, being strangers, were less prone to favoritism and bribery. The king,
being the source of justice thus became more powerful.
13. Juries - They were of two types. The original type was where a group of men went
before a royal judge to accuse someone of breaking the law. They did not decide
guilt. The modern Grand Jury system comes from this practice. The other type was
where a group of men heard evidence during a trial and then decided guilt or
innocence.
14. King John - He was a Plantagenet and youngest son of Henry II and brother of
Richard I, the Lion-Hearted, who became king of England in 1199. He lost some
French duchies held since William the Conqueror. He disputed with Pope Innocent III
over who would be Archbishop of Canterbury and lost when the pope deposed him in
1212. He gave in and accepted his kingdom back from the Pope as a fief in 1213 and
had to pay annual tribute. He invaded France in 1214 and was defeated. Upon return
to England, in 1215, he was forced to sign the Magna Carta by his barons at
Runnymede. He died in 1216 while fighting his barons in his attempt to defeat the
Magna Carta. He was called John Lackland.
15. Magna Carta - It was the great charter that limited King John of England’s power
and protected the nobles’ feudal rights. Its historical importance is in three principles:
1) Even the King should obey the law, 2) Even the King can be forced to obey the
law, and 3) there is equal justice under the law. This document later led to additional
rights and freedoms for the English people.
16. Parliament - It was started as the great national council called by Edward I to
approve extra taxes. It was made up of representatives elected from around England,
great nobles and Churchmen. In time, the Church withdrew, the nobles became the
House of Lords and the elected representatives the House of Commons. It became a
lawmaking body over time as it held back money from the king until the king signed
demands that wrongs be corrected.
17. Wars of the Roses - They were thirty years of wars between the House of Lancaster
and the House of York over the English throne from 1455 to 1485. These wars ended
with the winning of the throne by Lancaster’s Henry Tudor, his marriage to a York
heiress and the beginning of the Tudor dynasty.
18. Robin Hood - He may have been real or maybe not. The legend about him has him
living in Sherwood Forest stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. His
archenemy is the sheriff of Nottingham. His time period is set in the years of the
Third Crusade when Richard the Lion-Hearted was in the Holy Land and John ruled
England.
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19. Louis the Fat or Louis VI - He was the first French Capetian king, 1108-1137, to
show he was stronger than the nobles. He gained control over his royal lands and put
down the barons around Paris who threatened his power. This started the expansion of
France toward becoming a nation. His grandson won some English lands in France
from King John.
20. Hundred Years’ War - It was the English attempt to gain control of France from
1337 to 1453. The English in 1346 won at Crecy, then at Calais in 1347 and later in
1415 at Agincourt to retake Normandy. From 1429 to 1431 the English suffered
reversals at the hands of Joan of Arc. After 1431 the English were fighting a lost
cause and by 1453 they only held Calais.
21. Flanders - It was the region in what is now France, Belgium and the Netherlands
which was the center of the northern trade system. It was also an important market for
English wool. The English attempt to control this region plus the English attempt to
claim the throne of France after the last Captain king died caused the Hundred Years’
War to start in 1337.
22. Battle of Crecy - It is a famous battle of the Hundred Years’ War. It was fought in
August 1346. The use of the new longbow was a vital help to the English for heir
victory over the French Knights. The French were mired in the mud and killed by the
thousands by the English longbow.
23. Battle of Agincourt - It was a famous battle of the Hundred Year’s War that
occurred in 1415 in Flanders, which allowed the English King Henry V to take back
Normandy (lost by King John) from the French. The French were mired in the mud
and killed by the thousands by the English longbow.
24. Joan of Arc - She was a simple country girl who was a Shepherd. She followed her
voices to the Dauphin and was given the right to lead an army to save Orleans, which
she did. Before she could drive the English out of France, she was captured and tried
as a witch and burned at the stake. Her love for France and her courage helped France
develop a national spirit.
25. Orleans - It was a French city besieged by the English. A French country girl without
military training led an army and succeeded in breaking the siege and saving this city
for France in May 1429.
26. Charles VII - He was known as the Dauphin. He became King of France because a
country girl who had visions confirmed he had the right to rule. He was crowned
King of France in July 1429.
27. Rouen - It was the French city where Joan of Arc was burned alive at the stake, after
being convicted of witchcraft and heresy. This happened in 1430. It is located on the
Seine River northwest of Paris.
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28. Iberian Peninsula - It is the landform south of the Pyrenees Mountains in Europe. It
is here the Visigoths settled during the German invasion of the Roman Empire. Their
kingdom lasted until 711 when the Moors conquered them. This landform had the
Muslim kingdom of Cordova holding much of it during the Middle Ages and today
the modern nations of Spain and Portugal.
29. Alphonso I or Alfonso I - His father was the French knight Henry of Burgundy who
helped the king of Leon and Castile reconquer Toledo from the Moors in 1085. The
father was given Portugal as a fief. He succeeded his father as count of Portugal. In
1128, he seized power from his mother who had been regent since the year of his
birth, 1112. He fought Leon/Castle for ten years and succeeded in making Portugal an
independent kingdom in 1139. He captured Lisbon in 1147. In 1171 and 1184 he won
big victories over the Moors.
30. Reconquista - It was a war lasting over 700 years. The Christians of the Iberian
Peninsula fought to regain the peninsula after the Muslims conquered most of it in
711. The Christians under Ferdinand and Isabella conquered Granada in 1492. Spain
won the war and the Moors were driven out.
31. Inquisition - It was the medieval procedure for discovering and punishing heretics.
Ferdinand and Isabella revived it in their quest for religious conformity that they
thought necessary for national unity. After torture they burned thousands at the stake
and in 1492 expelled all Spanish Jews. These actions enhanced the power of the
Spanish crown, but caused many talented and educated people to flee the land of
persecution.
32. Otto the Great - He became one of the strongest kings of Germany. He first defeated
the Magyars/Hungarians, in 955, then moved eastward into Slavic lands. (Modern
Germany is 60% former Slav territory.) He made a mistake that had effects for
centuries. Instead of making himself supreme over all nobles in Germany, he married
the widow of the former Italian king and declared himself king of Italy. In 962, he
became Holy Roman Emperor. This “empire” stayed a loose collection of nations and
was for centuries and expensive distraction causing both Germany and Italy to stay a
collection of free cities and tiny feudal states.
33. Holy Roman Empire - It was created by Charlemagne and firmly re-established by
Otto the Great in 962 and eventually ended about 1000 years later in 1918. It was a
loose organization of nations ruled by German kings for much of the time. A French
writer wrote that its three-word name didn’t fit what this empire was really like.