World History Study Guide from 1648

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Term Definition
Age of Revolution 1763-1848: the time period during which nations rebelled against monarchies and attempted to replace them with republican/constitutional governments.
Bill of Rights in England 1689: passed by the British Parliament and agreed to by William and Mary, the English Bill of Rights stated that the monarchy could not deny citizens the right to petition, infringe on freedom of speech in Parliament, suspend a law created by Parliament, or impose taxes without Parliament's consent.
Joint Sovereigns Sovereigns who share power equally, as opposed to one person who holds all of the monarchial authority. An example is the joint sovereignty of William and Mary, who ruled England together from 1689 to 1694 (William ruled alone until 1702, after Mary died).
Estates of France the social rankings that led to the French Revolution: the First Estate was clergy, only 1% of population but in control of 10% of the land; the Second Estate was the nobility, only 2% of the population but in control of 20% of the land; and the Third Estate was the peasants, laborers and merchants, which was 97% of the population.
Simón Bolívar Known as "el Gran Libertador," or the Great Liberator, Bolívar fought for the independence of South America, including the countries of Venezuela, Ecuador, and Argentina. He was born in Caracas on July 24, 1783 and was educated in political philosophies in Europe during his youth. Bolívar died on December 17, 1830.
Winston Churchill Prime Minister of the UK during World War II (1940-1945), and again from 1951 to 1955. A fabulous writer and inspirational leader who gave the British people the willpower to resist Nazi Germany in 1940 and 1941, leading to the invasion of Italy (1943), the D-Day invasion of Normandy (1944) and ultimately victory over Hitler (1945).
European Union 1993-today: an economic and legal partnership among 28 nations in Europe. In 2002 it instituted a single currency, the euro. It has a common court system that can order a member nation to change its laws. Its roots began as a free trade area (1958), known as the Common Market, which became a single European market in the 1980s with extensive socialist-style regulation of business.
Reconquista (AD 722-1492) the Christian retaking of Spain and Portugal from Muslim control, after the Islamic takeover of the peninsula in 1711-18. This is the only territory taken back by Christianity from Islam.
Siege of Vienna 1529: Christian Europeans defeated the Muslim Ottoman Turks
9/11/1683, Gates of Vienna an alliance of Christian armies, led by the Polish King Jan III Sobieski, defeated a massive Muslim army; some say that the "9/11" attack in 2001 which destroyed the World Trade Center towers was timed for this anniversary
Dunkirk 1940: the harbor town, located on the northernmost tip of France, from where more than 300,000 British, French and Belgian soldiers were miraculously rescued by a ragtag assembly of boats, big and small, and taken back to England amid constant bombing by Germany during World War II; Winston Churchill called this success the "miracle of Dunkirk."
Decline of the Holy Roman Empire 1600s-1700s: weakened by the Ottoman Muslims, the Reformation, the Thirty Years' War, the growth of nation-states, and how the Italian and German cultures grew apart
Ferdinand and Isabella The King and Queen of Spain in the late 1400s, who expelled non-Christians (Muslims and Jews) from Spain and then funded Columbus's voyages
Christopher Columbus (1451-1506) a phenomenal navigator and Italian explorer who was funded by Spain to sail in four voyages across the Atlantic ocean in search for a trade route to India; he discovered the "New World" by reaching the Caribbean
Philip II (reigned 1556-1598) King of Spain and a descendant of Isabella and Ferdinand; his mighty navy the Spanish Armada was crushed by a quicker English fleet in 1588
England A nation-state based in the British isles off the western coast of Europe; it established the largest non-contiguous empire in history in the late 1800s but, due to its atheism and socialism, is much weaker than the U.S. today
mercantilism an economic system whereby a mother country (e.g., England) accumulated gold by exporting more goods than it imported, and by using her colonies (e.g., the American colonies) to ship it raw materials that could be manufactured in the mother country and exported for profit
Queen Elizabeth (1558-1603) was known as the "Virgin Queen" of England and her 45-year reign was the “Elizabethan Age”; the State of Virginia was named in her honor
King James Bible (1611) the magnificent English translation of the Bible, authorized by King James, which was so influential that it improved the English language itself
Seven Years’ War (1756-1763) France, Russia, Sweden, Poland and Austria were allied against Britain and Prussia, fighting over part of Eastern Europe. Britain and France also fought in North America (called the French & Indian War here). Britain won due to the genius of William Pitt ("Pittsburgh" is named after him), gaining Canada and India as a result; France was humiliated, leading to the French Revolution decades later.
American Revolution a revolution against the British in the American Colonies beginning in 1776 with the American Declaration of Independence, caused by over-taxation by England; Americans won with the help of the French; the Treaty of Paris (1783) resulted
George Washington (1732-1799) Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army; presided over Constitutional Convention to draft the Constitution; first President of the United States (1789-1797); voluntarily gave up power after two terms
Voltaire (1694-1778) a French philosopher, prominent during the Enlightenment, who favored absolute freedom, and his ideas led to the French Revolution; famous for defending a right of free speech even by people with whom he disagreed
capitalism the American system based on private ownership of property to give maximum incentives to people and businesses to be productive; capitalism is the opposite of socialism
Rasputin Russian peasant-turned-monk who helped Czar Nicholas II's son survive hemophilia, until he was murdered by rivals in 1916 (a year before the Communist Revolution)
Bernhard Riemann (1826-1866) an influential German mathematician who made lasting contributions to differential geometry and analysis, later used in physics
Constitution of the United States (1787) the oldest working constitution in the world, which established a masterful design for government based on limitations in power
Declaration of Independence (1776) an American statement of "inalienable" (God-given) rights, asserting a right of the people to break their "social contract" with a king when he violates those rights, such as the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness
Edmund Burke (1729-1797) a conservative Irish statesman in the British parliament who sided with the American colonies before the American Revolution, coined the phrase "salutary neglect" to support economic growth in the colonies, and criticized the misguided French Revolution while others were praising it
The Federalist Papers (1788) brilliant essays encouraging ratification of the U.S. Constitution, written mostly (and anonymously) by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) a leading German philosopher, Kant felt that behavior is moral only if it would work as a rule if everyone did it (e.g., littering is immoral for one person to do it, because it would be a disaster if everyone littered); Kant's book "A Critique of Pure Reason" criticized the use of pure reason to determine morality
Industrial Revolution technology-driven changes in society that began about 1760 in England and later in other countries, characterized chiefly by a shift from farming to factories and the use of power-driven machines, such as the steam engine
James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) the greatest physicist of the 1800s, Maxwell was a devout Christian from Scotland who developed the modern unified electromagnetic theory. The "maxwell", a unit of magnetic flux, was named in his honor.
Louis Pasteur (1822–95) the greatest chemist in history, this Frenchman was a devout Christian who founded microbiology, invented pasteurization, and developed vaccinations for anthrax, rabies, and chicken cholera.
steamboat a waterborne ship useful to the Industrial Revolution, which was powered by a steam engine with the steam produced by burning coal (or less often, wood); today boats are powered by diesel gasoline
economies of scale when increasing the size of a company enables it to lower its average costs due to improved efficiency, as big Wal-Mart stores do today. The Industrial Revolution benefited from economies of scale
Victor Hugo (1802-1885) one of the greatest Romanticist poets, he was a Frenchman who wrote the classics "Cromwell" (1827), "The Hunchback of Notre Dame of Paris" (1831) and "Les Miserables" (1862)
French Revolution began in 1789 by opening Bastille prison and freeing all its prisoners, and ended in 1794 with the killing of Robespierre.
Bastille Day (July 14, 1789) when French peasants invaded the huge Bastille prison in Paris, freeing the prisoners. This started the Great Fear, with riots breaking out every day and peasants burning wealthy homes
Marie Antoinette privileged wife of Louis XVI during the French Revolution who reportedly said to the peasants, "Let them eat cake!" upon hearing of the shortage of bread. She was killed too.
Reign of Terror terrifying chaos after the execution of Louis XVI when Maximilian Robespierre guillotined many people, until Robespierre died the same way (1794)
Napoleon (lived 1769-1821) Dictator of France after the French Revolution; signed peace treaties with major European enemies, created a successful system of laws known as the Napoleonic Code, and conquered much of continental Europe. He was ultimately defeated by British and Prussian armies at the Battle of Waterloo
United Kingdom the combination of "Great Britain" and "Northern Ireland." (Northern Ireland is on the island of Ireland, but is not part of the country of Ireland.)
Luddites a social movement in England that rioted and protested against the changes caused by the Industrial Revolution
Prussia a very militaristic nation-state in Europe, in the area where Germany is located today
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) the person who invented "utilitarianism", which abandons morality and instead looks to see if the benefits of something outweigh its costs. Under utilitarianism, punishing an innocent man is acceptable if it has greater benefits (such as discouraging crime).
Charles Darwin (1809-1882) English atheist who proposed the theory of evolution: that all species had evolved into complex forms of life over millions of years through the process of "natural selection," or "survival of the fittest"
Communism an oppressive system of government, beginning in Russia, which requires everyone to be equally poor and discourages people from working hard
Great War 1914-1918: later known as World War I, this was one of the deadliest wars in world history based on trench warfare; the Allies defeated the Central Powers and imposed terms of peace on Germany which were so unreasonable that they led to World War II
Entrenchment the first year-and-a-half of World War I (1914-15) during which there were terrible casualties without either side gaining the upper hand.
U-boat German submarines used to patrol the Atlantic in a terrifying manner and destroy British ships; the U-boats eventually sunk American ships too
Battle of Verdun (1916) longest battle of WWI with massive casualties and nothing gained by either side with nearly 1 million wounded or killed; began when Germans attacked the French city of Verdun
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870-1924) leader of the Communist Party who overthrew the Russian czars; Lenin led the violent Bolsheviks and then ruled the Soviet Union, imposing a system of Marxism-Leninism that remained until the 1990s; Lenin also ended Russia's support of the Allies in the war in 1918
Bolsheviks (after 1903) the more extreme Marxist group that caused a violent revolution, as opposed to the more peaceful Mensheviks who sought gradual change to communism
King Victor Emmanuel from 1861 to 1878, he was the king of Italy - its first king in more than 1000 years.
Il Duce "The Leader." Name used by the fascists to identify Mussolini from about 1920 to 1943
aggression by Italy in the 1930s Italy invaded and conquered Ethiopia in Africa in 1935-1936.
Mussolini founder of Italy’s Fascist Party, Mussolini emphasized the need to improve Italy’s economy and its military. In October 1922, the Fascists protested in Rome, causing the King to make Mussolini leader of Italy. He then made it illegal to strike, thinking this would make the economy bounce back. Later Mussolini was allied with Hitler during WWII, although Mussolini had a low opinion of Hitler.
aggression by Germany in the 1930s In 1936, Germany invaded the buffer zone separating Germany from France - the industrialized Rhineland; Germany annexed Austria in 1938 without much resistance, and on Sept. 1, 1939, Germany invaded and annexed western Poland by using tanks and air power to destroy the resistance.
Enigma a cipher (encryption) used by the Axis in WWII, thought to be unbreakable until a 27-year-old Polish mathematician cracked it in 1937 and shared it with the Allies (France and England, and then the United States). The Germans did not know that their secret code had been broken.
World War I (WWI) (1914-1918) also known as The Great War, the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary fought against the Entente of Britain, France and Russia (and later, the U.S.); the war ended with the economic collapse of the Central Powers in November 1918 after 4 years of brutal fighting and a successful blockade on Germany
World War II (WWII) began on Sept. 1, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland, and lasted until 1945 when the Allied powers defeated the Axis powers and forced them to surrender
Franklin Delano Roosevelt "FDR" was President during most of the Great Depression and WW II, when he wanted the U.S. to intervene to save Britain
The Holocaust Germany blamed Jews for its problems. In 1935 a law was passed to prevent Jews from holding government offices, and during WWII Germany established concentration camps that exterminated millions of Jews (and millions of Christians too). Poland was the location of the most Nazi concentration camps. Most of the victims of the Holocaust were Polish (both Jewish and Christian).
Manhattan Project (Dec. 6, 1941) one day before the attack at Pearl Harbor, American scientists began developing an atomic bomb
George Patton homeschooled, this American was the finest field general in WWII and the only one the Germans truly feared; he was better at blitzkrieg-style tank warfare than the Germans were. His aggressive style caused far more casualties in the enemy than suffered by his troops.
Big Bang 1927: a scientific theory developed by a Catholic priest, initially ridiculed before being accepted by many physicists, that the universe had a unique, sudden creation rather than having existed forever as other scientists claimed
Easter Rising (April 24-30, 1916) Irishmen seeking independence from Britain captured key locations in Dublin and proclaimed an Irish Republic; Britain suppressed this and executed its leaders
globalism the opposite of “nationalism”, “globalism” views the world as one political unit, as one massive village
Mahatma Gandhi spiritual Hindu leader who achieved independence for India from Britain in 1947 by emphasizing peaceful civil disobedience
GATT (1947) stands for “General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade,” in which western nations promoted free trade by first prohibiting increases in tariffs (taxes on goods sent between nations), and by later reducing the tariffs
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (1960) “OPEC” is a cartel (monopoly by a group) formed by Middle Eastern and a few other nations to keep the price of oil high by reducing competition. In 2007, OPEC controlled about 2/3rds of the total oil market, and keeps the price of gas expensive.
Pearl Harbor Dec. 7, 1941 Japanese launched a surprise attack on US navy fleet in Hawaii; Congress then declared war on Japan and entered WWII.
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution August 1964: in response to mysterious gunshots fired at an American ship in the Gulf of Tonkin near North Vietnam, and pressure from President Lyndon Johnson as he sought to be reelected, Congress authorized sending troops; Congress never formally declared war on North Vietnam, and this Resolution became the substitute for a formal declaration of war.
Arab-Israeli wars four major ones between 1948 and 1973 (in 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973)
intifada in general, "intifada" is a Muslim term that refers generally to an unorganized uprising, which can include violence; more specifically, "intifada" refers to a campaign by the Muslim PLO from 1987 to 1993 against Israelis.
Benjamin Netanyahu a conservative leader in Israel who has been its Prime Minister since 2009
Commonwealth of Independent States the successor to the Soviet Union; most of its nations (including Russia) joined, except for the Baltic republics and the nation of Georgia (no connection with the American state of Georgia)
John Paul II (reigned 1978-2005) the first Polish pope of the Catholic Church, who then opposed communism especially in his homeland of Poland, promising to return to Poland to fight against the Soviet Union if it invaded
Lech Walesa a leader against communism in Poland, who led his political party "Solidarity" to power once free elections were held in April 1989 as communism fell apart
Hungary attempted unsuccessfully to overthrow communism in 1956 (the Soviet Union invaded to suppress the revolt), but Hungarians eventually overthrew communism in October 1989
Czechoslovakia combination of diverse ethnic groups formed in 1919 out of the old Austria-Hungarian empire to promote Woodrow Wilson's "self-determination" principle, until Hitler invaded it in 1938; after WWII it was a communist-controlled nation until demonstrations forced its Communist Party leader to resign in November 1989. In 1993, the Czechoslovakia split along ethnic lines to form Slovakia and the Czech Republic
Nicolae Ceausescu communist dictator of Romania from 1965 to Christmas Day 1989; unlike all other communist dictators, Ceausescu was pro-life and he prohibited abortion. In the 1990s, many Americans went to Romania to adopt children.
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) (1980s) also known as “Star Wars,” Reagan proposed developing advanced technology to intercept and destroy fast-moving missiles that might be launched against the U.S.
9-11 (September 11, 2001) 19 Muslims, most from Saudi Arabia, hijacked American airplanes and flew one into each tower of the World Trade Center, which then collapsed, flew a third plane into the Pentagon, and a fourth crashed in Pennsylvania as the passengers attempted to retake control of the plane from the terrorists.
Arab Spring 2010-present: Muslims overthrowing governments in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, after which Islamic control was complete and persecution of Christians increased.
Modern Era two meanings: either since 1789 (The French Revolution), or since 1900

Honors terms

Term Definition
Standing army an Army in peacetime, and a sign of a nation's military strength
Emiliano Zapata Cowboy who helped lead the Mexican Revolution.
Henry Ford United States automobile manufacturer, and founder of Ford.
David Ben-Gurion 1948: first prime minister of Israel
Nationalsozialismus The political fascists in Germany. Nazi for short.
President Truman Vice-President who became president when Roosevelt died in early 1945. Ordered the dropping of the atom bomb on Japan. Caved into Joseph Stalin's demands for Stalin to take control of Eastern Europe.
Erwin Rommel Famous Nazi Field Marshall in Africa. Was aware of an attempt to assassinate Hitler, and because Rommel did not warn Hitler, Rommel was then forced to die himself.

See also

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