Vocabulary from Chapter 4 -- Krueger 2011
325743874 | Aryans | Indo-European pastoralists who moved into South Asia in 1500 BCE (about the same time as the collapse of the Indian River Valley Civilization | 0 | |
325743875 | Ashoka | The greatest Mauryan ruler (262-232 BCE) who gained all but the southern-most tip of India through conquest. Converted to and greatly promoted Buddhism | 1 | |
325743876 | Augustus Caesar | the grandnephew of Julius Caesar (63 BCE-14 CE) who restored order to Rome after a century of political chaos; he assumed the position of the first emperor of Rome in which he ruled as dictator, chief military general, and chief priest | 2 | |
325743877 | Caste System | traditional division of Hindu society into various categories; there are four main varnas; or classes:Brahmin, kshatriya, vaishya, and shudra; each class contains certain subgroups, resulting in more than three thousand categories. this governed society far more than any centralized body of government | 3 | |
325743878 | Civil Service Exam | The test that allows people to become part of the Bureaucracy in China, assuming of course, they pass. This creates a sense of meritocracy and makes China the first civilization to adopt human history | 4 | |
325873750 | Cyrus the Great | the most famous Persian Emperor (557-530 BCE) who controlled land and people across the northern Middle East and into North Western India | 5 | |
325873751 | Diocletian and Constantine | strong emperors towards the end of the Roman Empire who tried with some success to reverse the tide of its ultimate fall. Diocletian divided the Empire and Constantine moved the capital away from Rome and allowed freedom of worship for Christians | 6 | |
325873752 | Direct Democracy | a government based on the rule of the vote of the people (developed in Athens) | 7 | |
325877495 | Era of Warring States | (402-201 BCE) the time period between the Zhou and Qin dynasties in which regional rulers formed independent armies and reduced emperors to little more than figure-heads. this movement developed Confucian | 8 | |
325877496 | Gupta | decentralized Indian Empire that began in 320 CE and provided two centuries of political stability. This is South Asia's 'golden period'. it was overturned by invading Huns in around 535 CE | 9 | |
325877497 | Han Dynasty | (202 BCE - 220 CE) dynasty started by Lui Bang; a great and long-lasting rule, it discarded the harsh policies of the Qin dynasty and adopted Confucian principles; Han rulers chose officials who passed the civil service exams rather than birth; it was a time of prosperity | 10 | |
325877498 | Legalism | philosophy that gained ground during the Zhou and was dominant during the Qin Dynasties which was rooted in the belief that laws should replace morality and a ruler must provide discipline to maintain order | 11 | |
325877499 | Mandarin | Mandarin became the official state language of the Zhou Dynasty and as such was the most-used state language in the world. helped bring greater cultural unity to classical China | 12 | |
325877500 | Mandate of Heaven | Confucian ideology in which a good ruler was thought to have a divine right to rule, but if the ruler was a poor ruler, then the population had the right to revolt; because the gods no longer supported that ruler | 13 | |
325877501 | Maurya Dynsty | the first dynasty to unify much of the Indian subcontinent. Borrowed political examples from Persia and Alexander | 14 | |
325877502 | Qin Dynasty | (221-202 BCE) the Qin Dynasty was characterized by the centralization of state rule that resulted in the elimination of local and regional political competitors, through Legalist ideologies; ruthless | 15 | |
325877503 | Senate | the most important legislative body in the Roman Republic composed mainly of aristicrats | 16 | |
325743880 | Shi | educated bureaucrats who belonged to one of the three main social groups of ancient China | 17 | |
325743879 | Shi Huangdi | the first emperor of China; founded the Qin Dynasty, built the Great Wall, standardized road weights, established the main language, etc. | 18 | |
325887768 | Silk Roads | the most famous of the trading routes established by pastoral nomads connecting the European, Indian, and Chinese; transmitted goods and ideas among civilizations | 19 | |
325743881 | Yin and Yang | an expression of the Chinese belief in unity through balance. good and evil, light and darkness, sweet and sour, etc. | 20 |