1. ANCIENT AND CLASSICAL PERIOD IN WORLD HISTORY: FROM THE DAWN OF TIME TO 600 C.E.

2. CONTENT

3. HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY TO KNOW
Historic Regions
All AP Regions
Mesopotamia, Mesoamerica
Sudanic Africa (West African Sahel)
Historic States to Know
River Valley Civilizations
Amer-Indian geographic hearths
Classical Empires
Locations of world religions
Internal vs. External migration
Migration, Urbanization
Immigration
Movement in History
Original spread of humans
Indo-European
Bantu
Germanic and Viking
Spread of world religions
Polynesian

4. A.P. GEOGRAPHIC REGIONS

5. MODERN NATIONS TO KNOW

6. THEMES THEMES (P.E.R.S.I.A.N., S.C.R.I.P.T.E.D.) OTHER
Social, Gender Structures including Labor Systems
Cultural and Intellectual Structures
Religious Structures
Interactions: War, Diplomacy, Trade
Political Culture, Political Organization, State Structures,
Technology
Economics
Demography (geography) and Environment
OTHER
Change and Continuity over Time
Geography: Local and regional focus

7. THE ANCIENT AND CLASSICAL PERIOD
PERIODIZATION
What themes set a period apart?
When did it begin, when did it end?
Nature and causes of change
Breaks and continuity within a time period
1,000,000 BCE TO 600 CE
Prehistoric: 1 million to 4500 BCE or Stone age
Ancient: 4500 to 1000 BCE or Bronze Age
Classical: 1000 BCE to 600 CE or Iron Age
Breaks and Continuity within Period
Prehistoric: Rise of Humans, Hunter Gatherers
Ancient: Sedentary culture, domestications
Classical: Use of Iron

8. THE FIVE THEMES Relative Location Place Human Environment Interaction
Know relative locations
Know locations of major states, cultures
Place
Physical
Know the major features of physical geography
Human
Know the cultural characteristics of states
Human Environment Interaction
Movement
History is the result of movement
Region
All history is regional until 1450 CE

9. HUMAN ENVIRONMENT INTERACTION
PRE-SEDENTARY TIMES: ADAPT OR DIE
Climates diverse, man’s adaptations diverse
Man arose in Africa, spread out to other continents
Harshest climates around deserts, desert like conditions
Environment often forced man to change
As civilization advances, man begins to change surroundings
Hunter-gather nature
Slash and burn was the transition to sedentary agriculture
AGRICULTURAL SOCIETIES
Domestications
Farming
Herding
Sedentary civilization
PASTORAL SOCIETIES
Nomads and their flocks
Relationship to agricultural societies
DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGES WITH RISE OF CIVILIZATIONS
DEMOGRAPHIC STRESS
Overfarming and overhunting, deforestation, agriculture replaces plants

10. LOCATION: EARLY GEOGRAPHIC SETTING
PRE-HISTORIC
The whole world in all settings
The first towns, cities arose in marginal zones
Some building materials
Some foods, resources, marginal water, and protection
ANCIENT RIVER VALLEY CIVILIZATIONS (HEARTHS)
Mesopotamia
Sumer
Assyria and Babylon
Nile River
Egyptian Kingdoms
Kush-Meroe
Indus River
Harrappan, Mohenjo Daro
Aryans
Yellow River
Xia
Shang

11. LOCATION: LATER GEOGRAPHIC SETTING CLASSICAL
MEDITERRANEAN
Phoenicians, Jews, Persians
Greeks: Hellenes, Hellenistic Age
Romans: Republic and Empire
SOUTH ASIA
Persians and Greeks
Mauryans
Guptans
EAST ASIA
Zhou,
Qin, Han
CENTRAL ASIANS
OTHERS
Ghana, Axum-Ethiopia
Mayans, Toltecs, Aztecs
Incas and predecessors

12. EARLY POLITICAL STRUCTURES
Paleolithic Structure
Small bands, generalized social equality
Led by best hunters, male or female
Neolithic
Sedentary villages
Village Councils, Elders, some hereditary chiefs
Much more patriarchal
Early Cities
Often city states
Ceremonial Centers: Plazas, Temples
Centralized rule of priests, kings, elite class
Class structure usually based on land ownership
Hereditary positions become common

13. CHANGE OVER TIME STATE STRUCTURES
Small city states
Sumer, Indus, Xia
Phoenicians, Greeks
Olmecs, Mixtec, Zapotecs, Mayans
Small Regional State
Shang
Babylonia, Israel
Ghana, Kush, Axum
Early Theocratic Empires
Egyptian Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom
Toltecs
Akkad
Shang, Zhou
Funan (SE Asia)

14. EARLY CULTURE PALEOLITHIC CULTURE TOOL MAKING CULTURE
Language, Religion
Traditions and Institutions
Occupations and Past-times
Simple artifacts, art (cave paints, totems, jewelry)
TOOL MAKING CULTURE
Hunter Gathers had tools, only primitive
Neolithic technology become complex, varies
NEOLITHIC CULTURE
Social Revolution: hierarchy, gender relations
Technological Revolution: pottery, advanced tools, irrigation
NATURE OF CIVILIZATION
Writing is at the center of a cultural change
Complex culture based on living in a city
People packed more closely together
Social mores reflect this change
Artisans, toolmakers have great influence
SOPHISTICATION: Increased over time

15. SOCIAL HIERARCHY Patriarchal Social Class Differentiation
Increasingly so over time
Social Class Differentiation
Superior vs. Inferior
Increasingly classes defined over time
Caste Systems
If classes become rigid, it is a caste system
Slavery
Common since dawn of history in all cultures
Rigidity depended on culture
Serfdom

16. CHANGE OVER TIME EARLY SOCIAL
PALEOLITHIC: HUNTER GATHERER
Gender equality, work equality
Short life, Limited survival, foods
Small groups, bands led by elders
Religion: animist, afterlife
Extended family
NEOLITHIC: SETTLED AGRICULTURE, DOMESTICATIONS
Domestication of plants and animals
Shifting Agriculture and Migratory Farmers
Nomadic Pastoralism
Patriarchal society, patrilineal descent ; gender differences in work, farming
ANCIENT: VILLAGE TO CIVILIZATION
Sedentary life led to rise of social classes
Social differences, gender differences, Specialized occupations
Rise of inequalities; rise of aristocrats, kings, priests; unfree labor inc. slavery, serfs
Villages and a few cities
Nuclear Family
CLASSICAL
Continuation of Ancient although trends heightened
Classes often become rigid, rise of warriors, war leaders; castes
Aristocracy, artisan, intellectual classes
Gender differences pronounced and often codified in law

17. CHANGE OVER TIME RELIGIONS
UNIVERSALIZING vs. ETHNIC RELIGIONS
MAJOR FEATURES OF EACH, WHERE ARE RELIGIONS LOCATED
OVERTIME:
RISE OF PERMANENT RELIGIOUS CASTE, MORAL CODES INCLUDING SOME CASTING
ANIMISM/SHAMANISM TO GENERALIZED ANTRHOPOMORPHISM T0 POLYHEISM
PHILOSOPHIES AND MONOTHEISMS DEVELOP AT END OF PERIOD
EARLY RELIGIONS
ANIMISM, SHAMANISM
ANTHROPOMORPHIC POLYTHEISM
ELABORATED POLYTHEISM WITH PRIESTS, RITUAL, DOGMA
HINDUISM
SHINTO
ETHICAL PHILOSOPHIES AND RELIGIONS BLEND
CHINESE RELIGIOUS COMPLEX: TAOISM, CONFUCIANISM, LEGALISM
JAINISM, BUDDHISM
HELLENIC PHILOSOPHY
MONOTHEISM: EXCLUSIVITY
JUDAISM
CHRISTIANITY
ISLAM

18. TECHNOLOGY OVER TIME The ability to make and use tools Materials
Man has always been a toolmaker
Tools increasingly designed to meet specific needs
Simple to complex
Materials
Bone, Stone, Wood; Mixture of Media
Metallurgy, Metalworking: Copper, Bronze, Iron
Include domestications as technology if necessary
In many ways writing is a technology
Technology is specialization
Expands if group supports artisans who do not hunt, gather, farm
Irrigation systems requires team work leading to political structure
Know how inventions improved life

19. CHANGE OVER TIME INTERACTIONS
War
Not a new invention but rare in Pre-history
History introduces scarcity, contest for it
War becomes increasingly complex; warrior classes
Technology effected war; empires are core of classical
Diplomacy
Similar to War
Contact between states led to diplomacy
First treaty was between Hittites, Egyptians
Trade
The simplest way for cities to overcome failings
Trade for what you do not have
Most international trade was for luxury
Commodities traded locally, internally
Exchanges: ideas, diseases
Migration of nomads, Bantus, Indo-Europeans
Interactions between nomads, sedentary

20. MOVEMENT Themes Spread of Agriculture Spread of Technology
Indigenous or Independent Development
Cultural Diffusion
Spread of Agriculture
Spread of Technology
Popular Movements
Early Humans spread across globe
Indo-European Migrations or “Chariot Peoples”
Bantu Migrations
Polynesian Migrations
Xiong Nu or steppe peoples
Germanic Peoples

21. CLASSICAL ENDS Reasons for Decline Decline in Given Areas
External and Internal
Internal Decay vs. External popular forces
Aspects
Geographic, Demographic, Environment
Military, Political
Economic, Social
Decline in Given Areas
Mediterranean, South Asia, East Asia
Mesoamerica
That which remains
Classical cultures
Classical religions
Classical traditions
Interregional Networks: Trade, Spread of Religions
Movements of Bantu, Huns, Germans, Polynesian

22. ESSAYS

23. COMPARISONS AND SNAPSHOTS
Compare and contrast the development of institutions and traditions (political, social, economic, or intellectual) in any two of these classical civilizations:
China
India
Greece
Rome
Mesoamerica
Andes
Compare and contrast any two of these cultures:
The Neolithic Revolutions
Early civilization
Pastoral nomadism
Shifting agriculture

24. COMPARISONS AND SNAPSHOTS
Compare major religions and philosophical systems including similarities in cementing a social hierarchy, e.g. Hinduism contrasted with Confucianism.
Compare the role of women in different belief - Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and Confucianism
Compare and contrast the rise, development and spread of Buddhism and early Christianity.

25. COMPARISONS AND SNAPSHOTS
Understand how and why the collapse of empire was more severe in Western Europe than it was in the Eastern Mediterranean, China, or South India
Compare the caste system to other systems of social inequality devised by ancient and Classical civilizations, including slavery

26. COMPARISONS AND SNAPSHOTS
Compare societies and cultures that include cities with pastoral and nomadic societies.
Compare the development of traditions and institutions in major civilizations, e.g. Indian, Chinese, Greek
Describe interregional trading systems e.g. the Indian Ocean trade system and the Silk Road
Compare and contrast the intellectual accomplishments of the classical Chinese and Mediterranean civilizations (Hellenic, Hellenistic, and Roman).

27. COMPARISONS AND SNAPSHOTS
Compare any two of the interregional trading systems:
 Mesoamerica
Mediterranean
Southwest Asia
South Asia
East Asia
Compare and contrast the popular movements and settlement patterns of any two of these peoples: Indo-Europeans/Chariot Peoples, Germans, Polynesian, or Bantu.

28. COMPARISONS AND SNAPSHOTS
Compare the political and social structures of two early civilizations using any two of the following:
Mesopotamia (Sumer through Persia)
Egypt (Old Kingdom through New Empire)
Indus Valley (Harappan to Aryan)
Shang Dynasty
Mesoamerica (Olmecs, Mayans, Toltecs)
Andean South America (Moche, Chan Chan)