Study Guide for World History – Second Semester
Remember there will be more questions on the final covering World War II and after than other topics because
you have not yet been tested on that material!
Also remember that this is not exhaustive, merely representative of things you should be studying for the final!
Geography / Maps: Be able to locate the following locations or areas on a map.
 Europe (major countries and major seas / oceans) in 1700, 1800 and 1900, including Russia and Ottoman
Empire / Turkey (as appropriate)

Location of St. Petersburg, Istanbul / Constantinople, Rome, Paris, London, Berlin, Vienna

Africa, India, China, Middle East: know where each is in relation to the others; Specifically know where
the Suez Canal is located and why it is important
Big Ideas

Why did the West win?

Italian Renaissance (why did it occur?)

Humanism (why did it start in Florence?)

Renaissance values

Scientific Revolution (what was it / what did it represent)

Protestant Reformation (causes & effects of Reformation)

English Protestant Church (how was it different in its establishment)

Counter-Reformation (Know three main areas of reform)

Triangle Trade (products / people went from where to where; chart interpretation)

Columbian Exchange

Safavid Empire / Mughal Empire / Ottoman Empire / Ming Dynasty (know why each failed to challenge
West)

Theory of Absolutism (know what divine right is, etc)

Ancien regime (know its characteristics)

French Revolution & Latin American Revolutions

Industrialization / “Factors of Production”

Mercantilist economic theory

Laissez Faire economic theory

Capitalist economic theory

Socialist economic theory

Communist economic theory

Nationalism (what is a Nation? What is a State? What is Sovereignty? What is a nation state? Why is this
such a radical idea?)

Imperialism (four reasons for its development; why in Africa?; India; China)

World War I (why so horrific?)

Russian Revolution (causes; how it happened; effects)

Great Depression

Fascism & Nazism

World War II

United Nations

The Cold War

Communist China

“Petro-Politics” and Radical Islam
Important Groups / Places / Things

Renaissance Art and artists

Reconquista of Spain

Magna Carta

Constitutional Monarchy

Oprichnina / Oprichniki

Time of Troubles (know what a false Dmitri is)

“Great Embassy”

St. Petersburg

Estates System of France (three estates / characteristics of each)

Tennis Court Oath

National Assembly of France

Jacobins

Continental System

Peninsular War

Encominedas system

Spanish Colonial Empire social classes

Caribbean independence

South American Independence

Mexican Independence

Labor unions

East India Company

Colonial India (why “jewel in the crown” of Imperial Britain?; Positive / negative effects of colonialism in
India; the Raj)

Imperialism in China (Opium Wars; Boxer Rebellion – causes)

Trench Warfare (characteristics; why so brutal?)

Bolsheviks

Mensheviks

Weimar Republic

National Socialist Party

UN Security Council

UN General Assembly

Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD)

Jihad
Important Events

Fall of Constantinople

Council of Trent (important decisions)

Thirty Years War (causes)

Peace of Westphalia (guaranteed what to HRE)

Spanish Armada

War of Spanish Succession (what caused it)

French Revolution (causes; Storming of the Bastille; Reign of Terror)

Battle of Austerlitz

Battle of Trafalgar

Napoleon’s Invasion of Russia (Why invade? Tactics of Russians; “General Winter”)

Battle of Waterloo (Napoleon’s exile and escape; “The 100 Days”)

Congress of Vienna (goals of Congress; 4 results)

Industrial Revolution in England (enclosures; three factors causing IR; first industry to industrialize; what
were effects of economic efficiency)

Spread of IR to Continent (spread to what country first? Why? Next? Why? Rest of Europe?)

Effects of Industrialization (global inequality; two things industrialized countries need)

European Imperialism (causes; European advantages)

Berlin Conference

Sepoy Mutiny (what caused it)

Opium Wars and Boxer Rebellion

Causes of World War I (four main causes; precipitating event)

World War I ( Trench Warfare in Western Front / Eastern Front / World at War – who was allied to who)

End of World War I (how did war end; Treaty of Versailles and its effects in Germany)

Russian Revolution (know how and why it happened!)

Great Depression

Fascism and Nazism

World War II

Cold War

Modern Middle East (modern Israel’s foundation; rise of Islamist extremism)

United Nations
Important Dates (know what happened around these dates)

1453

1517

1618-1648

July 14, 1789

1815

1914-18

March 1917 & November 1917

October, 1929

1939-1945

December 7, 1941

August 6 and August 9, 1945

September 11, 2001
Important People

Alberti

Michelangelo

Leonardo Da Vinci

Bruneschelli

Erasmus

Queen Elizabeth I

William Shakespeare

Copernicus

Johannes Kepler

Galileo

Isaac Newton

Martin Luther

John Calvin

Anabaptists (who are modern day Anabaptists?)

Ignatius of Loyola and the Jesuits (three activities of Jesuits)

Magellan

Cortez

Pizarro

Vasco De Gama

Amerigo Vespucci

Cardinal Richelieu

Cardinal Mazarin

Louis XIV (nickname; famous quote; primary goal in war)

Ivan the Terrible (know his “good” and “bad” periods)

Peter the Great (four factors making Russia different than W. Europe in 1700)

Mehmet the Conqueror

Suleiman the Magnificent

Louis XVI

Robespierre

Napoleon (“whiff of grapeshot”; rise to power; crowned emperor; major reforms as Emperor)

Toussaint L’Ouverture

Simon Bolivar

Dr. Livingstone

Empress Dowager

Archduke Ferdinand

Gavrilo Princip

General Schlieffen (explain the Schlieffen Plan)

Czar Nicholas II

Karl Marx

Lenin

Stalin

Trotsky

Hitler

Mussolini

FDR

Douglas MacArthur

Dwight D. Eisenhower
Important Technologies and Cultural Advancements

Perspective

The Dome

Da Vinci’s Notebooks

The Divine Comedy

95 Theses

Institutes of the Christian Religion

Caravel

Factory

Steam Engine

Macadam road

Railroad (why a transformative industry?)

Social Darwinism

Ironclad / battleship /submarine / airplane / machine gun

Atomic weapons

Islamist belief
Europe in 1700
DON’T FORGET TO MAP THE CITIES!!!
Europe in 1800
DON’T FORGET TO MAP THE CITIES!!!
Europe in 1900
DON’T FORGET TO MAP THE CITIES!!!
India & China
India and Africa