Around 1200 B.C.E., climate change catalyzed by a major volcanic eruption, waves of migrations, warfare, famine, economic decline, and political discontinuity led to [BLANK-1]. This was a widespread period of crisis and destruction in the Eastern Mediterranean world that saw the decline of Ancient Mesopotamian societies and empires, such as the Egyptians. While it was a period of political turmoil for many established empires of the ancient world, it was also a period of time in which new technologies were circulating.

Egyptian funerary rituals during the Old Kingdom included mummification and carving religious texts and spells in the tomb of a pharaoh in order to bring him back to life and help him ascend to heaven. By the Middle Kingdom and New Kingdom, mummification had been democratized, and wealthy nobles and even commoners were then afforded the luxury of mummification. As Egypt came into contact with other Mesopotamian civilizations, their funerary rites became more complex. Egyptians recorded their beliefs about the afterlife, funerary rituals, and the rites of some mystical spells in [BLANK-1], a text written in the New Kingdom. It explained that the soul left the body after death to become part of the divine. Further, it told versions of the Osiris Myth and explained that the god Osiris died each year and was brought back to life by his wife (and sister), Isis, when the Nile flooded. Osiris, and his assistant, the god Anubis who assisted in mummification, weighed the hearts of departed humans to determine whether they had lived justly enough to earn everlasting life.

Part 3 Essay Question (40%): Your essay should have an introduction with a clear and specific thesis, a body with evidence, and a conclusion that reinforces your central argument. Select the option you feel the most comfortable with and answer it to the best of your ability. You may find it helpful to write out a brief outline of the essay before you begin writing.Choose ONE (1):Describe the reign of Sargon. How did he come to found the world’s first empire and what was that empire? In what ways did Sargon incorporate the culture of conquered peoples into his empire? How did he legitimize his rule? What challenges did he face?Despite the absence of sustained political unity, what allowed for some level of cohesiveness among Indian society? What cultural elements loosely unified the subcontinent? What role did the environment play in terms of allowing Indian cultures to flourish?Compare and contrast Ancient Greece’s two greatest poleis: Athens and Sparta. In what ways were these societies similar and in what ways did they differ? Describe how these city-states came into conflict with one another during the Peloponnesian War.  What issues led to this conflict and which group ultimately emerged victorious?

Part 2 Short Answer ID Terms (30%): A short answer ID should briefly address the basic journalistic questions: who or what, when, where, and why. Each answer should be a coherent paragraph of at least 4-5 sentences. Be sure to discuss the historical significance – this is the most important part of your ID term. Do not leave any portion of the five options you choose blank – it is best to write something, even if you must guess somewhat. Partial credit is better than nothing.Answer FIVE (5) of the following terms:AchillesAshokaChinese CosmologyDaoismHammurabi’s CodeNefertitiThe Osiris MythThe Peloponnesian WarPericlesVardhamana Mahavira

Religious violence between Catholics and Protestants was commonplace following the Protestant Reformation. One of the most notable examples came at the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in 1572, which occurred following the wedding of the Catholic sister of the King of France, Margaret de Valois, to a Protestant groom: [BLANK-1]. The bridegroom was a pragmatist and recognized that converting to Catholicism would ultimately allow him to serve as King of France himself; he was said to have cynically stated “Paris is worth a mass.” The wedding itself began in a bizarre fashion. As a Protestant, the groom was not allowed inside the cathedral where the wedding was being held, so his brother had to stand in for him with the groom yelling his vows out from across the threshold of the door. Following the ceremony, the Catholic Queen, Catherine de’ Medici, ordered troops to kill the thousands of unarmed French Huguenots (Protestants) who had traveled to Paris for the wedding and who had been assured of the safety of the event as wedding guests. The number of dead within Paris likely numbered at a few thousand; however, violence spread throughout the countryside as Catholics surprised Protestants and massacred as many as 30,000 over the course of several weeks. The bridegroom escaped the religious violence from the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre and did ultimately convert to Catholicism and become King of France; however, he would ultimately be a victim of later religious violence as he was assassinated by a Catholic extremist in 1610.

Florence was the center of the Italian Renaissance and became notable for its unique Renaissance-era architecture. Florence’s celebrated building of this style is [BLANK-1] designed by the Renaissance architect Filippo Brunelleschi (1377-1446).

[BLANK-1] described the cultural importance of the tianguiz, or marketplace, in Mexica society. Marketplaces were held in extremely high esteem, housed shrines with food offerings, and had feast days dedicated to their honor. Marketplaces specialized in certain goods, with the marketplaces in Azcapotzalco and Itzocan dedicated to selling slaves (usually prisoners of war who would be used as human sacrifices). The slaves set aside for human sacrifice would be ritually bathed, dressed in fine clothes, treated divinely, given the best food to eat, and then sacrificed to the gods.

At the end of the twelfth century, the Muslim scholar Maulana Burhān ud-dīn Marghīnānī wrote [BLANK-1]. In this text, he discussed the rules regarding Muslim marriage and stated that Muslim men could practice polygamy and marry as many as four wives, as that number was explicitly expressed in the Qur’an. The wives could be free women or slaves and he argued against an older Muslim scholar named Shāfi’ī, who claimed that only one of the wives could be a slave. According to Marghīnānī, any number of the four wives could be slaves or free women.

[BLANK-1] were a nomadic group of Euroasian Steppe People who were founded around 552 and were the first Inner Asian people to found large states and leave a written record. They never united, however, and often fought against one another, rarely founding a lasting state. They came into frequent conflict with both Tang China and the Byzantine Empire. By the tenth century, most members of this group converted to Islam, however, they did not adopt Arabic trappings. They maintained their own distinct culture, language, customs, and identity distinct from Arab Muslims.

Key Term Bank​Anasazi Cultures​Andalusia​Arabian Camels​Bactrian Camels​The Battle of Hattin​Book of the Gods and Rites​The Delhi Sultanate​Esoteric Buddhism​Fulcher of Chartres​Guidance: Alms, Marriage, and Testimony​The Gupta Empire​Honen Buddhism​Joseph de Acosta​Khanates​Llamas​Magyars​Mahmud of Ghazni​Mongols​Peasants​The Pyramid of the Sun​Scholasticism​Serfs​Shinran Buddhism​The Tale of Genji​The Tale of Heike​The Tea Trade​Turks​Vikings​Xiongnu​Yi Song-gye