Foundations:
From Prehistory to 1000 C.E.

Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4

World Geography:

This ancient tablet from the 7th Century BC depicts the world at the time of Sargon (2300 BC) as a circle surrounded by water, with Babylon at its center. (British Museum)

• Locations of Continents.
• Locations of Oceans, seas and major Rivers.
• Location of key political units prior to 1000 (Roman Empire, Abbasid Caliphate, Sudanic kingdoms of Ghana and Nubia, Chinese empire [Han and Tang dynasties], Byzantine Empire, Mayan Civilization)

Economic Systems:

• Agricultural, pastoral, and foraging societies and their demographic characteristics.
• Basic Characteristics of economic structures including technological patterns (Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages)

Crises of Late Antiquity

• Movements of peoples (Huns, Germans and Arabs)
• Collapse of Empires (Han China, loss of European portion of the Roman Empire ).
• Emergence of new empires and political systems (Tang China, Arab caliphates, Byzantine Empire, early European and Japanese feudal systems).

Key Cultural and Social Systems (Research Cubes)

• Basic features of major world belief systems prior to 1000 and where each belief system was applied by 1000.
  
  

  Buddhism	Christianity	Confucianism	Daoism	Hellenism
  Hinduism	Islam	Judaism	Polytheism	Caste System
  Characteristics of Social Structures	Developments in the Arts and Sciences	Nature and Location of Slave Systems	Confucian Social Hierarchy	Patriarchal family structures and trends

Principal International Connections (700-1000 C.E.)

• Missionary outreach (Buddhist, Christian and Islamic)
• Leading International trading patterns (Middle Eastern, Chinese, East European, trans-Saharan).
• The role of nomadic groups in Central Asia.
• The Impact of Bantu migrations in Africa.

Foundations Review