Let's review everything you need to know about Unit 1, the Global Tapestry in AP World History Modern. Before we get going, two things. First, this is a review video.
I'm here to review this unit with you. When you got time to go back and cover every single topic in detail, that's what your class is for. This video is to review all of that information your teacher threw at you over the past few weeks and arrange it in one digestible video so that you can pass your test. and get a five on the exam in May. Second, I made you a study guide.
It covers all the big ideas and key concepts for the global tapestry. You can download it from the link in the description below from the Ultimate Review Pack. You know what I'm going to do?
I'm going to throw in all the answers to the study guide as well. Just go down there into the comment section. You can find the link. Let's start from the beginning.
And in AP World History, that means the year 1200. Now, I made a whole video on what's going on in 1200 that makes a good starting point for the course. And you should never focus on dates. You should always focus on periodization.
Think of periodization as breaking down the course into four different periods. Your teacher may present the course to you in nine separate units, but you need to see the course as four different time periods. You can see from this graphic that the course is really divided into quarters. Today, we zero in on that first period, the post-classical period. The first two units both take place in that first period, 1200 to 1450. Unit one is a quick tour of the major world regions during that time period, and unit two is all about how those regions connected in this time period.
Oh, that's another thing. Make sure you know these regions for the course. When your teacher asks you questions, and more importantly when the college board asks you questions, it may you need to be able to tell the difference between East and Southeast Asia or South Asia and the Middle East. Know this map. Alright, periodization is important.
Regions are important. But you clicked on this video for Unit 1 review stuff, so let's review Unit 1 stuff. Our global tapestry in Unit 1 consists of six different regions. Each section covers the history from that region from 1200 to 1450. And heads up, The College Board straight up tells you what percentage of the exam will be on each unit.
And the first two units, these are two of the smaller ones. You can see here, 8 to 10% of the exam each. Check out units 3, 4, 5, and 6, though.
They could be up to 15% each. But not today. Unit 1 is 8 to 10% of the AP World Histories. The global tapestry of Unit 1 kicks off in East Asia.
No matter when you're talking about East Asia, you almost always need to start with, Hey, what's China doing? They were a big deal in 1200. They're a big deal today. They'll be a big deal tomorrow. So what is China doing from 1200 to 1450?
Till you get to Unit 7, China is on that dynastic cycle. That means they have an emperor who rules as an absolute monarch until he dies. Then his successor does the same thing until a whole other group or dynasty comes in and takes over.
And then they crown an emperor and repeat the whole process. There are four different dynasties covered in AP World History and you need to know them all. And since it's 1200, that means the Song dynasty. You don't need to know a ton of Song specific stuff. You don't need to know specific capitals or emperors, but you do need to know a bunch of Chinese dynasty specific stuff.
And this goes for every section in Unit 1, by the way, but how does this group rule this region? In East Asia, the Song were a dynasty. They have emperors that rule over the people.
They staff their bureaucracy, which is a fancy word for people who work within the government to make the government function, with the civil service exam. This exam is built on Confucian principles of mutual respect, filial piety, and personal ethics. Another generic thing to focus on for Unit 1 are the belief systems.
For the most part, these are going to stay the same throughout the course. Know these in Unit 1, and you'll know them in Units 2 through 9. Here's a map of the major belief systems from 1200 to 1450. All of these are mentioned in Unit 1, so be comfortable with the basics, locations, and spread of these belief systems in the first period from 1200 to 1450. Okay, there are two more things to focus on for East Asia. First, Everybody is copying China. I mean, they're the biggest economy on earth until 1900, so game recognize game, am I right? The big stuff to focus on here are things like filial piety, which is just a fancy word for respecting your elders.
That's a main tenet of Neo-Confucianism, which spread along with Buddhism to Korea and Japan. The last thing to focus on for East Asia is the economy. The Song economy is kind of what they're most known. Their economy was three times larger than all of Europe's when the court kicks off in the year 1200. I mean, they kind of got it going on economically. I mean, chomper rice, paper, paper money, gunpowder, porcelain, and all of it connected by the Grand Canal.
Don't get too attached. This all goes away in Unit 2 when the Mongols come to town, so. How's your study guide looking, by the way?
See if you can go back and complete the section on East Asia now that we just reviewed that section. And if you're stuck or you don't know an answer, you know I got that key for you. I know, that was a ton on 1.1. But to be honest, East Asia and the next section, Dar al-Islam, are probably the most important in Unit 1. Speaking of Dar al-Islam, some quick vocab for you.
Dar al-Islam means the world of Islam. It's everywhere Islam is the major belief system. You can see that this covers most of the Middle East. Told you, the AP world regions matter.
Think of East Asia as dominated by Song China. Well, in western parts of Afro-Eurasia, it's... all about Dar al-Islam.
But Dar al-Islam is fragmented. In the centuries prior to 1200 CE, Dar al-Islam was mostly under the control of one group, the Abbasid Caliphate. But, much like the Song Dynasty, the Abbasids have a hard out at 1258 CE when the Mongols take Baghdad.
In reality, they have been slowly fading as a power since the death of Herod al-Rashid back in 809. So if the Caliphates are donezo, what's next? The new kids on the block are the Turks. I made a map because of Of course I made a map. These are just some of the Turkish empires that ruled throughout Afro-Eurasia during this period. The Turks themselves are a collection of very diverse peoples originating in Central Asia and their sultanates.
Think of these like an Islamic kingdom that dominate the global tapestry west of China. Now, the Arabs aren't gone. They're just not in charge of the sultanates anymore. You don't have to memorize these empires, but you do need to know that the Turks are in charge. It spreads any number of ways in places like South Asia.
It's spread through warfare in places like Southeast Asia, aka Indonesia. It spread via merchants and trade. And in places like Central Asia, it often spread through the network of Sufis.
Sufis, by the way, are the vocab word for Dar al-Islam. So let's focus on them for a second. If you look at the basics of Islam as a belief system, it has a very clear cut and dry system of how the faith operates.
Things like the five pillars. But for some people, that's not enough. Some require a more mystical, personal, spiritual relationship with Allah.
Think of the Sufis as mystical Islamic monks. And they spread across Asia. In fact, when he traveled across Asia on one of his massive journeys, He said he didn't so much travel the world as he went from one Sufi order to another.
So once you know the Turks are in charge politically, you need to really focus on Dar al-Islam for their innovations and transfers. Your teacher could have used a million different examples here because there are a million different examples here. Think of East Asia and Dar al-Islam as first the preservers of ancient and classical knowledge and then the innovators that improved well beyond what they learned from the classical world.
These are things like algebra, trigonometry, Sufi poetry. medical procedures and medicine, scientific classifications of plants, animals, and diseases. Look, you're reviewing, so pick one of these or whatever your teacher was obsessed with.
These aren't just some historical tangent, by the way. These are a major part of the cultural legacy of Dar al-Islam in this period. Not only did they innovate, they also provided for the transfer of technology and intellectual innovations across time and space. Think of all that ancient Greek philosophy. They translated it and made commentaries on it.
When the Europeans rediscovered Aristotle, they thought he was Islamic. That's how well they preserved the classical world. When the Europeans completely forgot about a Greek philosopher from Europe, Dar al-Islam reminded Europe.
They literally transferred Greek knowledge back to Europe. If you need a specific building to represent all this knowledge, go with the House of Wisdom in Baghdad. But don't get too attached.
58 years into AP world history, right at the beginning, the House of Wisdom will fall alongside the old Abbasid Caliphate. That's two sections. Double back to that study guide. Give that section a try.
Have we mentioned some people to know yet? Feeling better about Champa Rice and the Sufis? Okay, the heavy hitters of Unit 1, the Global Tapestry, are East Asia and Dar al-Islam.
If you were wondering what you should study the most, it's those two. What about the other four sections in this unit? 1.3 is South and Southeast Asia. Told you this unit was a bit of a world tour.
Now, if you're looking at Europe and Dar al-Islam, you'll find three big religions. There's Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. But here in South and Southeast Asia, it's a different trio.
Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam. Each have their own impacts and different regions and varying legacies. But as far as the College Board goes, this is basically a section about these religions and where they are located. I made this map for this section and you can see there are a ton of Buddhist and Hindu states in this AP World region.
Do not memorize them all. Pick one of each. My faves, for Islam, the Delhi Sultanate. For a Hindu state, Vijayanagara. And for a Buddhist state, go with Srivijaya.
Honestly, this region is massively important, just not in Unit 1. Double down here in Unit 2 because the trade route, the Indian Ocean trade, is arguably the most important one. So jump ahead to Unit 2 for more here or just wait until you watch that video later in the end. Either way. Oh, one quick vocab word before we leave.
Bhakti. Remember a second ago when I said how the Sufis emerged as a more spiritual, personal relationship with Allah? Well, the Bhakti movement is that for Hinduism. By 1200, Hinduism was in full-blown competition with Buddhism for the souls of the people of South and Southeast Asia.
The Bhakti movement. emerged as a more spiritual version of Hinduism to kind of rival what was being seen in Buddhism. Study guide check, just saying. 1.4 is all about the Americas and boy is it vague.
Like literally this is all the college board gives you here. In the Americas, as in Afro-Eurasia, state systems demonstrated continuity, innovation, and diversity, and expanded in scope and reach. Your teacher could have chosen any number of places to focus on, but if you want some low-key return on investment here, focus on the Aztecs and the Incas. They both show back up in Unit 4, and they are two of the largest, most influential state systems in the Americas. For the Incas, focus on their location, the vertical archipelago of the Andes Mountains, their labor system, called the Mita, or the Turn System.
And the Incan road. Think of the Roman roads, but up in the mountains. For the Aztecs, focus on their genius Chinapa farming system and, obviously, the human sacrifice.
But that's really it to review for the Americas. They want you to know how they grew and developed over time. I doubled down on the Incas and their growth along the mountains, and how they connected using the roads and built the empire using the Mida system.
Sit there, study gun. 1.5 is all about Africa. They give you as much information here as they do on the Americas. So, not a lot.
Again, think of 1.5 state building in Africa like 1.3 South and Southeast Asia. It's really hard to talk about any of it without focusing most of your brain matter on the trade route. In this case, the Trans-Saharan trade route.
Fortunately for you, this route gets its own section in Unit 2. Basically, it links West Africa to Dar al-Islam with all of the technological and cultural exchanges you might expect. Most notably, Islam, salt, and gold. As for actual empires, focus on Mali, a dominated sub-Saharan Africa from 1226 to 1670. The most famous person from Mali is undoubtedly Monsa Musa and his famous or infamous Hajj to Mecca in 1324. The capital of Mali is a major trade and intellectual center known as Timbuktu.
There are other spots of interest in Africa that may come up on the AP World Exam or your teacher's unit exam. Places like Great Zimbabwe in Southern Africa or Aksum, aka Ethiopia, in East Africa, most notably because it's a Christian kingdom in East Africa. But as you get closer to the Indian Ocean over there in the east...
the more important the Indian Ocean trade route becomes with the arrival of Islam and the growth of Swahili. Swahili is literally a mix of Bantu and Arabic cultures in East Africa. Finally, it's Europe time. Your teacher may have gone, I'm here, I used to, but you don't really need to.
All you need to know here is two things. First, it's decentralized. When you think of most countries today, they are centralized. Centralized countries have a ruler.
They have a central government that rules over and legislates all the laws for the country. In the global tapestry, Europe ain't like that. Picture in your mind a map of Europe.
Now take a hammer to that map and shatter it into a million pieces. That's how Europe was divided. Now when we get into units 3 and 4 in the next period, 1450 to 1750, you'll start to see large kingdoms and empires forming. Not today. It's decentralized.
It's a bunch of duchies and dukedoms and principalities and townships, countships, lordships. It's a mess. And since there's no Roman Empire around to provide stability and order, that falls upon the smaller areas to fill the role of government.
Your local government, whether dukedom or lordship or whatever, was the only government you had. So think of a million tiny little kingdoms linked through blood or marriages. It's not centralized. It's decentralized. And in this decentralized world, everything is organized around the feudal system.
That's the second thing you need to know about Europe and the global tapestry. Basically, it's a system where you're given land. in return for service or labor.
This could apply to knights fighting for princes or even more on a local level. This is often included with manorialism. Think of a manor as a piece of land given to a lord.
That lord has a manor house there in fields and forests. On the manor lived peasants or even serfs who were contractually bound to the land, coerced labor style, to farm some for themselves and some for the lord. Feudalism is tough because it's a very broad term.
A lot of people have a lot of different definitions for it, but it's most often associated with the military obligations, while manorialism... is more specific to an estate owned by a lord where the serfs and peasants work the land. See? The Global Tapestry is literally just a quick check-in of the major regions of the world from 1200 to 1450. Did you finish the study guide? No?
You have some spots that you need to work on? No worries. The same place you found the study guide, you will find the key to the study.
Look at my key to help you out. Alright, let's review the review. Know the periods for the first two units, that's 1200 to 1450. Know the regions. In this unit, that's East Asia, Southeast Asia.
South Asia, Dar al-Islam, the Americas, Africa, and Europe. Know the different states in the six regions and how they ruled and maintained power. Know how the belief systems like Islam and Buddhism, where they are, and how they impacted those regions. That's Unit 1. How are you feeling?
This is probably your first AP. If this wasn't so bad, keep up this momentum. We're still in the Shire.
We're on Tatooine. We're at Platform 93 quarters at King's Cross Station. Your journey has just begun.
Stick with me and you should be alright. I've been at this for 20... Years, and there are a ton of videos over on my channel.
Be sure to follow, like, and subscribe, because I'm constantly posting little weird history stuff all throughout the year, all AP World History based. Plus, here in the Ultimate Review Packet, I have a practice sheet on the AP World History skill of comparison for Unit 1, so check that out. All kinds of stuff in there to help you out as well.
Good luck on that Unit 1 exam, and on the AP World History Modern exam this May.