As you read this week’s required materials, complete this worksheet. This is a multipage assignment; double-check that you completed each page before submitting.
Fill in the blanks to complete the following sentences.
a. The written record of the past and the study of past written records is called .
b. Sunnis struggled against Shiites, especially , for the faith of North Africans in the 11th and 12th centuries.
c. Between 1000 and 1800, North African politics was characterized by as its tribes and city-states fought to maintain effective . Several empires controlled parts of the region north of the Sahara during this time, including the , but none was able to control the large areas for long periods of time.
d. The were rulers of Morocco who claimed to be descendants of .
e. Islam spread southward across the desert primarily with Muslim . The , a group of zealous Muslims, began trying to convert people by force in the 1030s.
a. The kingdom of Ghana, with its capital at , controlled the slave and trade in the 11th and 12th centuries. Traders and government workers who followed were influential, but the king and court practiced paganism and idol worship.
b. Following the decline and collapse of Ghana in the late 12th century, the region consisted of several smaller kingdoms until the empire of consolidated power in the mid- and late-13th century. The Muslim kings of this empire made pilgrimages to and encouraged trade.
c. Mali’s most important kings from the Keita dynasty were , who extended Mali’s power west to the Atlantic and established the Malian capital at , and , who encouraged Muslim scholars, artists, architects, scientists, and poets to settle in Mali. Many of these intellectuals moved to , where the madrasas and libraries made it a lasting center for culture in West Africa.
d. The Songhai became an empire after the conquests of Timbuktu and Jenne during the reign of , who practiced traditional African religion. His successor, , was a Muslim and encouraged Muslim settlement and scholarship. Under Songhai rule, ________ expanded its role as the center of Islamic learning and scholarship in the Sahel and Sudan. Trade continued to expand under the rule of , who defended the empire against the Mossi and Berbers. Soon, though, civil war and an invasion force armed with _____________from Morocco caused the decline of the Songhai empire.
e. The empire in the central Sudan and , southwest of Lake Chad, were the centers of an Islamic empire with an economic foundation based on .
f. The Nubian kingdoms of and gradually became more and more influenced by Arabic culture and Islam.