HistoryNerd94's definitions

Scribe

In the governments of many ancient societies, a professional position reserved for men who had undergone the lengthy training required to be able to read and write using cuneiform, hieroglyphics, or other early, cumbersome writing systems.

Male domination of the position of scribe—an administration or scholar charged by the temple or palace with reading and writing tasks—further complicates efforts to reconstruct the lives of women.

by HistoryNerd94 December 21, 2010

Renaissance

The intellectual and artistic flowering in Europe during the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries sparked by a revival of interest in classical antiquity.

The Renaissance celebrated human possibility.

by HistoryNerd94 December 30, 2011

Reconquista

The long struggle (ending in 1492) during which Spanish Christians reconquered the Iberian peninsula from Muslim occupiers.

Columbus finally sold his plan to Isabel and Ferdinand, the monarchs of Castile and Aragon, who had married and united their kingdoms. In 1492, the couple had succeeded in conquering Grenada, the last Muslim-controlled province in Iberia, ending a centuries-long struggle known as the reconquista.

by HistoryNerd94 January 2, 2012

Foragers

People who support themselves by hunting wild animals and gathering wild edible plants and insects.

Modern foragers in the Kalahari Desert of southern Africa and the Ituri Forest of Central Africa derive the bulk of their day-to-day nourishment from wild vegetable foods.

by HistoryNerd94 November 8, 2010

Feudalism

A medieval European social system in which land was divided into hundreds of small holdings.

Europe was characterized by a social system historians have called feudalism.

by HistoryNerd94 December 27, 2011

City-State

A small independent state consisting of an urban center and the surrounding agricultural territory. A characteristic political form in early Mesopotamia, Archaic and Classical Greece, Phoenicia, and early Italy.

The term city-state refers to a self-governing urban center and the agriculture territories it controlled.

by HistoryNerd94 December 18, 2010

Treaty of Tordesillas

Treaty negotiated by the pope in 1494 to resolve the territorial claims of Spain and Portugal.

The Portuguese colonized Brazil under the terms of the Treaty of Tordesillas, a 1494 agreement dividing the Americas between Spain and Portugal.

by HistoryNerd94 January 6, 2012