| A | B |
|---|
| West Indies | other name for the Caribbean |
| Andes | longest mountain range in the world |
| Sierra Madre Occidental | run along west side of Mexico |
| Sierra Madre Oriental | run along east side of Mexico |
| Altiplano | "high plain" in Bolivia |
| Patagonia | area of hills and low tablelands in southern Argentina and Chile |
| Mexican Plateau | between the Sierra Madres |
| Amazon River | runs 4,000 miles and drains Brazil |
| Rio Grande | border between US (Texas) and Mexico |
| Lake Titicaca | highest lake in the world, located between Peru and Bolivia |
| Angel Falls | highest waterfall in world, located in Venezuela |
| Maya empire | located on Yucatan peninsula and in central America |
| Aztec empire | located at current day site of Mexico city |
| Incan empire | located in present day Peru, but empire stretched 2,500 miles |
| Tenochtitlan | capital city of the Aztec empire |
| Cuzco | capital city of the Incan empire |
| 1492 | when Columbus "sailed the ocean blue" |
| Treaty of Tordesillas | Pope Alexander VI divided the new world between Spain and Portugal |
| hacienda | Spanish plantation |
| Portugal | European country that colonized Brazil |
| mestizos | people of European and native ancestory |
| mulattoes | people of European and African ancestory |
| Brazil | country in Latin America that gained independence peacefully |
| caudillos | military dictator |
| coup | when one caudillos overthrows another |
| Puerto Rico | US territory in the Caribbean |
| Elizabeth I | who the Virgin Islands were named for |
| Spanish | the most widely spoken language in Latin America |
| Portuguese | language spoken in Brazil |
| Roman Catholic | religion of about 90% of Latin Americans |
| mosaics | pictures or designs made out of colored pieces of material set together |
| coffee | major crop of Brazil |
| bananas | major crop of Honduras |
| cattle | major export of Argentina |
| Appalachians | mountains along the east side of the US |
| Rockies | mountains along the west side of the US |
| Mississippi River | runs 2,348 miles from near Canada border to the Gulf of Mexico |
| Yukon | drains Alaska and NW Canada |
| St. Lawrence | drains Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean |
| Colorado River | created the Grand Canyon |
| Rio Grande | border between US (Texas) and Mexico |
| Great Lakes | created by glacial erosion |
| Great Salt Lake | located in Utah |
| Bering Strait | separates Alaska from Russia |
| England | settled the 13 colonies that eventually became the US |
| Spain | settled California, Florida, and the SW |
| France | settled Louisiana and parts of Canada |
| Northern colonies | good fishing & timber; Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Mass, & Conn |
| Middle colonies | New York, New Jersey, Penn, & Delaware |
| Southern colonies | Virginia, Maryland, N. Carolina, S. Carolina, & Georgia; plantations |
| July 4, 1776 | US Declaration of Independence |
| British Commonwealth | limited unification of former English colonies |
| Manifest Destiny | expansion of US territory from "sea to shining sea" |
| Louisiana Purchase | in 1803 the US bought it from France |
| Mexico | US took Texas and the SW from |
| Russia | the country the US bought Alaska from |
| Constitution | the document that sets up the US government |
| Bill of Rights | first 10 Amendments to Constitution |
| Representative Democracy | type of gov't in the US |
| executive branch | President in US, Prime Minister in Canada |
| legislative branch | Congress in US; Parliament in Canada |
| judicial branch | Supreme Court |
| 10 | provinces in Canada |
| 50 | states in the US |
| Catholic | major religion in Canada |
| Protestant | major religion in US |
| Quebec | French speaking province of Canada |
| Washington, D.C. | capital of the US |
| Ottawa | capital of Canada |
| Governor-General | Queen's representative in Canada |
| 435 | number of representatives in US House of Reps |
| 100 | number of Senators in US Senate |
| Seward | US Secretary of State who bought Alaska |
| Scandinavia | Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland |
| Low countries | Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg |
| Jutland peninsula | Denmark |
| Iberian peninsula | Spain & Portugal |
| Balkan peninsula | Greece |
| British Isles | United Kingdom & Ireland |
| North Sea | oil & natural gas |
| Germany | coal |
| Pyrenees | mountains separating Spain & France |
| Rhine River | carries much of the regions freight into central Europe |
| fjords | steep cliffs cut by glaciers into the coasts of Norway & Sweden |
| Thames River | flows through London |
| Vatican City | headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church & smallest country on Earth |
| Celts | were pushed into Scotland, Wales, & Ireland by the Romans |
| Druids | Celtic priests |
| Parthenon | built in honor of the goddess Athena |
| Greece | birthplace of democracy |
| Etruscans | built Rome as a trading empire |
| Latins | overthrew the Etruscans and became known as the Romans |
| Roman Empire | responsible for spreading Christianity throughout Western Europe |
| Constantinople | center of the Eastern Roman Empire |
| Rome | center of the Western Roman Empire |
| Vandals | one of the Germanic tribes that sacked Rome |
| feudalism | system of government established during the Middle Ages with kings, nobles, and peasants |
| crusades | holy wars waged by the Catholic Church in the 11th, 12th, & 13th Centuries to reclaim Jerusalem from the Muslims |
| Renaissance | "rebirth" of interest in ancient Greek & Roman knowledge that begin in Italy in the 1300s |
| Reformation | started by Martin Luther when he split from the Catholic Church |
| Industrial Revolution | began in the UK in 18th Century. Use of machinery to produce goods. |
| French Revolution | 1789, resulted in the beheading of the monarch and a republic form of government |
| Parliamentary democracy | type of government in Western Europe today |
| Berlin Wall | went up in 1961 and torn down in 1989 |
| Cold War | power struggle between democracy and communism from 1945 - 1991 |
| Hitler | leader of Germany during World War II |
| invasion of Poland, 1939 | event that began World War II |
| assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand | event that began World War I |
| trench warfare | characteristic of WWI |
| Romantic languages | Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese |
| Germanic languages | German, English, Norwegian, Danish |
| Northern Ireland | still faces violence between Catholics and Protestants |
| arch | Roman addition to Greek architecture |
| European Union (EU) | united Europe into a common economy by eliminating tariffs and quotas |
| autobahn | interstate in Germany with no speed limit |
| chunnel | Channel tunnel that connects England & France |
| D-day | June 6, 1944 - allied invasion of Normandy, France |
| Pearl Harbor Day | December 7, 1941. Japan bombed the US naval fleet in Hawaii |
| Byzantine Empire | name for the Eastern Roman Empire after the fall of Rome |
| Yugoslavia | broke apart in the 1990s due to civil war following the fall of communism |
| Serbia | attacked neighboring Croats and Serbs in the 1990s as part of the civil war that engulfed Yugoslavia |
