| A | B |
|---|
| Omar Khayyam | a Muslim poet, mathematician, and astronomer |
| caliph | a Muslim ruler |
| Sufis | a mystical Muslim group that believed they could draw closer to God through prayer, fasting, and a simple life |
| Muhammad | the prophet and founder of Islam |
| nomads | people with no permanent home, who move from place to place in search of food, water, or pasture |
| caravan | a group of traders traveling together for safety |
| Mecca | an Arabian trading center and Muhammad's birthplace |
| Muslim | a follower of Islam |
| mosque | a Muslim house of worship |
| Quran | the holy book of Islam |
| Constantinople | the capital of the eastern Roman Empire and later of the Byzantine Empire |
| Constantine | an emperor of the Roman Empire and founder of Constantinople |
| Justinian | one of the greatest Byzantine emperors |
| Justinian's Code | an organized collection and explanation of Roman laws for use by the Byzantine Empire |
| schism | a split, particularly in a church or religion |
| migration | the movement from one country or region to settle in another |
| Bantu | a large group of central and southern Africans who speak related languages |
| savanna | an area of grassland with scattered trees and bushes |
| Sahara | a huge desert stretching across most of North Africa |
| oral history | accounts of the past that people pass down by word of mouth. |
| clan | a group of families who trace their roots to the same ancestor |
| Mansa Musa | a king of Mali in the 1300s |
| Mali | a rich kingdom of the West African savanna |
| Ghana | the first West African kingdom based on the gold and salt trade |
| Songhai | a powerful kingdom of the West African savanna |
| Ile-lfe | the capital of a kingdom of the West African rain forest |
| Benin | a kingdom of the West African rain forest |
| Kilwa | one of many trading cities on the East African coast |
| Aksum | an important East African center of trade |
| city-state | a city that is also a separate, independent state |
| Swahili | a Bantu language with Arabic words, spoken along the East African coast |
| Great Zimbabwe | a powerful southeast African city |
