Nigeria history

Nigeria ⁱ/naɪˈdʒɪəriə/, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federalconstitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic ofBenin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in the north. Its coast in the south lies on the Gulf of Guinea on the Atlantic Ocean. There are over 500 ethnic groups in Nigeria, of which the three largest are the Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba.

The name Nigeria was taken from the Niger River running through the country. This name was coined by Flora Shaw,^{[citation needed]} who later married Baron Lugard, aBritish colonial administrator, in the late 19th century. The British colonised Nigeria in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, setting up administrative structures and law while recognising traditional chiefs. Nigeria became independent in 1960. Several years later, it had civil war as Biafra tried to establish independence. Military governments in times of crisis have alternated with democratically elected governments.

Nigeria is roughly divided in half between Christians, who mostly live in the South and central parts of the country, and Muslims, concentrated mostly in the north. A minority of the population practice traditional and local religions, including the Igbo and Yorubareligions.

Nigeria, known as "the Giant of Africa", is the most populous country in Africa and theseventh most populous country in the world.^[10] Its oil reserves have brought great revenues to the country. Nigeria is considered to be an Emerging market nation by theWorld Bank.^[11] Nigeria's economy is the second largest in Africa, and the 37th largest in the world as of currently.^[12] Nigeria has been identified as a regional power, it also has regional hegemony, and major influence within its region.^[13][14][15] It is listed among the "Next Eleven" economies. Nigeria is expected to become the largest economy in Africa overtaking South Africa in the near future and become one of the world's Top 20 economies by 2050.^[13]

Nigeria is a member of both the Commonwealth of Nations, and the African Union.

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Ghana: An Empire Built on Trade

Ghana: An Empire Built on Trade
Document 1

The Beginnings of Ghana 
In the 400s, a group of primarily nomadic people named the Berbers formed a kingdom just south of the Sahara desert; they called their kingdom Ghana. They began to use camels to carry goods across the Sahara Desert. From the north came salt; from the west came the rich resources of gold, ivory, and other goods. Ghana was located in the middle of the salt and gold trade routes.

nomadic – without a permanent home

The Empire of Ghana 
Although founded by Berbers, Ghana eventually was controlled by the Soninke, a group of people living in the region. They built their capital city, Kumbi Saleh, right on the edge of the Sahara and the city quickly became the most important southern trade center of the Saharan trade routes. The kingdom was ruled by a king called the ghana. In addition to holding military power, the king was the supreme judge of the kingdom.

Gradually, Ghana grew very rich, due in large part to the trans- Saharan trade. The ghana required traders to give him a percentage of the products they were trading. If a trader was trading in gold, he was required to pay the ghana part of his gold. The ghana also placed a tax on the local goldmines. As Ghana grew richer, the kingdom expanded into an empire, requiring neighboring groups of people to pay tribute. This increased Ghana’s wealth and power even more.

trans-Saharan trade – across the Sahara Desert 

tribute – tax

Kumbi Saleh 
Kumbi Saleh was the capital of Ghana. It actually two cities six miles apart, separated by a road. Most of the houses were built of wood and clay, but wealthy and important residents lived in homes of wood and stone. About 30,000 people lived in Kumbi Saleh. The most important part of the city was protected by a stone wall and served as the royal and spiritual capital of the empire. Here is where the king lived, his palace being the grandest structure in the city. It also contained a sacred grove of trees used for religious ceremonies. The other part of the city was the center of trade and served as a business district of the capital. It was inhabited almost entirely by Arab and Berber merchants, and contained more than a dozen mosques.

inhabited – lived in 

The End of Ghana 
In the year 1062 CE, however, the empire of Ghana came under attack. Berbers, calling themselves Almoravids, sought to gain control of the Saharan trade routes, and launched a war against Ghana. In 1076 the Almoravids captured Kumbi Saleh, ending rule of the ghanas and converting many to Islam.

Mali: West Africa's Golden Empire
Document 2

The Beginnings of Mali 
With the demise of Ghana, another great empire arose in West Africa. Mali, located in the Sahel, a grassland region on the southern border of the Sahara Desert, became powerful by controlling the rich trans-Saharan trade routes between northern and western Africa, especially the gold trade. Mali was located in anagriculturally rich area along the upper Niger River. Most of the gold for trade came up the Niger River, which gave Mali a chance to control that trade. Control of the Niger River helped Mali grow as an empire.

demise – end

trans-Saharan trade – across the Sahara Desert 

agriculturally – ability to farm, grow crops

Mali’s First King

Sundiata, the historical founder of Mali (whose name meant “Hungering Lion”), ruled Mali from 1230-1255 CE. As a king, he was said to have worn hunter’s garments instead of royal robes. At the time of Sundiata’s rule, the empire of Mali extended over 1,000 miles from east to west and Mali took control of the gold and salt trade. Sundiata is also said to have introduced the cultivation and weaving of cotton into the area.

cultivation – growing

The Golden Age of Mali

The rulers of Mali came to be called mansa, meaning “emperor” or “master.” Mansa Musa was Mali’s greatest king, ruling from 1312 to 1337 CE. He was the grandson of Sundiata’s half brother, and ruled Mali at a time of greatprosperity, during which trade tripled. During his rule, he doubled the land area of Mali; it became a larger kingdom than any in Europe at the time. The cities of Mali became important trading centers for all of West Africa as well as famous centers of wealth, culture, and learning. Timbuktu, an important city in Mali, became one of the major cultural centers not only of Africa but of the entire world. Vast libraries and Islamic universities were built. These became meeting places of the finest poets, scholars, and artists of Africa and the Middle East. Mansa Musa, who was Muslim, was perhaps best known outside of Mali for his pilgrimage to Mecca in 1324 C.E. According to some accounts, 60,000 people accompanied him, along with 200 camels laden with gold, food, clothing, and other goods. This pilgrimage displayed Mansa Musa’s enormous wealth and generosity.

prosperity – wealth

vast – very large

The End of Mali 
After the death of Mansa Musa, the power of Mali began to decline. Mansa Musa’s sons could not hold the empire together. In 1430 C.E., the Berbers in the north took much of Mali’s territory, including the city of Timbuktu, and gradually Mali lost its hold on trade until the empire crumbled.

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Mali Empire

Mali began as one of the districts in the Kingdom of Ghana. Around 1230 CE, Ghana collapsed and Mali took over. In time, they grew to be larger than Ghana!

The new king, Sundiata, was young and clever. He was a very good king. One of the first things he did, when he became king after Ghana collapsed, was to restore trade with the neighbors. He recognized that trade was critical to Mali's survival and growth. 

He expanded Mali so that Mali controlled some of the gold mines to the south and some of the salt mines in the north. His son Wali continued his good works, and expanded the borders of the empire even more.

His grandson, Mansa Musa, has intrigued people for hundreds of years. His adventures are legendary! 

Mansa Musa loved knowledge and poetry. Under the direction of Mansa Musa, a university was built at Timbuktu, a city on the Trans-Sahara Trade Route, in ancient Mali.This university became a famous center of learning. People came from all over to study there.

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Alexander the Great 323 B.C.E.

1: Philip of Mace donica was the first king to unite the city-states of Greece.

2: Philip's son was Alexander and Will expand his empire.

3: Alexander will conquer The Persian empire all the way to India...... 30 times more land than Greece.

4: through the entire empire he spread Greek culture and blended it with Persian culture...... The new blended culture will be known as Hellenistic.

5: Alex is most famous for culture diffusion.

Ghana History

The Republic of Ghana is named after the medieval West African Ghana Empire, The Empire became known in Europe and Arabia as the Ghana Empire by the title of its emperor, the Ghana. The Empire appears to have broken up following the 1076 conquest by the Almoravid General Abu-Bakr Ibn-Umar. A reduced kingdom continued to exist after Almoravid rule ended, and the Kingdom was later incorporated into subsequent Sahelian empires, such as the Mali Empire several centuries later. Geographically, the ancient Ghana Empire was approximately 500 miles (800 km) north and west of the modern state of Ghana, and controlled territories in the area of the Sénégal river and east towards the Niger rivers, in modern Senegal, Mauritania and Mali.

Historically, modern Ghanaian territory was the core of the Empire of Ashanti, which was one of the most advanced states in sub-Sahara Africa in the 18–19th centuries, before colonial rule. It is said that at its peak, the King of Ashanti could field 500,000 troops.

For most of central sub-Saharan Africa, agricultural expansion marked the period before 500. Farming began earliest on the southern tips of the Sahara, eventually giving rise to village settlements. Toward the end of the classical era, larger regional kingdoms had formed in West Africa, one of which was the Kingdom of Ghana, north of what is today the nation of Ghana. Before its fall, at the beginning of the 10th century Akan migrants moved southward then founded several nation-states including the first great Akan empire of the Bono founded in the 11th Century and for which the Brong-Ahafo Region of Akanland is named after. Later Akan groups such as the Ashanti federation and Fante states are thought to possibly have roots in the original Bono settlement at Bono manso. Much of the area was united under the Empire of Ashanti by the 16th century. The Ashanti government operated first as a loose network and eventually as a centralized kingdom with an advanced, highly specialized bureaucracy centered in Kumasi.

By the end of the 16th century, most of the ethnic groups constituting the modern Ghanaian population had settled in their present locations. Archaeological remains found in the coastal zone indicate that the area has been inhabited since the Bronze Age (ca. 2000 BC), but these societies, based on fishing in the extensive lagoons and rivers, have left few traces. Archaeological work also suggests that central Ghana north of the forest zone was inhabited as early as 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. Oral history and other sources suggest that the ancestors of Ghana's residents, the Akan entered the area at least as early as the 10th century AD, and that migration from the north by the Dagomba continued thereafter.

These migrations resulted in part from the formation and disintegration of a series of large states in the western Sudan (the region north of modern Ghana drained by the Niger River). Strictly speaking, ghana was the title of the king, but the Arabs, who left records of the kingdom, applied the term to the king, the capital, and the state. The 9th-century Berber historian/geographer Al Yaqubi described ancient Ghana as one of the three most organized states in the region (the others being Gao and Kanem in the central Sudan). Its rulers were renowned for their wealth in gold, the opulence of their courts, and their warrior/hunting skills. They were also masters of the trade in gold, which drew North African merchants to the western Sudan. The military achievements of these and later western Sudanic rulers, and their control over the region's gold mines, constituted the nexus of their historical relations with merchants and rulers in North Africa and the Mediterranean.

Ghana succumbed to attacks by its neighbors in the 11th century, but its name and reputation endured. In 1957, when the leaders of the former British colony of the Gold Coast sought an appropriate name for their newly independent state—the first black African nation to gain its independence from colonial rule—they named their new country after ancient Ghana. The choice was more than merely symbolic, because modern Ghana, like its namesake, was equally famed for its wealth and trade in gold.

Although none of the states of the western Sudan controlled territories in the area that is modern Ghana, several small kingdoms that later developed such as Bonoman, were ruled by nobles believed to have immigrated from that region. The trans-Saharan trade that contributed to the expansion of kingdoms in the western Sudan also led to the development of contacts with regions in northern modern Ghana, and in the forest to the south.

The growth of trade stimulated the development of early Akan states located on the trade route to the goldfields, in the forest zone of the south. The forest itself was thinly populated, but Akan-speaking peoples began to move into it toward the end of the 15th century, with the arrival of crops from Southeast Asia and the New World that could be adapted to forest conditions. These new crops included sorghum, bananas, and cassava. By the beginning of the 16th century, European sources noted the existence of the gold-rich states of Akan and Twifu in the Ofin River Valley.

It seems clear from oral traditions, as well as from archaeological evidence, that after the establishment of the Akan kingdom states in the 11th century, the Dagomba states, was the earliest kingdom to emerge in modern Ghana, being well established by the close of the 16th century.Although the rulers of the Dagomba states were not usually Muslim, they brought with them, or welcomed, Muslims as scribes and medicine men. As a result of their presence, Islam influenced the north. Muslim influence, spread by the activities of merchants and clerics. In the broad belt of rugged country between the northern boundaries of the Muslim-influenced state of Dagomba, and the southernmost outposts of the Mossi kingdoms (of what is today the southern Burkina Faso and northern Ghana border), were peoples who were not incorporated into the Dagomba entity. Among these peoples were the Kassena agriculturalists. They lived in a so-called segmented society, bound together by kinship tie, and ruled by the head of their clan. Trade between Akan kingdoms and the Mossi kingdoms to the north (of what is today the northern Ghana and southern Burkina Faso border) flowed through their homeland, subjecting them to Islamic influence, and to the depredations of these more powerful neighbors.

Athenian and Sparta

 How is Athenian democracy different from modern American democracy?

 

                                      Athenian democracy                             America 50 states

1. Athenians were divided into 10 tribes, however Americans are divided into 50 states 2. Athenians elected 50 men from each tribe, however Americans elect by population 3. Athenians had a direct democracy (participated directly), however Americans have a representative deomcracy (elect representatives) 4. Athenians had the Council of Five Hundred, however Americans have the Government 5. Athenians limited electing and voting rights to just men, however Americans have electing and voting rights to men and women 6. Athenians had slaves, however Americans don't have slaves (well, they used to until 1863 when all of the slaves were freed by Abraham Lincoln) 7. In Athens, women stayed at home and work, however in America, women participate in all kinds of daily activities, even in the Army 8. In Athens, slaves were just captured war prisoners, however in America, slaves were Africans who were treated as property due to their dark skin.

How would you compare the ideals of spartan and Athenian societies?

                        

                     Sparta society                                                Athen society


The Spartans were more of a warrior and practical society while the Athenians were a more philosophical society who held education in high regard. They were both good fighter but Sparta was obviously better (Peloponnesian War) Both sides were also very intelligent but Athens dominated in that section Values: S: Strength, A: Smarts Governments: S: Oligarchy, A: Democracy Lifestyles: Same as Values


How did the Persian wars affect the Greek people especially the Athenian?

                                 
       greek after war                                                        greek and Persians at war

   

         

Early on in the Fifth Centruy B.C., the Greeks defeated the Persians, which victory allow Athens to flourish as a center of culture and political power among the 1500 or so Greek city states. This was the golden age of Athens, which resulted in the development of Greek democracy, architecture, sculpture, theater. Athens also became an empirical power and forced many Greek city states to pay tribute. Athens became wealthy with this tribute, but it was the fear of this every expanding empire that drove Sparta to lead a coalition against Athens and to initiate the long war known as the Peloponesian war, which dominated Greece during the last 30 years or so of the Fifth century. For years the war was a stalement without a defining conclusion. Eventually the Athenians were defeated owing to the huge financial aid given to the Spartan cause by the Persians. Athens would never again assume its Fifth Century cultural dominance and its political dominance in the Grecian world . Thus Persia, by losing a war and later by winning one, was pivotal both in the rise of Athens and its decline.

MAIN IDEAS

How does an aristocracy differ from an oligarchy?

                           
         Aristocracy                                                                  oligarchy

Oligarchy is a form of government where power is held by a small number of individuals from a elite or noble families. On the other hand, an aristocracy is a group of aristocratic ruling class.An aristocracy and an oligarchy have very similar features, yet their origins are different. In an aristocracy, the nobles are born into their position by royalty. In an oligarchy, the nobles r men of high position are there not because of birth rights but because of their financial position.



What contributions did Solon and Cleisthenes make to the development of Athenian democracy?

                             
                  Solon                                                            Cleisthenes

Solon outlaw debt slavery, and introduced legal concept that any citizen could bring charges against wrongdoers. Cleisthenes broke up the power of nobility by organizing citizens into ten groups based on where they lived rather than wealth. He increased the power of assembly by allowing all citizens to submit laws for debt and passage.


How did Athens benefit from victory in the Persian wars?

                                           
              Athenian coin                                                                     extanded land

Athens benefited from victory in the Persian Wars because they gained a lot of land. They also gained a large amount of prestige. It converted the anti-Persian league it had headed into an empire of its own, and turned its revenues to its own benefit.