7/8 World History

Week 23

Mali & Inca

Monday Do Now

What do you know about the history Africa? What cultures have you studied so far that were located in Africa?

Objectives Students will understand the relationship between geography and economic opportunity in the Mali Empire.

Mali Empire

Africa After Migration • When large groups of early humans began leaving

their original homeland of East Africa from 70,000 to 40,000 BCE, all humans were living as hunter-gatherers in small family groups.

• As we've studied in the class so far, those groups of people who left Africa spread all over the world, creating civilizations as diverse as the Aztecs in Mexico, the Romans in Italy, and the Shang in China.

• The parts of Africa that were close to the Middle East and Europe (like Egypt and Carthage) developed early, complex civilizations, but not the rest of the continent. One of the main reasons for this is the Sahara Desert.

• Stretching across the entire continent underneath Egypt and the North African coast, the Sahara is hundreds of miles across and almost completely barren of water or food sources. The people who lived in the area underneath the Sahara (called Sub-Saharan Africa), were therefore cut off from most of the rest of the world because it was so difficult to cross this desert.

• The people of Sub-Saharan Africa did not begin creating large societies until much later than most of the rest of the world for one simple: they didn't need to.

• Most of Sub-Saharan Africa's land was abundant with natural fruits, vegetables, and large animals to hunt, as well as having plenty of natural rainfall and rivers.

• Because of this natural wealth, it was easy for the many groups of people there to survive without trading, and continue living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, or practice subsistence agriculture (growing just enough to feed yourself, not to trade).

• Small civilizations developed in different parts of Sub-Saharan Africa over the years, but they remained isolated from the rest of the world and did not produce written records or large amounts of artifacts.

Location • The Mali Empire was the first Sub-

Saharan civilization to have large-scale contact with the outside world. It was located mostly in the modern countries of Mali and Mauritania in West Africa, at the very edge of the Sahara Desert.

• The largest cities of the empire were all located along the Niger River, a large river that runs through the area's dry, desert landscape.

• The location of the empire made sense because it was at the border of two of Africa's large geographical regions - the Sahara Desert to the north, and the savannah (grassy plains) to the south.

• The climate of Mali is extremely hot and dry all year round. Even in winter the average temperature is 86 degrees.

Origins • The archaeological evidence shows that

humans started building villages in Mali around the 400's BCE, but historians know nothing about their culture that long ago.

• The villages in the area remained very small for over a thousand years, and only started to grow larger in the 1200's CE after several cities united to form one kingdom, called the Mali Empire.

• The largest cities of the empire were called Niani, Timbuktu, and Jenne.

• The ruling noble families of Mali practiced a syncretic religion combining Islam (which was slowly spreading down from North Africa) and the native polytheistic West African religion.

• Very little is known about the early years of the Mali Empire because most of the historical records only began once the population fully converted to Islam in the 1300's.

Spanish drawing from 1375 showing Mansa Musa dressed like a European king

Government • Once the cities of Mali united into a single

kingdom, they began to have a monarchy, ruled by one king called a mansa.

• The most famous ruler was called Mansa Musa. He became the leader of the empire in 1312, and he was the first fully Muslim mansa. He spoke and read Arabic, and had spent his early years studying the Quran and hadith.

• Under Mansa Musa, the Mali Empire grew in strength and wealth because of valuable new lands he conquered. In 1324, he decided to make the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca that all Muslims are supposed to do at least once in their lifetime.

• When Mansa Musa made the hajj though, he did it in style, taking a group of 60,000 noblemen and servants with him, and giving gifts of gold to all the cities they passed through along the way.

• This huge, extravagant journey had many purposes, including religious obligation, displaying the empire's wealth, and showing other people their kindness and generosity.

Economy • The reason the Mali Empire was so rich was because

their land had two very valuable resources in large amounts: gold and salt.

• Mali traders used huge caravans of camels to cross the Sahara to trade their gold and salt with the Islamic governments of Spain and Egypt for the most part.

• They traded these things for luxury items like fine cloth and spices.

• Although it seems like an odd thing to be valuable now, salt was a very precious item for most of human history. It was desirable because it made food taste better, but it was very difficult to obtain naturally, without the kind of technology we have today. The desert near Mali, though, had large natural deposits of salt, like the large salt flats in the desert between Nevada and California.

• Most of the Mali Empire's wealth was personally owned by the mansa and his family, but they were generous in sharing it with the people of the empire by building mosques, universities, and expanding the cities with new homes and marketplaces.

Cultural Center • Mansa Musa, in particular, was very

interested in religion and learning, and wanted to make his empire a new center of knowledge and culture that would draw scholars from around the world.

• To this end, he built a huge university in the city of Timbuktu. While on the hajj in Arabia, Mansa Musa purchased tens of thousands of books to take back to the new university, including books on history, religion, mathematics, science, and more.

• He also recruited dozens of scholars and scientists to come back with him to teach at the university, where he paid them huge sums of gold.

• Mansa Musa was successful in making Timbuktu a new center of learning and culture within the Islamic world. The university's library there became one of the largest in the world and soon began attracting scholars who wanted to study there from as far away as Spain and India.

• Several buildings still exist in Mali that were built by Mansa Musa, displaying their unique style of architecture made out of mud bricks and wooden beams. One of the best-preserved examples is a large mosque built by Mansa Musa in the city of Jenne (shown above).

Exit Ticket

In what ways did the geography of the Mali Empire (its location, land, etc.) help it become successful?

Homework

• African Geography reading & questiosn

Tuesday Do Now

If you had the chance to go back in time to live with the Aztecs, would you do it? Why or why not? What would you be most/least interested in experiencing?

Objectives

Students will demonstrate knowledge of Mayan and Aztec culture through art.

Mali Quiz

1. Who was the most famous leader of the Mali Empire? 2. What two natural resources made Mali wealthy and powerful? 3. What is the name of the desert that separated Mali from the civilizations of North Africa?

• Maya/Aztec Project presentations

Block Day Do Now

What do you remember about the Chavin civilization?

Objectives

Students will learn the history and cultural practices of the Inca Empire.

The Inca Empire

Origins • The Inca civilization began in the Andes

Mountains of Peru, about 800 miles south of where the Chavin civilization had existed over a thousand years before.

• They began as a tribe of small-scale farmers, but began building a city in the 1100's CE called Cuzco.

• Over the next 300 years, Cuzco grew larger and more powerful. In the year 1438, a powerful new king named Pachacuti gathered an army from the city and began conquering all the tribes north through the mountains.

• By the time of his death, Pachacuti's new Inca Empire stretched for hundreds of miles through the Andes Mountains. His son continued conquering through the mountains, and eventually conquered the tribes living along the Pacific coast, at the base of the mountains, making one giant empire stretching from modern-day Chile to Colombia.

Economy • Most Incans were farmers, growing potatoes and

quinoa (like the Chavin) as their main crops. These plants were native to the Andes and grew well in the cool, dry mountains.

• Like the Chavin, the Inca also practiced terraced agricultural and built many small canals to channel the small amount of available water through the mountainous land.

• The Inca government collected taxes from most people in the form of dried quinoa, which the government then stored in large warehouses. Some of this quinoa was used to feed the king's household and the army, but the rest was saved to redistribute to all the people in times of bad harvests.

• Although their empire was huge and included millions of people, the Inca never invented a writing system.

• In order to keep track of business and taxes, they invented a unique system of recording just numbers called quipu using pieces of rope. Different numbers and categories of things being counted were represented by different types of knots instead of being written down using symbols.

Metalworking • The Inca were the most advanced

metalworkers of the Americas. Most other Native Americans didn't have metal tools at all, and the few who did (like the Mayans and Aztecs) only used copper tools.

• The Inca, though, discovered how to make bronze, which they used to make a wide variety of weapons, including spears, spiked clubs, and axes. These stronger weapons played a big part in why they were able to conquer so much territory in a short amount of time. The other tribes didn't stand a chance against such strong weapons.

• Even though the Inca travelled long distances throughout their empire and became quite advanced in metalworking, like other Native Americans, they never invented the wheel. When they had to move anything, they relied on humans or animals to carry heavy packs instead of having carts.

Government • The Inca Empire was ruled by one king,

who was worshipped like a god. He was both the ruler of the people and the head of the Inca religion.

• Because the Inca didn't have a writing system, that meant they didn't have written laws. Instead, they had men called tokoyrikok (Inca for "inspectors") who were trained in the capital city of Cuzco to memorize the Inca system of law. They were then sent out to all different parts of the empire to act as judges.

• Like the Mayans, the Inca also studied astronomy and had an advanced two-calendar system. They had a 365-day calendar for ordinary things, and a slightly shorter lunar calendar (based on the phases of the moon) just for religious holidays.

The symbol of the Inca Empire, used on their flags and banners

Religion • The Inca worshipped a polytheistic religion

which included many gods and goddesses. The most important were Inti (the chief god, and god of the sun), Pachamama (the goddess of agriculture), and Apu Ilapu (the god of rain).

• Beside just praying to gods for help, the Inca religion believed in following a 3-part moral code: "Do not steal, do not lie, do not be lazy."

• They believed that people who followed that code went to a heaven-like place, and those who didn't just remained dead and unthinking.

• Like many other Native American groups, the Inca practiced human sacrifice on important holidays, or to commemorate the death or crowning of a king. Unlike the Olmecs, who sacrificed infants, or the Mayans and Aztecs, who sacrificed adults, the Inca specifically sacrificed children, usually between the ages of 5 and 15.

• Due to the climate conditions where sacrifice victims were usually left (on high mountaintops, where it's cold, dry, and low in oxygen), several incredibly well-preserved Inca mummies have been discovered over the years.

• The girl pictured above was estimated to be 13-15 years old and was sacrificed with her 5-7 year old half sister, and an unrelated boy.

Culture • One of the most unique cultural practices of

the Inca was cranial deformation - the purposeful reshaping of the skull.

• Cranial deformation was started during infancy, when the human skull is still moveable and growing. The process consisted of wrapping many strips of cloth tightly around the baby's head in order to make it grow longer and more cone-shaped, sometimes alone or sometimes by tying the head to a plank of wood.

• Only wealthy Inca practiced cranial deformation, and it was a physical sign of belonging to an important wealthy family.

• Probably because of their experience with the human skull, the Inca were skilled at the surgical procedure of trepanation - removing small pieces of the skull in order to relieve swelling and pressure on the brain after a head injury.

Art & Architecture • Due to the excellent climate conditions for

preserving delicate artifacts, there are a wide variety of rare, well-preserved ancient art forms like textiles and feathers.

• In addition to these, the Inca also produced intricate stone carvings, metal art, and ceramic art.

• Machu Picchu is the most well-known example of Inca architecture (shown left), located about 50 miles from the capital city of Cuzco, high on a mountaintop, where it remained relatively undisturbed for hundreds of years after it was abandoned.

Exit Ticket Why did the discovery of bronze help the Inca expand their empire?

Homework

• Machu Picchu reading & questions

Friday Do Now

What are your greatest strengths as a writer? What are your biggest challenges?

Objectives

Students will practice effective historical writing skills.

Inca Quiz

1. What mountain range was the Inca Empire located in? 2. Instead of a writing system, what did the Inca use to keep track of number-based data (like crops, taxes, etc.)? 3. Why did the Inca practice cranial deformation? (What did it represent?)

• Writing for history