AP World History: Modern (College Board)

This event unfolded in Delhi, the city sitting on the flat Indo-Gangetic Plain in northern India, exactly where the Himalayas to the north give way to the vast lowlands stretching toward the Deccan…

Runnymede is a flat meadow on the southern bank of the River Thames in England, sitting on the island of Great Britain just west of London — exactly the kind of quiet riverside ground where a king…

The pin belongs at Kouroukan Fouga, in what is now southern Mali — right where the upper Niger River winds through the West African interior, deep in the Saharan borderlands that the clue called the…

This event unfolded in Sukhothai, in what is now north-central Thailand, on the inland plains of the Southeast Asian peninsula — exactly the region framed by major river systems to the west and east…

This is Baghdad, the capital of modern Iraq, sitting on the Tigris River in the broad lowland plain of Mesopotamia — the ancient 'land between the rivers' flanked by the Zagros Mountains to the east…

Ain Jalut is a spring and valley in what is now northern Israel, sitting in the land bridge that links Africa to Asia — with the Mediterranean Sea to the west and the Jordan River valley to the east…

Karakorum sits in the grassland steppe of central Mongolia, north of China and south of Siberia, in the empty middle of Asia where the Mongol Empire built its capital. By 1260 that empire, stitched…

This event unfolded in Khanbaliq, the city now known as Beijing, in northern China — sitting on the North China Plain where the terrain flattens out just south of the mountains that separate China…

This battle took place at Yamen, near the mouth of the Pearl River delta on the southern coast of China, where sheltered coastal waters meet the South China Sea — the bay the title clue anchored on…

This event unfolded at Trowulan, on the island of Java in present-day Indonesia — sitting between the South China Sea to the north and the Indian Ocean to the south, at the maritime crossroads of…

This event unfolded in Söğüt, a small town in northwestern Turkey — sitting on the Anatolian plateau, roughly between the Black Sea to the north and the Sea of Marmara to the south, close to the…

This is Tenochtitlan, founded in 1325 on an island in Lake Texcoco — sitting in the high basin of central Mexico, exactly the highland plateau the title described, ringed by volcanic peaks. The…

This event unfolded at Vijayanagara — modern-day Hampi — in southern India, on the Deccan Plateau between the Arabian Sea to the west and the Bay of Bengal to the east. In 1336, brothers Harihara I…

This event took place at Caffa, modern Feodosia, on the Crimean Peninsula in present-day Ukraine — a port on the northern Black Sea coast, exactly where the Eurasian steppe grasslands reach the water…

This event unfolded in Nanjing, China — a city on the lower Yangtze River plain, roughly where that great river curves toward the East China Sea, deep in the heart of eastern China. In 1368, Zhu…

This achievement took place in Palma, on the island of Mallorca, Spain — sitting in the western Mediterranean, west of Italy and north of the African coast across a narrow sea. In 1375, Abraham…

This is Malacca, on the southwestern coast of the Malay Peninsula in modern Malaysia — sitting precisely at the strait where the Indian Ocean's trade winds funnel ships into the South China Sea…

This event began in Nanjing, the great city on the Yangtze River in eastern China, exactly where a powerful dynasty launched its fleets toward the Indian Ocean world. In 1405, Admiral Zheng He led…

This is Machu Picchu, perched on a mountain ridge in present-day Peru, high in the Andes range that runs like a spine down the western side of South America. Around 1450 CE, Inca builders constructed…

This is Constantinople, now called Istanbul, in modern Turkey — sitting precisely on the Bosphorus strait where Europe and Asia are separated by less than a kilometre of water, exactly the narrow…

This is Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, Turkey — perched on the promontory where the Bosphorus strait separates Europe from Asia, exactly where the Black Sea funnels into the Sea of Marmara. In 1459…

On 2 January 1492 the forces of the Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella entered Granada as its last Muslim ruler, Boabdil, surrendered the Alhambra palace-fortress. This ended the Emirate of…

Tordesillas, a small town in central Spain on the Castilian plateau between the Tagus and Douro rivers, was where Spain and Portugal signed the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494. The two Iberian powers…

This is Tabriz, in what is now northwestern Iran — set on a high plateau between the Caspian Sea to the east and Lake Urmia to the west, ringed by the Zagros and Armenian mountain systems. In 1501, a…

This was the Battle of Diu, fought off Diu — a small coastal outpost on the northwestern tip of the Indian subcontinent, where the Arabian Sea meets the Gujarat coast near the Gulf of Khambhat. In…

This is Goa, on the western coast of India, exactly where the Arabian Sea meets the subcontinent's Konkan shoreline — the geographic crossroads the event title pointed toward. In 1510, the Portuguese…

The Battle of Chaldiran took place in 1514 near what is now Caldiran, in the Van Province of eastern Turkey — on the high Anatolian plateau where the highlands of Anatolia give way toward the Zagros…

This event took place in Wittenberg, Germany — a small town sitting on the Elbe River, on the broad North European Plain that stretches from France to Russia with few natural barriers to slow the…

On 31 October 1517, the German monk and theology professor Martin Luther nailed a list of 95 arguments — known as the 95 Theses — to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. The list…

This is Cairo, Egypt — where the Nile Delta meets the northeastern edge of Africa, just west of the Sinai Peninsula that links Africa to Asia. In 1517, the Ottoman Sultan Selim I crushed the Mamluk…

Seville, Spain — sitting on the Guadalquivir River in the southwestern corner of the Iberian Peninsula, where Europe reaches closest to Africa across the Strait of Gibraltar and the Atlantic…

This event unfolded in Tenochtitlan, the island capital of the Aztec Empire, built on a lake in the high Valley of Mexico — a volcanic plateau sitting at roughly 2,200 metres above sea level, almost…

The city is Worms, Germany, sitting on the western bank of the Rhine River as it flows northward across the broad central European plain toward the North Sea. In 1521, the religious reformer Martin…

The battle unfolded near Mohács, Hungary, on the broad floodplain beside the Danube that sits almost exactly midway between the Carpathian arc and the Adriatic coastline. On August 29, 1526, the…

This is Panipat, in present-day India, sitting on the flat plains south of the Himalayas and north of the Gangetic heartland — exactly the kind of open ground where cavalry armies could manoeuvre…

This is Vienna, now the capital of Austria, sitting on the Danube where the Alps give way to the vast flat basin stretching east toward the Black Sea — exactly the geographic bottleneck the title…

In Westminster, England — on the north bank of the Thames just inland from the channel that separates the island from the continent — Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy in 1534, declaring King…

In 1541 the French-born reformer John Calvin returned to Geneva and, through his Ecclesiastical Ordinances, reorganised the city as a Reformed Protestant republic governed by scripture. Geneva sits…

In 1543, Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus published De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, arguing that the Sun — not the Earth — sits at the centre of the universe, and that all planets…

This was Trent, a city in what is now northern Italy, sitting in the Adige River valley just south of the Brenner Pass — the great Alpine gateway connecting the Italian peninsula to central Europe…

Amasya, a city in northern Turkey, sits on the Yeşilırmak River in the highlands of Anatolia — the broad peninsula between the Black Sea to the north and the Mediterranean to the south, forming the…

Augsburg, in present-day Germany, sits on the Lech River just north of where the Alps rise from the Bavarian plateau — exactly the central European heartland the title clue described. In 1555, the…

Manila, the capital of the Philippines, sits on the western edge of a vast Pacific archipelago roughly 1,000 kilometres east of the Vietnamese coast and directly across the South China Sea from…

The Battle of Talikota was fought in 1565 near the town of Talikota, in what is now the state of Karnataka in southern India — on the broad, semi-arid Deccan Plateau that stretches across the…

This event took place in London, England — a city straddling the River Thames near where it widens into the North Sea, on the northwestern edge of the European continent. On December 31, 1600, Queen…

Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, sits at the mouth of the Rhine delta on the North Sea — exactly the northwest European coast where river trade from deep inland Europe meets the sea route between…

Jamestown, Virginia — now part of the United States — sits on a low, marshy peninsula along the James River, which flows into Chesapeake Bay on the Atlantic coast of North America, roughly midway up…

This is Agra, in present-day India, sitting on the Yamuna River on the broad Indo-Gangetic Plain — the flat, river-crossed heartland stretching south from the Himalayas. In 1632, Mughal Emperor Shah…

This was Münster, in the Westphalia region of what is today northwestern Germany, sitting on the broad North European Plain between the Rhine to the south and the North Sea coast to the northwest. In…

This uprising took place in Santa Fe, in what is now the state of New Mexico, United States — a high desert city nestled in the Rocky Mountains, far inland from the Pacific coast, straddling the…

In 1687, Isaac Newton published Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica from Cambridge University, England. The book set out three laws of motion explaining how and why objects accelerate and…

Moscow, Russia — a fortress city on the Moskva River, which feeds into the Oka and then the Volga, sitting west of the Ural Mountains in the vast country that straddles both Europe and Asia, exactly…

Around 1764, weaver and carpenter James Hargreaves, living near Blackburn in Lancashire, England, invented the spinning jenny — a frame allowing one worker to spin eight threads of cotton…

On 29 April 1770, Lieutenant James Cook and HMS Endeavour landed at what is now Kurnell, on the southern shore of Botany Bay — the first recorded landing by Europeans on the east coast of Australia…

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in what is now the United States, sits on the Atlantic seaboard of North America — tucked between the Appalachian Mountains to the west and the Atlantic Ocean to the east…

On 26 January 1788, eleven ships of the First Fleet under Captain Arthur Phillip landed at Sydney Cove in Port Jackson, founding the first British penal colony in Australia and the settlement that…

This is Paris, the capital of France — sitting on the Seine River as it winds through the northwestern corner of Western Europe, roughly midway between the English Channel coast and the Alps to the…

This uprising unfolded on Saint-Domingue — the western portion of Hispaniola, the large Caribbean island shared today with the Dominican Republic, lying between Cuba to the northwest and Puerto Rico…

This was Vienna, Austria — a city cradled in the Alpine foothills of Central Europe, where the Danube River begins its great eastward sweep toward the Black Sea. In 1815, the major European powers…

This event unfolded in Kingston, Jamaica — the largest city of the island of Jamaica, sitting in the Caribbean Sea roughly 150 kilometres south of Cuba and just east of the narrow isthmus connecting…

This is Algiers, the coastal capital of Algeria, sitting on the southern shore of the Mediterranean Sea — directly across the water from southern France and Spain, with the Atlas Mountains rising…

This event unfolded in London, the capital of the United Kingdom, sitting on the Thames River in southeastern England — the large island off the northwestern coast of continental Europe, separated…

London, the capital of the United Kingdom, sits on the River Thames in southeastern England — on the northwest edge of Europe, where the Thames broadens toward the North Sea. In 1833, the British…

Istanbul, Turkey — the city straddling the Bosphorus strait where Europe and Asia touch — was the seat of the Ottoman Empire when, in 1839, it launched the Tanzimat, meaning 'reorganization,' a…

This is Canton — today called Guangzhou — in southern China, sitting at the head of the Pearl River delta where it opens into the South China Sea, exactly the coastal gateway the title clue…

This catastrophe struck Ireland — the large island lying in the North Atlantic directly west of Britain, separated from it by the Irish Sea. Beginning in 1845, a potato blight caused total crop…

This event took place in Seneca Falls, a small town in upstate New York, United States — nestled between Lake Ontario to the north and the Finger Lakes, a cluster of long narrow lakes carved by…

This discovery was made at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California, USA — a small settlement on the American River, tucked between the Sierra Nevada mountains to the east and the Pacific coast to the…

This uprising erupted in Guangzhou, a major port city in southern China, sitting in the Pearl River delta just inland from the South China Sea — exactly the southern interior region where rebel…

Gold was discovered at Ballarat, in the colony of Victoria, in August 1851, triggering one of the great gold rushes of the nineteenth century. Through the 1850s and 1860s hundreds of thousands of…

This event unfolded in Guangzhou, China — the great port city where the Pearl River delta opens onto the South China Sea, on the southern edge of the world's most populous country. In the Second…

This is Meerut, a garrison city on the great Gangetic plain of northern India — sitting exactly where the Himalayan foothills flatten into the wide, river-laced lowlands that stretch toward the Bay…

London, the capital of the United Kingdom, sits on the River Thames in southeastern England — the large island off northwestern Europe's Atlantic coast, separated from France by the English Channel…

Saint Petersburg, Russia — the imperial capital sitting on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, at the far northwestern edge of the enormous Eurasian landmass — is where Tsar Alexander II signed the…

This event unfolded in Tokyo, the capital of Japan — an island nation curving along the western Pacific, separated from the Asian continent by the Sea of Japan. In 1868, Emperor Meiji was restored to…

This event unfolded in Ulundi, in what is now KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa — on the southeastern edge of the African continent where interior grasslands slope toward the Indian Ocean. In 1879, British…

This is Khartoum, the capital of modern Sudan, sitting precisely at the confluence of the Blue Nile and the White Nile in the heart of northeastern Africa — exactly the Nile junction the title…

Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, sits on the eastern seaboard of North America — on the Potomac River where the Appalachian foothills give way to the Atlantic coastal plain…

This is Cairo, Egypt — where the Nile delta fans out into the Mediterranean at the northeastern edge of Africa, just north of the narrow isthmus pierced by the Suez Canal linking the Red Sea to the…

The event took place in Berlin, Germany — a city sitting on the broad North European Plain, roughly midway between the Rhine River to the west and the Oder River to the east, deep in the heart of the…

This battle took place at Adwa, in northern Ethiopia — on the high plateau of the Horn of Africa, where the continent's northeastern corner reaches toward the Arabian Peninsula across the Red Sea and…

This conflict was centered on Manila, the capital of the Philippines — an archipelago of over 7,000 islands strung across the western Pacific, southeast of mainland Asia and separated from it by the…

This event unfolded in Beijing, the capital of China — a city seated on the North China Plain where the Yellow River's basin stretches south and the Mongolian plateau rises to the north. In…

The conflict centered on Manchuria — the broad, flat, river-laced plain in what is now northeastern China, wedged between the Korean peninsula to the south and the Russian Far East to the north, with…

Mexico City, the capital of Mexico, sits in a high mountain basin on the central plateau, ringed by the Sierra Madre Occidental to the west and Sierra Madre Oriental to the east — exactly the…

This is Wuhan, China, sitting on the Yangtze River roughly in the geographic center of the country, midway between the Tibetan Plateau to the west and the Pacific coast to the east. In 1911–1912, an…

Between 1912 and 1913, the Balkan nations of Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece, and Montenegro fought two back-to-back wars that dramatically redrew the map of southeastern Europe. In the First Balkan War…

This is Sarajevo, the capital of modern Bosnia and Herzegovina — a city nestled in a mountain-ringed valley along the Miljacka River, deep in the Balkan Peninsula where Central Europe grades into the…

The Battle of the Somme took place near Albert, in the Somme river valley of northern France — that flat, open farmland sitting between Paris to the south and the English Channel to the north that…

This was Verdun, a fortified city on the Meuse River in northeastern France — sitting in the rolling hills of the Western European interior, roughly midway between the Rhine to the east and the…

This is Petrograd — now called Saint Petersburg — in Russia, sitting at the eastern tip of the Baltic Sea where the Neva River meets the Gulf of Finland, exactly where Europe's great northern plain…

This event unfolded in Pskov, a city in western Russia — deep in the vast European plain, east of the Baltic Sea and well west of the Ural Mountains that mark Europe's boundary with Asia. In March…

The location is the Forest of Compiègne, about 80 kilometres northeast of Paris in northern France — sitting in the broad, low basin drained by the Oise River, a tributary of the Seine, well inland…

Paris, France — sitting on a wide bend of the Seine River in the heart of Western Europe, exactly where the flat North European Plain rolls toward the Atlantic coast — was where Allied leaders…

Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, sits on the eastern seaboard of North America, wedged between the Atlantic coastal plain and the Appalachian Mountains, roughly midway up the…

On 28 June 1919 — exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand — Germany and the Allied powers signed the Treaty of Versailles in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of…

This event unfolded in Ankara, the inland capital of modern Turkey — set on the Anatolian plateau, with the Black Sea to the north, the Mediterranean to the south, and the Bosphorus strait linking…

Moscow, the capital of Russia (then the heart of the Soviet Union), sits on the Moskva River in the broad East European Plain, west of the Ural Mountains that divide Europe from Asia — the geographic…

This event unfolded in New York City, USA — a vast metropolis on the northeastern Atlantic seaboard, built where the Hudson River meets one of the world's great natural harbours. In October 1929, the…

On 6 April 1930, after a 24-day, 240-mile march from Sabarmati Ashram, Gandhi reached the coastal village of Dandi on the Gulf of Khambhat — an inlet of the Arabian Sea — in what is now Gujarat…

This event unfolded in Mukden — today called Shenyang — in China's northeastern region of Manchuria, exactly where the broad, flat plains stretching toward the Korean Peninsula and the Russian Far…

Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, sits on the eastern seaboard of North America, on the Potomac River just east of the Appalachian Mountains — exactly the Atlantic coastal plain the…

On 23 March 1933, the German parliament passed the Enabling Act, transferring full legislative power to Chancellor Adolf Hitler's cabinet. Hitler could now pass any law without parliamentary…

This event unfolded in Berlin, the capital of Germany — a city planted firmly on the flat North European Plain, roughly halfway between the Rhine River to the west and the Oder River marking the…

Guernica, in the Basque region of northern Spain, sits close to where the Pyrenees taper toward the Bay of Biscay — exactly the rugged Atlantic corner of the Iberian Peninsula the title clue pointed…

This is Warsaw, the capital of Poland — a city sitting on the Vistula River, on the broad North European Plain that stretches from the Baltic coast south to the Carpathian Mountains. On September 1…

This is London, the capital of the United Kingdom — sitting on the River Thames in southeast England, on the island of Great Britain, separated from continental Europe by the narrow English Channel…

Auschwitz, in southern Poland — a country on the northern edge of the Carpathian Mountains, at the heart of Europe's great northern plain — was the largest and most lethal site in a continent-wide…

This is the Normandy coast of France — a stretch of sandy beaches along the English Channel, directly south across a narrow strip of water from southern England, on the northwestern edge of the…

The event took place in San Francisco, on the Pacific coast of the United States — exactly where a famous bay cuts into California's coastline, just south of where North America's western shore bends…

Hiroshima and Nagasaki, two major cities on the Japanese archipelago, sit on the western edge of the Pacific Ocean, facing the East China Sea and the Korean Peninsula across narrow straits — exactly…

New Delhi, the capital of India, sits on the broad plains south of the Himalayas, roughly midway across the subcontinent that juts like a triangle into the Indian Ocean between the Arabian Sea and…

On March 12 1947 President Harry Truman addressed Congress requesting military and economic aid for Greece and Turkey, both threatened by communist movements. He articulated what became known as the…

This is Berlin, the capital of Germany, sitting on the flat North European Plain roughly halfway between the Rhine River to the west and the Polish border to the east. Beginning in June 1948, the…

Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, sits on the eastern seaboard of North America — on the Potomac River's banks, between the Appalachian Mountains to the west and the Atlantic coast…

Pretoria, the administrative capital of South Africa, sits on the Highveld plateau in the far south of the African continent, where the Atlantic and Indian Oceans meet around the Cape of Good Hope…

Tel Aviv, on the Mediterranean coast of what is now Israel, sits on the narrow strip of land where the Levant's coastal plain meets the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea. On May 14, 1948, David…

Washington, D.C., on the eastern seaboard of the United States — sitting between the Potomac River and the Chesapeake Bay lowlands, exactly where the title clue pointed — was where the North Atlantic…

The Korean Peninsula — a finger of land hanging from northeastern Asia between the Yellow Sea to the west and the Sea of Japan to the east — was the battleground of the Korean War, which began in…

This was Nairobi, Kenya — sitting on a high plateau in East Africa, inland from the Indian Ocean, just south of the equator and well south of the Horn of Africa. In October 1952, Britain declared a…

This is Algiers, the capital of Algeria — a country stretching from the Mediterranean's southern shore deep into the Sahara, directly across the sea from France and Spain. In 1954, the National…

This was Bandung, a highland city in Indonesia — on the island of Java, sitting between volcanic mountain ranges and the Java Sea, in the world's largest archipelago straddling the equator between…

This conflict unfolded across Vietnam, a long, S-shaped country on the eastern edge of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia — flanked by the South China Sea to the east and sharing borders with…

Warsaw, the capital of Poland, sits on the Vistula River in the heart of the North European Plain — exactly the flat, open corridor between the Baltic Sea to the north and the Carpathian Mountains…

The launch site is Baikonur Cosmodrome, located in what is now Kazakhstan — a vast, flat, semi-arid steppe basin lying between the Caspian Sea to the west and the former Aral Sea to the east, deep in…

This event unfolded across China — the world's most populous country, occupying the eastern portion of Asia between the Himalayas to the southwest, the Gobi Desert to the north, and the Pacific Ocean…

This event unfolded in Léopoldville — today called Kinshasa — the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, positioned deep in the Congo River basin at the heart of central Africa, exactly as…

This event is rooted in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, situated on the Potomac River along the Atlantic coastal plain, east of the Appalachian Mountains and roughly midway up…

This was Havana, Cuba — the island nation sitting in the Caribbean Sea just 90 miles south of the Florida peninsula, exactly where those reconnaissance flights detected the missiles. In 1962, U.S…

Boston, Massachusetts, on the northeastern Atlantic coast of the United States, is where Rachel Carson's Silent Spring was published in 1962 — exactly the densely populated eastern seaboard the title…

On 12 December 1963, Kenya became independent from British colonial rule, with Jomo Kenyatta becoming its first Prime Minister and later its first President. Kenya had been a British colony since the…

This is Kabul, the high-altitude capital of Afghanistan — a landlocked nation sitting in the heart of Asia, where the Hindu Kush mountains divide Central Asia from the Indian subcontinent, east of…

Bhopal sits inland on the Deccan Plateau in the state of Madhya Pradesh, well north of Sri Lanka in the heart of the Indian subcontinent — precisely the plateau city the disaster's location…

The Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant sits near Pripyat, in northern Ukraine — on the broad lowland plains east of Europe, north of the Black Sea, and just south of the border with Belarus. On April 26…

This is Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China — the immense paved plaza at the symbolic centre of the North China Plain, where the ancient imperial capital sits between the Taihang Mountains to the west…

This is Berlin, the capital of Germany, sitting in the broad North European Plain between the Rhine basin to the west and the Oder River — the natural boundary with Poland — to the east. On November…

This scene unfolded at Pushkin Square in Moscow, Russia — a city sitting on the vast East European Plain, roughly halfway between the Ural Mountains to the east and the Baltic Sea to the west. On…

This event unfolded in Moscow, Russia — the capital city sitting on the flat East European Plain, roughly equidistant between the Baltic Sea to the northwest and the Caspian Sea to the southeast, at…

Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, sits on the Potomac River along the eastern seaboard of North America — the continent that stretches from the Arctic tundra of Canada in the north…

This is Kigali, the capital of Rwanda — a densely hilled, landlocked country sitting on the high plateau between the Congo basin and the East African Rift Valley, almost exactly at the continent's…

Geneva, Switzerland — a landlocked city tucked between the Alps to the south and the Jura Mountains to the northwest, close to the borders of France and Germany — is where the World Trade…

Seattle, Washington, in the United States, is the city on Puget Sound — the deep inland sea carved into the Pacific Northwest coast, with the Cascade Range rising sharply to the east. In late 1999…