OCR GCSE History B key terms

People handed over as security that an agreement would be kept.

A member of the king’s elite fighting force. English housecarls fought on foot and could form a defensive shield wall.

An institution where people regarded as idle or disorderly could be confined and made to work.

A call for members of the local community to pursue and help capture a suspected criminal.

The title of the Aztec emperor, meaning ‘Great Speaker’. The emperor stood above the other rulers and nobles in the political hierarchy.

A French Protestant, many of whom fled religious persecution in early modern France.

The Aztec god associated with the sun and war, and the patron god of the capital, Tenochtitlan.

The main body of a ship, which encloses its interior and keeps it afloat.

Basic rights and freedoms that belong to every person.

A parliament in which no single political party has an overall majority of seats.

A possible explanation that can be tested against evidence.

The ‘House of Worship’ built by Akbar at Fatehpur Sikri in 1575, where he hosted religious discussions.

An Elizabethan label for people considered capable of working but believed to be unwilling to do so.

Movement into a country to live there.

The desire to extend a country’s power overseas by claiming territory, establishing colonies or controlling trade.

The ruler’s power to command obedience and enforce decisions across an empire.

Support for extending or maintaining a country’s power over other territories and peoples.

Money and precious metals held by the government to fund its activities.

Keeping someone confined in a prison; in medieval England this was chiefly used to hold accused people awaiting trial.

A worker bound by a contract to serve for a fixed period, often in exchange for the cost of their passage overseas.

Support for Indians gaining greater control over their own government, ranging from demands for increased self-government to an end to British rule.

The 1830 US law supporting President Andrew Jackson's policy of relocating eastern Indigenous nations west of the Mississippi River.

The name used by the US government for land west of the Mississippi River designated for relocated Indigenous peoples, in what later became Oklahoma.

The original inhabitants of a region and their descendants; in the American West, these included many distinct peoples with their own territories and societies.

Government through existing local rulers and institutions rather than direct administration of every community by the ruling power.

The repeated teaching of a set of beliefs so that people accept them without questioning them.

The growth of manufacturing using machinery and factories, with an increasing share of economic activity based on industry rather than agriculture.