Western Civilization I / Unit 11 WC1 1037 worked example, 60 to 90 seconds
Reading a Map of the Crusader States and the Reconquista
The idea
The exam's map shows either the Levant with four crusader states or Iberia with a moving frontier, and asks what a region is or when a line was drawn. The method for the Levant is a strip: four states down the coast from north to south, with Jerusalem at the bottom, and Muslim powers inland. The method for Iberia is a frontier moving south: Muslim Spain shrinking from almost the whole peninsula in seven eleven to Granada alone by the late thirteenth century.
In practice
Four questions. A coastal strip of shaded states with Jerusalem shaded: between ten ninety-nine and eleven eighty-seven, before Hattin. The same strip with Jerusalem unshaded: after eleven eighty-seven, when Saladin took it. An Iberian map with the Christian north holding Lisbon and the center but not Andalusia: after eleven forty-seven and before twelve twelve. An Iberian map with only Granada in Muslim hands: after the mid-thirteenth century and before fourteen ninety-two. A fifth: a Baltic map with a shaded state of monk-knights is the Teutonic Order after the twelve twenties.
Where people slip
The crusader states were coastal forts with hostile populations, the anchor says, so shading exaggerates their depth. And the Reconquista's line is not one date; check whether the map asks for the frontier after Las Navas, the sample question's moment, or later.
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