AP European History — 1789–Present flashcards
10 of 77 cards free to study here · 5 topics · the whole deck is built into Willys
Units 5–9 of AP European History — the French Revolution and Napoleon, industrialization and ideologies, nationalism and imperialism, the world wars and totalitarianism, and the Cold War and today's Europe — asked as cause and comparison questions.
Learn deck · part of AP European History · written against: College Board AP European History Course and Exam Description (nine units, c. 1450–present). Updated 2026-10-10.
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What long-term problems brought the French monarchy to crisis in 1789?Debt from wars, including aid to the American Revolution, a tax system in which the clergy and nobility paid little, Enlightenment criticism of privilege, and bad harvests that drove up bread prices in 1788–89 forced Louis XVI to call the Estates-General.Revolution and Reaction › French Revolution
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What was the Tennis Court Oath (June 1789)?Locked out of their meeting hall, deputies of the Third Estate, who had declared themselves the National Assembly, swore not to disband until they had written a constitution for France.Revolution and Reaction › French Revolution
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Why did continental Europe industrialize later than Britain?Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars disrupted trade, coal and iron were less accessible in many regions, guilds and internal tolls survived and capital was scarce; Belgium industrialized first, then governments sped the rest along with railways and tariffs.Industrialization › Spread of Industry
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What was the Zollverein, and why did it matter?A customs union led by Prussia from 1834 that removed tariffs among many German states, encouraging industry and trade and giving Prussia economic leadership over Germany before political unification.Industrialization › Spread of Industry
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How did Cavour and Garibaldi each contribute to Italian unification?Cavour, Piedmont-Sardinia's prime minister, used diplomacy and an alliance with France to drive Austria from much of the north (1859); Garibaldi's Red Shirts conquered Sicily and Naples (1860) and handed them to King Victor Emmanuel II.19th-Century Perspectives › Nationalism and Unification
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Which three wars did Bismarck use to unify Germany?Wars against Denmark (1864), Austria (1866) and France (1870–71); the German Empire was proclaimed at Versailles in January 1871.19th-Century Perspectives › Nationalism and Unification
Why it matters: the classic example of realpolitik. -
How did the assassination of Franz Ferdinand turn into a general European war in 1914?Austria-Hungary, with a German 'blank check' of support, issued Serbia an ultimatum and declared war; Russia mobilized to back Serbia, Germany declared war on Russia and France, and its invasion of Belgium brought Britain in.Global Conflicts › World War I and Revolution
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Why did the Western Front settle into trench warfare by late 1914?The Schlieffen Plan to knock out France quickly failed at the Marne, and machine guns, artillery and barbed wire favored defenders, so both sides dug in from the Channel to Switzerland.Global Conflicts › World War I and Revolution
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How did the Soviet Union build a bloc in eastern Europe after 1945?With the Red Army in occupation, communists took power through coalition governments, rigged elections and purges; the bloc was tied together by Comecon (1949) and the Warsaw Pact (1955).Cold War and Contemporary Europe › Cold War
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Why did the Soviets blockade West Berlin in 1948, and how did the West respond?Stalin cut land access to protest Western plans for a West German state and a new currency; the United States and Britain airlifted supplies for about a year until he lifted the blockade.Cold War and Contemporary Europe › Cold War
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About these cards
Review status: Second-reader reviewed, with corrections applied.
Checked against:
- Topic outline follows the College Board AP European History Course and Exam Description (effective Fall 2026), Units 5–9; no text copied.
- OpenStax World History, Volume 2, consulted as a reference; no text copied.
- Dates, documents and figures also checked against the Liberty, Equality, Fraternity French Revolution archive (Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media and American Social History Project), Pius VI's Charitas (1791), the Avalon Project (Yale Law School), the BYU World War I Document Archive, the Marxists Internet Archive, the National Army Museum, the U.S. State Department's Office of the Historian, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the ICTY and IRMCT, europa.eu (CC BY 4.0), and GOV.UK and legislation.gov.uk (Open Government Licence v3.0); reference only, no text copied.
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