AP Art History, AP exams, 6%

Africa, 1100-1980 C.E.

Fourteen works span West, Central, East, and Southern Africa, including architecture, court arts, masks, and power objects. Many works are performative — activated in ceremony, worn, or consulted — so form, material, and use are inseparable. Court patronage and the authority of rulers recur across regions.

Position: 6 of 10 content areas
Published weighting: 6% in the official framework
Topics covered: 5 topics in this guide

What is covered

Topics inside this content area.

These topics describe the scope students most often review for this part of AP Art History. Treat them as a study checklist rather than an exhaustive list of what a single exam form can sample.

Architecture and urbanism: Structures such as the Great Mosque of Djenné and the stone walls of Great Zimbabwe, and their maintenance traditions.
Court arts and royal authority: Metal, ivory, and wooden works made for rulers, including commemorative plaques and royal portraits.
Masquerade and performance: Masks understood as part of costume, music, and movement rather than as standalone sculpture.
Power objects and mediation: Figures activated by specialists to resolve disputes, heal, or enforce agreements.
Memory and record keeping: Objects that store history and lineage, showing how communities preserved knowledge without writing.

Study tips

How to practice Africa.

Section-specific guidance that follows from how this material is usually tested.

Record the culture, region, and material for each work in one line and rehearse them together.
Describe masks in performance context; static description loses the evidence rubrics ask for.
Prepare one African work you could confidently pair with a European or Asian work for comparison essays.

Where this fits

Africa, 1100-1980 C.E. is 6 of 10 content areas in the AP Art History guide, and it carries a published weighting of 6% in the official framework. Use the full guide to balance it against everything else you have to review.

Back to the AP Art History guide Official exam information

Sample Africa questions

Practice questions, not yet expert-reviewed

Original practice questions written to the published framework for this section. No expert has reviewed them, and they are not taken from any official exam. Try each one before you open the answer.

Question 1Foundational
The Great Mosque of Djenné in Mali, whose walls bristle with projecting palm-wood beams, is built of what material that the community replasters together each year?
1. ASun-dried mud brick
2. BFired brick
3. CCoral stone
4. DCut sandstone
Show answer
Answer: A. Sun-dried mud brick
Djenné is built of sun-dried earthen brick coated in mud plaster, and the projecting toron beams serve as permanent scaffolding for the annual replastering festival. Fired brick is the tempting answer for a durable-looking building, but firing would remove exactly the maintenance tradition that ties the community to the mosque.
Key insight: At Djenné the building is renewed by the community every year, so upkeep is part of the work's meaning.
Question 2Foundational
How is a Kongo nkisi n'kondi power figure activated when a community brings a dispute or an oath before it?
1. ANails and blades are driven into it
2. BIt is washed in white kaolin clay
3. CIt is buried beneath a doorway
4. DOfferings are burned inside it
Show answer
Answer: A. Nails and blades are driven into it
Each nail or blade hammered into an nkisi n'kondi by a ritual specialist marks an agreement, an accusation, or an oath, so the accumulated metal is a record of community use. Burying the figure would remove it from the public, consultative role that gives this object type its meaning.
Key insight: The nails are not decoration but a visible archive of the disputes the figure has been asked to enforce.
Question 3Intermediate
By what metalworking process were the brass plaques that once covered the pillars of the Oba's palace in Benin City produced?
1. ALost-wax casting
2. BSand casting
3. CRepoussé hammering
4. DCold forging
Show answer
Answer: A. Lost-wax casting
Benin guild casters modeled the plaques in wax over a clay core, encased them, melted out the wax, and poured in molten brass, a technique known as lost-wax casting. Repoussé is the closest competing metal technique but it works a sheet from behind with hammers rather than pouring metal into a mold, and it cannot produce the deep relief and undercuts of these plaques.
Key insight: Lost-wax casting was controlled by royal guilds, so the technique itself is evidence of centralized court patronage.
Question 4Intermediate
What is the function of a Luba lukasa, a hand-held wooden board studded with beads and shells and read by a trained specialist?
1. AA memory device for reciting royal history
2. BA game board for court competitions
3. CA loom part for weaving raffia cloth
4. DA tray for casting divination seeds
Show answer
Answer: A. A memory device for reciting royal history
Members of the Luba Mbudye association read the placement, color, and size of the beads on a lukasa as prompts for reciting genealogies, migrations, and the origins of kingship. A divination tray is the tempting alternative because it is also handled by a specialist, but divination seeks new answers while the lukasa recalls established history.
Key insight: The lukasa shows that record keeping does not require writing; it requires an agreed system and a trained reader.
Question 5Advanced
Which named Yoruba sculptor, working in Nigeria in the early twentieth century, carved the veranda post showing an enthroned king with his senior wife standing behind and above him?
1. AOlowe of Ise
2. BAreogun of Osi
3. CBamgboye of Odo-Owa
4. DOsei Bonsu
Show answer
Answer: A. Olowe of Ise
Olowe of Ise is one of the few African sculptors of his generation known by name, and his veranda posts are recognized by elongated proportions, open space around the figures, and the towering senior wife who supports the king. Osei Bonsu is a genuine early twentieth-century carver, but he was Asante in Ghana rather than Yoruba in Nigeria.
Key insight: Naming Olowe of Ise pushes back on the idea that African art is anonymous; individual hands were known and sought after.

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Africa, 1100-1980 C.E.