It’s a word used routinely in relation to the American Civil War in social studies textbooks, but in my experience never taught explicitly in social studies classrooms, so maybe this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the adjective antebellum. This Latinism, as this half-page worksheet points out in its two-sentence reading (with two comprehension questions), means “before the war.”
If you think it will help, here is a word root exercise on the Latin root bell-.
If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.