Unit 3: The Renaissance – Flashcards

Which situation contributed most to the beginning of the Renaissance?
a. Strong rulers censored new ideas.
b. Europe became increasingly isolated from other regions.
c. The emphasis on religious uniformity increased.
d. A wealthy class that supported the arts emerged.
e. Europe began to discover the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas.

In contrast to most of Europe, marriages in Italian Renaissance cities
a. occurred when both individuals were very young.
b. tended to be increasingly rare.
c. tended to take place between older men who had made their fortune and much younger women.
d. were generally longer lasting due to increased wealth and improved living conditions.
e. were based on romantic love.

“Vernacular” is a term used to describe

Select one:
a. the frame of the human skeleton.
b. mercenary warfare.
c. Latin translations.
d. local language.
e. philosophical emphasis

Renaissance humanists sought virtue in

Select one:
a. activities performed in solitude.
b. public performance of civic duties.
c. amassing immense fortunes through business success.
d. rebuilding Greek and Roman ruins.
e. justifying Christian theology.

By 1500 the leading patrons of intellectual and artistic pursuits were

Select one:
a. clergymen.
b. the feudal nobility.
c. monarchs.
d. condottieri.
e. wealthy bourgeoisie.

The first major writer to embody a number of the characteristics of the Renaissance was

Select one:
a. Petrarch.
b. Villehardouin.
c. Giovanni Boccaccio.
d. Dante Alighieri.
e. Niccoli Machiavelli.

During the Renaissance, the most widely read book of manners for the wealthy was

Select one:
a. The Prince by Machiavelli.
b. Stanze Della Giostra De Giuliano de Medici by Poliziano.
c. The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri.
d. Orlando Furioso by Ariosto.
e. The Book of the Courtier by Castiglione.

Popular anti-clericalism, a major theme of Renaissance literature, was evident in

Select one:
a. Boccaccio’s Decameron
b. Henry VIII’s Defense of the Seven Sacraments.
c. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica.
d. Copernicus’ The Revolutions of the Heavenly Bodies.
e. Pope Leo X’s Exsurge Domine.

What was the main theme of Machiavelli’s The Prince?

Select one:
a. The survival of the state depends on its adherence to moral principles.
b. Human nature strives naturally to justice and religion
c. The ruler is God’s lieutenant on earth.
d. The pope, as vicar of Christ, has ultimate authority.
e. The survival of the state must take precedence over moral law.

Machiavelli’s The Prince represented an attempt to find ways to

Select one:
a. blend medieval and Renaissance scholarship.
b. unify the entire Italian peninsula under a powerful ruler.
c. convince the French to intercede in Italian affairs on behalf of his native Florence.
d. show how the rule of princes was clearly inferior to republican forms of government.
e. show how a Christian prince can use religious precepts as a moral guide.

The Italian humanist who is generally given credit for the view that his own times were the “dawn of a new era,” and an improvement over the Dark Ages was

Select one:
a. Francesco Petrarch.
b. Pico della Miranadola.
c. Baldassare Castiglione.
d. Lorenza Valla.
e. Michel Cervantes.

Which of the following best describes the political and economic environment of much of fifteenth century Italy?

Select one:
a. a few large states dominated by a wealthy landed nobility
b. many independent city-states with prosperous merchant oligarchies
c. a strong unified Italian monarchy that patronized the arts
d. control of most of Italy by the Pope, who encouraged mercantile development
e. support of the arts in Italy by the kings of France and the Holy Roman Emperors

In the 15th century Lorenzo Valla proved that the Donation of Constantine was a forgery by

Select one:
a. showing that the paper was too new to be from the time of Constantine.
b. providing other documents that contradicted what was supposedly stated in the Donation.
c. revealing papal documents that discussed the forged nature of the document.
d. showing that the language used in the document was not in use in the age of Constantine.
e. guessing that Constantine never would have wanted to leave the West to the Church.

“The art of printing is very useful insofar as it furthers the circulation of useful…books but it can be very harmful if it is permitted to widen the influence of pernicious works. It will therefore be necessary to maintain full control over the printers so that they may be prevented from bringing into print writings which are antagonistic to the Catholic faith.”

This statement was most likely authored by

Select one:
a. Henry VIII of England
b. John Hus
c. John Wycliff
d. Rabelais
e. Pope Alexander VI

The first sculptor of the Renaissance was

Select one:
a. Andrea Palleadio.
b. Donatello.
c. Benvenuto Cellini.
d. Vergerio.
e. Brunelleschi

The statue of David as well as The Pieta were creations of

Select one:
a. Leonardo da Vinci.
b. Giorgio Maggiore.
c. Michelangelo Buonarotti.
d. Albrecht Durer.
e. Baldisare Castiglione.

The Platonic Academy, the intellectual center of Florence, was subsidized by

Select one:
a. Pope Sixtus VI.
b. Lorenzo the Magnificent, Medici.
c. Desiderius Erasmus.
d. Giovanni Palestrina.
e. Manuel Chrysoloras.

In art, chiaroscuro refers to

Select one:
a. the use of perspective in painting.
b. the use of oil paints.
c. the technique of stressing contrasts of light and shade.
d. pigments applied to wet plaster on a wall.
e. the commissioning of artists by wealthy patrons.

Oil paints were developed by the artists of

Select one:
a. France.
b. Flanders.
c. Germany.
d. Italy.
e. Spain.

“Thus all artists are under a great and permanent obligation to Michelangelo, seeing that he broke the bonds and chains that had previously confined them to the creation of traditional forms.” Vasari, Lives of the Artists (1550)

In this quote, Vasari was expressing the contemporary view that

Select one:
a. by the early Renaissance, traditional art forms had become dated.
b. all honest work, including oil painting, was a “holy calling”.
c. artists should be honored as geniuses who create beautiful new works.
d. great art brought fame to the artist, his patron, and his city-state.
e. only during the Renaissance had truly beautiful art been created.

Christian humanism of the sixteenth century can be characterized as which of the following?

Select one:
a. a sustained attack on the power of the Catholic Church.
b. an attack on the secularism of the Italian Renaissance.
c. a movement toward an economy based on Christian socialism.
d. an effort to promote personal spirituality through education.
e. a last stand by the papacy to stop the Protestant Reformation.

The “Prince of Humanists,” who wrote In Praise of Folly as a criticism of the clergy and the abuses of the Christian Church was

Select one:
a. Petrarch
b. Pico della Mirandola
c. Michel de Montaigne
d. Cervantes
e. Desiderius Erasmus

The cities of northern Italy differed from most of the rest of Europe in all of the following ways EXCEPT

Select one:
a. they continued to be under the effective control of the nobility
b. their wealth came from commerce and industry
c. they had more regular contact with countries outside of Europe
d. they had more visible reminders of Rome’s grandeur than most other parts of Europe
e. their internal politics meant that they had to regularly take into account the interests of
small merchants and artisans

In Germany, England, and Poland the Renaissance was centered at the

Select one:
a. universities.
b. royal courts.
c. homes of great merchants.
d. major seaports.
e. churches.

Which of the following describes a major difference between Northern humanists and Italian humanists?

Select one:
a. Italian humanists focused on human intellect and achievements, whereas Northern humanists concentrated on nature and emotion.
b. Italian humanists focused on national consciousness, whereas Northern humanists rejected politics.
c. Italian humanists viewed human nature as corrupt and weak, whereas Northern humanists viewed human nature as generally good.
d. Both concentrated on spiritual concerns, but Northern humanists also focused on secular matters.
e. Both looked to classical sources, but Northern humanists also emphasized Christian sources.

Renaissance humanism was a threat to the Church because it

Select one:
a. espoused atheism.
b. denounced scholasticism.
c. denounced Neoplatonism.
d. emphasized a return to the original sources of Christianity.
e. advanced an amoral philosophy.

At the core of Francios Rabelais’ humanist was

Select one:
a. a faith in the fundamental goodness of people and the need to let them be free to
arrange their lives as they please
b. a faith in the fundamental goodness of institutions and their ability to mold better
Individuals
c. the need to convert spontaneous creativity to logical, precisely formulated doctrine
d. a disillusionment with human nature and human institutions
e. a fear of a vengeful God

Which of the following would most likely be described as l’uomo universal (universal man)?

Select one:
a. Pope Leo X
b. Leonardo da Vinci
c. Sir Thomas More
d. Niccoli Machiavelli
e. Lorenzo de Medici

The central thesis of Pico della Mirandola’s Oration on the Dignity of Man was

Select one:
a. man’s dignity comes from the fact that God loved man so intensely that he became
human and died for his sins.
b. a challenge to papal authority after the disastrous fourteenth century.
c. a defense of republican government against the threat posed by the condottieri.
d. that God gave man the freedom to shape his own being.
e. that the human body was beautiful and should be portrayed in its natural state.

A central theme in the work of Shakespeare was

Select one:
a. the striking contradiction between a person’s nobility and his capacity for evil and self-destruction.
b. the unpredictable consequences of fortune.
c. that love will always win.
d. despite elaborate facades people are fundamentally simple and well-meaning.
e. that tragedy is the main source of nobility.

Renaissance thinkers most commonly believed that women

Select one:
a. should get the same education as men
b. should be protected from the new learning because of their natural inclination toward religion.
c. should receive a humanist education with the exception of rhetoric since women were not suited for leadership roles.
d. possessed reason but did not possess the ability to use it effectively.
e. presented the ideals of education and refinement towards which men should aspire.

“Many virtues of the mind are as necessary to a woman as to a man, but I do think that beauty is more necessary to her than to the Courtier, for truly that woman lacks much who lacks beauty. In a Lady who lives at court a certain pleasing affability is becoming above all else, whereby she will be able to entertain graciously every kind of man with agreeable and attractive conversation.”

This quote from Castiglione’s Book of the Courtier (1527) demonstrates that in terms of their status during the Renaissance, women

Select one:
a. made significant gains in positions of political power.
b. gained educationally but were often treated as objects.
c. often dominated the intellectual life of Renaissance salons.
d. were encouraged to engage in artistic and intellectual pursuits.
e. were the slaves of their husbands and could be bought and sold.

Italian society differed from the rest of Europe during the Renaissance in which of the following ways?

Select one:
a. Strong traditions of kingship
b. Political unity centered on the papacy
c. The number of urban commercial centers
d. The rapid pace of agricultural innovation
e. Matriarchal political leadership

In The City of Ladies, Christine de Pizan argued that

Select one:
a. the Virgin Mary rehabilitated the nature of all women, making women in all respects equal to men.
b. “the perfection of conduct and virtues” is more important than gender, thus, men and
women do not differ in their social roles.
c. just as Augustine’s City of God would outlast “the City of Man,” so the City of
Ladies will surpass male accomplishments.
d. in the Renaissance environment women are the de facto rulers of the more advanced society.
e. “the perfection of conduct and virtues” is more important than gender, however, men
and women still have distinctly different roles in society.

The political strength of the Medici family in Florence was initially based on

Select one:
a. a close alliance with the papacy.
b. the influence and wealth of their bank.
c. the support of the lower classes.
d. the support of a powerful citizen militia.
e. their tenure in various municipal offices.

Which of the following best characterizes Renaissance humanists?

Select one:
a. They rejected Christian perspectives.
b. They concentrated on the study of humans from a biological perspective.
c. They rejected writers of the pre-Christian period.
d. They emphasized rhetoric based on classical models.
e. They maintained the principles of medieval Scholasticism.

Which of the following was a major factor in the spread of humanist culture in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries?

Select one:
a. The creation of new religious orders by the papacy
b. Annual meetings of humanist scholars in Italy
c. A major increase in government funding for elementary education
d. The development of the printing press
e. The sale of basic textbooks written in the vernacular

Which of the following characterized painting and sculpture during the Renaissance?

Select one:
a. Reliance on Gothic themes and styles
b. Cold and one-dimensional depictions of myths
c. The human body presented in naturalistic terms
d. Inaccurate and unrealistic representations
e. Exclusively secular themes

In which area did the status of women rise and opportunities for them increase the most during the Renaissance?

Select one:
a. types of occupations help
b. influence on society’s values
c. access to education
d. political power
e. ownership of property