ARTH101 Midterm

What do art historians call the courses of dressed stones used in the construction of the Great Pyramids?

Ashlar masonry

What is the name of the chancellor/architect-engineer who served during the reign of Hatshepsut?

Senenmut

What accounts for the similarity of the statue of Mentuemhet to the figure of Menkaure in the statue of Menkaure and Khamerernebty?

The Egyptian canon

Why did the Sumerians refer to their temples as "waiting rooms"?

This was where priests stood to await the appearances of the divinity.

Which of the following is not thought to be the function of the megalithic monument at Stonehenge?

A historical memorial

What is the most likely function of the Neolithic site of Göbekli Tepe?

A religious center

Where do scientists believe humankind originated?

Africa

Which settlement is associated with the beginning of large-scale, or monumental, sculpture?

Ain Ghazal

Which pharaoh abandoned the worship of the multitude of Egyptian gods in favor of Aton?

Akhenaton

What is the seeming contradiction in the paintings of the Chauvet cave?

Although these are archaeologically the oldest Paleolithic paintings, they exhibit advanced painting features and narrative content.

At Persepolis, the style of the processional reliefs depicting representatives of many nations is highly reminiscent of which contemporaneous culture?

Archaic Greece

How was the sole god of Akhenaton represented in Egyptian art?

As a sun disk

Which people ruled an empire extending from the Persian Gulf to Asia Minor in the first half of the first millennium BCE?

Assyrians

What is the purpose of the Stele of the Vultures, seen here?

Commemoration of a victory

What pictorial narrative convention is not present on the Warka Vase?

Descriptive inscriptions

Who of the following was not a Fourth Dynasty pharaoh?

Djoser

What is the most famous Sumerian work of literature?

Epic of Gilgamesh

What was the primary purpose of most Egyptian funerary art?

Equating the deceased's existence in the afterlife to life on earth

Which phrase is often used to describe Mesopotamia?

Fertile Crescent

What do art historians suspect is the purpose of the Venus of Willendorf?

Fertility figure

The Eshnunna votive statuettes and the statue of Napir-Asu share what formal characteristics?

Frontality and cylindrical volume

Which falcon-headed god was the son of Osiris and hunted down his father's murderer, Seth?

Horus

Who is the first known named artist, and who was his patron?

Imhotep and Djoser

What was the primary objective of mummification?

Immortality

Why is the inferred purpose of the twisted perspective used to depict animals in the Lascaux caves?

It allows a complete depiction of the concept of the animal.

What neighboring kingdom, mentioned in Early Kingdom texts, later conquered Egypt?

Kush

The reliefs from the palace at Ninevah show Ashurbanipal hunting which creature?

Lion

The human with feline head discovered in Hohlenstein-Stadel, Germany, is carved from what material?

Mammoth ivory

What is the most salient feature of the climatic environment of northern Europe around 9000 BCE?

Melting ice

What transitional period occurred just before Europe became climatically, geographically, and biologically much as it is today?

Mesolithic era

In what region did the change from hunter-gatherer to farmer-herder first occur?

Mesopotamia

Which component is lacking from large Neolithic fortifications and megalithic structures?

Mortar

Where is the Apollo 11 Cave located?

Namibia

What was the lifeline of ancient Egypt?

Nile River

What is the title and subject of the artwork shown here?

Palette of Narmer, showing the events of the unification of Egypt

What architectural technique is used at the far-flung Neolithic sites of Hagar Qim and Stonehenge?

Post and lintel

What was the purpose of the Assyrian lamassu?

Protection

What is the name of the sculptural element in the form of a bull shown here?

Protome

Which empire made Egypt one of its province after 30 BCE?

Rome

What is the most likely purpose of the "negative" handprints appearing in some Paleolithic caves?

Signatures

In what country is the Altamira Cave located?

Spain

Which group is credited with developing the first known writing system?

Sumerians

What does the inscription on the statue of Queen Napir-Asu tell us?

That her statue was intended as a permanent votive offering

What site did Leonard Woolley excavate in the 1920s in southern Mesopotamia?

The Royal Cemetery at Ur

What do art historians now believe was the model for the shape of the pyramids at Gizeh?

The ben-ben

Which two objects share decorative technique and materials?

The bull-headed harp and the Standard of Ur

What architectural form makes this temple at Hagar Qim especially noteworthy?

The combination of straight and curved forms

How and why does the style of the Amarna period depart from the traditional Egyptian canon?

The curving forms contradicted the rigid lines of the traditional Egyptian canon just as Akhenaton's new religion contradicted the old.

Which of the following is not an important milestone represented by the bronze head of an Akkadian ruler?

The figure is an accurately rendered portrait of a known historical figure.

What is the most likely explanation for the lack of consistent ground line, the different drawing techniques, and the overlapping figures in the cave paintings of the Paleolithic in Europe?

The paintings were done over many years by many different artists.

What Middle Kingdom form took on the function of the Old Kingdom mastabas?

The rock-cut tomb

What great human advance accounts for the Neolithic origins of metalwork, weaving, pottery, and simple clay records?

The settlement into organized societies around agriculture

What structure formed the nucleus of a Sumerian city?

The temple

How do the materials of the paintings from Çatal Höyük differ from Paleolithic paintings?

They are made using brushes on a prepared surface.

Why was foreign trade such an important activity for the Sumerians?

They had few natural resources.

Although cylinder seals originally had an administrative use—for specific individuals to verify and secure inventory—what is their value to contemporary art historians?

They provide details of everyday life.

What is the symbolism of the crowns worn by the king on the Narmer palette?

They refer to the unification of the kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt.

What was the purpose of Egyptian royal portraiture?

To highlight the divinity of the pharaoh

Anatolia, a region that stands between two continents, is a part of which modern country?

Turkey

What earlier architectural form does the stepped pyramid resemble in form but not purpose?

Ziggurat