Western Civilizations Final Exam Study Sheet
The court in Geneva called the Consistory consisted of a combination of
church officials and elected members of the laity
When Luther visited the Vatican in 1510, he was struck by the
churches reliance on indulgences monies and the opulence of the papacy
In essence, chivalry was a
code of conduct espoused by chevaliers or knight
We know about the Greek rulers of Bactria and India primarily from
coins and popular tales
The Indo-European peoples were agents of
cultural penetration and engagement
Like Socrates, Alexander belonged to the Hellenistic Age because of his
extreme individuality and cosmopolitan interests.
One of Antony's greatest problems was that
few roman soldiers were willing to fight for a foreign queen
The purpose of the Statute of Laborers was to
fix wages to pre-plague rates
Like Mesopotamian society, Mesopotamian religion was
hierarchical
Sophocles' Antigone explores the nature of power and the danger of pride, or
hubris
The late eleventh century might be thought of as a critical take-off point for European
mobility and outreach
The three essential navigational tools on fifteenth-century ships were
portolan charts, magnetic compasses, and the astrolabe
The emperor Julian is known as an apostate because he
renounced his Christian faith.
The ideology of vassalage glorified
service and loyalty
Herodotus indirectly warned Athens about the dangers of
straying beyond its native land
The Archaic Age was never able to overcome the
stubborn independence of each polis.
The Dark Age of Greece is so-called because
the Greece of the period left few material traces.
The Protestant approach to the establishment of new Christian churches and forms of Christianity was to base them on
the apostolic or early Christian church
In the battle of Pharsalus in July 48 BCE, Caesar's army defeated that of
the senate
After the plague, the balance of power shifted from the countryside to the
towns
Among the factors leading to the sheer complexity of Roman politics was the
unfixed character of Rome's unwritten constitution
The first to give chivalric meaning and glory to the knight's role were the
vernacular poets of Provence in Southern France
Which early explorer was the first to proclaim that the lands across the Atlantic were previously unknown continents?
Amerigo Vespucci
Alfred the Great set a model for
Anglo Saxon Kingship
Constantine called a great church council that met at Nicaea in 325 to address a dispute over what doctrine?
Arianism
As the Roman imperial government disappeared from much of the west, who stepped in to act as the chief administrators of the shrinking cities of Europe?
Bishops
What New World territory did Portugal receive as a result of the terms of the Treaty of Tordesillas?
Brazil
How did the Romans during the reigns of the "five good emperors" find a way to overcome the inherent weakness of family rule?
By reaching outside the imperial family to adopt excellence
Luther's most critical theological insight was sola fide, "by faith alone", meaning that
Christians can do nothing to achieve salvation by their own merit or works, and that faith alone, as a pure gift from God brought salvation
The call for reform in western Christendom came first from the
Cluniacs
The century of imperial disorder that began with the accession of Commodus ended only with the rise of what emperor?
Diocletian
What was likely the greatest precondition for crusade?
Economic Upsurge
Why did Ptolemaic Egypt last the longest of the Hellenistic kingdoms?
Egypt was a governable kingdom whose wealth allowed it to remain militarily strong
William the Conqueror defeated King Harold at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, making William ruler of
England
What was the purpose of the Arsenal in Venice?
Equip and repair the republic's warships and merchant vessels
At the Marburg Colloquy, Luther and Zwingli found they had a great deal in common, but they could not reconcile their beliefs concerning the
Eucharist
Why did the European Renaissance have a more overtly religious cast to it than did the Italian Renaissance?
European humanists applied the critical spirit of humanism to the church and its doctrines
Where in Europe did strong monarchies develop in the High Middle Ages?
France and England
To what humanist from Florence is the development of renaissance individualism most closely linked?
Giovanni Pico della Mirandola
Why did Alexander and the creation of a wider Hellenistic world set religion on the move?
Greek soldiers and traders spread religions that had previously been restricted regionally.
The native people of the Canaries were called the
Guanches
How did Luther work to reinforce in his new church the idea that a person's faith was all that was truly important in achieving salvation?
He simplified church rituals and ornamentation
Why was Martin Luther unsatisfied as a monk?
He was tormented by the worry that he was a wretched sinner who would never achieve salvation
What was the paramount problem that Augustus never solved?
How to solve the problem of imperial succession
How did the Lycurgan code of life shape Sparta?
It militarized Spartan society.
Why did the Roman military machine operate so successfully?
It was driven by the individual's desire to achieve glory
When Columbus made landfall in a cluster of islands on October 12, 1492, he thought he had reached
Japan
Most French Huguenots were followers of
John Calvin
Why did King Philip IV lead a campaign to dissolve the Knights Templar?
King Phillip was heavily in debt to the order
State power in Egypt flowed to officials, including viziers, from the
King, and through him from the gods.
What were the three central ingredients of the Early Middle Ages in the west?
Late Roman civilization, Christianity, and the Germans
Renaissance humanism emphasized the study of what languages and literatures?
Latin and Greek
1. What people did the Romans focus on subduing after the defeat of the invading Gauls?
Latins
The most celebrated document to survive from the reign of Hammurabi is his famous
Law Code
Which of the following best describes works like The Travels of Sir John Mandeville?
Literary combinations of myth, history, and geography
The greatest poets of the last phase of the Republic were
Lucretius and Catullus
What was the most deadly challenge Native Americans faced as a result of the encounter with Europeans?
Microbes
Charles Martel's victory in 732 stopped the forward advance into Francia of the
Muslims from Spain
How did the Little Ice Age affect the Scandinavian settlements in Greenland?
Norse disappeared from Greenland.
The first German king to rule Italy was
Odovacar
What was German gem-cutter and goldsmith Johann Gutenberg's great achievement?
Perfection of a technology for the mass production of books
The single most important piece of evidence to bolster the Roman church's claim to primacy was the
Petrine authority
By the second millennium BCE, Mesopotamian scribes introduced into their writing signs for sounds, which are called
Phonograms
The two greatest Roman comic writers were
Plautus and Terence
Who crowned Charlemagne emperor?
Pope Leo
The first pope to return the papacy permanently to Rome was
Pope Martin V
The most centralized and economically successful regime of the Hellenistic kingdoms was the
Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt
When western Europe reached the point of its greatest disorganization in the sixth century, which of the following brought order to the chaos?
Religion
One feature of the Romanization of the Christian religion was the intertwining of
Roman, Greek, and Christian thought
How did the city-state of Rome succeed where the Etruscan and Greek cities failed?
Rome became a city that dominated and incorporated surrounding lands and peoples.
Why did medieval people revere saints?
Saints seemed to offer supernatural protection
Which European monarchy led the way in establishing an overseas territorial empire?
Spain
In having defined territories and representative assemblies, the monarchies of France and England were on their way toward
Statehood
What does the word "Islam" mean?
Submission to the will of God
What were Luther's critical starting points in securing secular support for his religious movement?
Support from the elector of Saxony and deference to political authority
During the build-up to the Peloponnesian War, the Spartans and their allies claimed what about the Athenians?
The Athenian drive for imperial dominance violated the legitimate rights of other Greek states.
Which later Hellenistic philosophical movement advocated for individual responsibility, individual action, and the pursuit of virtue?
The Stoics
Why were powerful churchmen and monarchs bound to infringe upon one another's authority in the medieval world?
The church had become politicized and the monarchy sanctified
What did medieval and renaissance popes depend on to maintain their relative political autonomy?
The income and power they drew from the Papal States
What dramatic transformation did the book undergo between 1150 and 1250?
The large, early medieval codex gradually gave way to smaller, portable books
Which of the following most contributed to the anxieties of Greeks in the early Hellenistic Ages?
The need to look after oneself, spiritually and materially.
What was the goal of the Spanish method of colonization?
The systematic military takeover of a territory, in order to establish permanent settlements
1. Why did the Hebrew civilization endure and remain largely immune to assimilation, unlike the other civilizations of the early ancient world?
They developed a singular religious identity and core beliefs.
How did the ecstatic visions of people such as Teresa of Ávila and John of the Cross further the Catholic Reformation?
They inspired a popular renewal of belief in the sanctity of monks and nuns and the holiness of the celibate life
Which of the following statements about Roman traders in the east is the most accurate?
They often settled, married Greek women, and achieved prominent roles in society
What did western monarchs strive to achieve in the mid-fifteenth century as they reformed their state bureaucracies?
To centralize authority under their control
What was Hannibal's plan during the Second Punic War?
To invade Italy and win over Rome's Italian allies
Why did kings and magnates have an interest in promoting towns and cities in their realms?
Towns and cities lay outside the direct control of nobles or could be dislodged from their control
The War of the Roses led to the foundation of what dynasty in England.
Tudor
The first state in Europe to establish banks was
Venice
The three great Latin poets of the Augustan age were
Virgil, Horace, and Ovid
Why did the agreements and shared interests of the Roman peoples break down in the Late Roman Republic?
What worked for city-state worked less well for the governance of a vast territory
During the Dark Age of Greece, the contraction of the eastern Mediterranean economy meant that
an economy based on aggressive sea trade was no longer sustainable.
The Medici and Florence were at the forefront of the formative development of
banking
The late medieval monarchs of France, England, and Spain headed toward new methods and goals of government by
bureaucratizing their governments.
By what date had most of the animals upon which humans depend been domesticated?
2500 BCE
Abelard's Sic et Non is an extraordinary example of what method of learning?
A dialectical method that questioned received wisdom
What did John of Salisbury and the intellectuals that he found in Paris seek to achieve?
A rational explanation of the world that reflected the divine will
What assisted the drive toward centralization and state control during the High Middle Ages?
A strong bureaucracy