Deck 13: The Renaissance

Question 1

Renaissance means:

A) New thought
B) Enlightenment
C) Rebirth
D) New Life

Answer 1

C

Question 2

The rallying cry of the Renaissance was Ad Fontes. This means:

A) To the Sources
B) To the foundations
C) To the Fundamentals
D) The author says that it is untranslatable

Answer 2

A

Question 3

Culturally, what did the Renaissance recognize in the classical texts they found?

A) A way to live poetically
B) Different cultural assumptions that allowed them to forge a different view of humanity
C) New possibilities for a whole new legal code
D) Lasting values in contrast to their ever-changing values

Answer 3

B

Question 4

What was happening politically in the Renaissance period?

A) The pope became even more embroiled in political intrigue
B) Monarchs began defecting from Christianity
C) The power of monarchs became increasingly muted
D) Kingdoms became consolidated

Question 5

What was the relationship between the Spanish crown and their Muslim and Jewish populations?

A) Once Ferdinand became king, he lifted all bans against Muslims and Jews
B) Muslims and Jews were forced to convert or emigrate
C) Muslim scholarship blossomed, while Jewish scholarship deteriorated
D) Muslims and Jews flooded into Spain

Question 6

What characterizes the Byzantine Church during the Middle Ages and Renaissance periods:

A) They became theologically radical
B) They increasingly became apocalyptic
C) They looked inward and backward
D) They began to cooperate with Muslims to form a new type of orthodoxy

Question 7

The Renaissance was spurred on the most by which of the following technical innovation?

A) The invention of paper
B) The new ability to build roads
C) The clock
D) The printing press

Question 8

Renaissance humanism represented:

A) Those who wanted to separate church and state
B) A celebration of the human subject
C) A rejection of God and a refocus on humanity
D) A late medieval atheism movement

Question 9

What does anthropocentric mean?

A) Human centered
B) Circling the Divine
C) Living humanely
D) Searching for truth

Question 10

What was the relationship between Renaissance thinkers, artists, and poets to the classical world?

A) They rejected it as antiquarian
B) They embraced it
C) They studied it diligently, only to realize it represented something they could not adopt
D) They realized that although it was good for rethinking law, it ultimately could not advance their own cultural interests

Question 11

What did Lorenzo Valla discover by using Renaissance literary criticism?

A) The Bible was filled with errors
B) The divine right of kings was unjustified by ancient documents
C) Medieval Latin was virtually incomprehensible
D) The Donation of Constantine was a forgery

Question 12

How did Renaissance architecture differ from that of the Middle Ages?

A) It rejected the gothic model and emphasized symmetry and proportion
B) It advanced new designs, such as cathedral spires
C) It created new forms for even larger, more elevated churches
D) It advanced centrality and distinction to create a new style

Question 13

How did the author contrast medieval from Renaissance artists?

A) Renaissance artists now became funded by the state
B) Renaissance artists tended to hide their fame, so as to glorify God and the church
C) Renaissance artists became famous
D) Renaissance artists distained perspective

Question 14

How were Renaissance maps different from medieval maps?

A) They were filled with theological symbolism
B) They were far more accurate
C) They intended to highlight the explorers who developed them
D) They now had to have their sponsor commended at the bottom of the map

Question 15

What does the discovery of perspective refer to?

A) Depicting the world and persons with accuracy
B) Understanding one's own culture by exploring others
C) Knowing one's inner self as a way of celebrating humanity as a whole
D) Seeking objectivity in knowledge

Question 16

Avignon became:

A) The new center for Renaissance art
B) The residence of the pope
C) The height of French culture
D) The French province where most of Renaissance artists and architects came from

Question 17

What did the Council of Constance do?

A) It demanded that all bishops had to submit to the pope
B) It declared Renaissance art to be morally heinous
C) It proclaimed that all monarchs were subject to the pope
D) It deposed three simultaneous popes and elected a replacement

Question 18

What is conciliarism?

A) The claim that councils had ultimate church authority
B) A form of church democracy
C) A movement to unite the Roman and Byzantine churches
D) The position that no form of government is legitimate unless it conforms to Rome

Question 19

Were popes supportive of the Renaissance?

A) Yes, eventually, but initially they condemned it as a heresy
B) Yes, from start to finish
C) No, it formed the cultural conditions that constantly challenged the papacy
D) No, they saw it as a way to humiliate the sacred traditions

Question 20

The emphasis of the northern Renaissance was:

A) High art
B) Constructive architecture
C) Classical texts
D) Political reform

Question 21

What was unique about Erasmus's Handbook for the Christian Soldier?

A) It lampooned biblical meditations
B) It provided Christian elite with their own special piety
C) It challenged medieval practices and was uninterested in the sacraments
D) It was never printed, but was disseminated by hand copies

Question 22

What does Vulgate refer to?

A) A group of scholars who lampooned the institutional church
B) A college Renaissance society
C) The Latin version of the Bible
D) A group of Christians highly criticized by Rome for challenging the institution

Question 23

Who was John Wycliffe?

A) The archbishop of Canterbury who wrote Canterbury Tales
B) The archbishop of Canterbury who proclaimed England as a national church
C) The eventual reforming King John III who reformed English monasteries
D) An English priest and scholar who challenged the institutional church

Question 24

Did John Wycliffe and Jan Hus both challenge transubstantiation (literal change of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ)?

A) Yes, Christ dwelt along with the bread and wine
B) Yes, though for Wycliffe this was a theological problem and for Hus a philosophical one
C) No, Wycliffe challenged it, but Hus embraced it
D) No, Hus argued only for a symbolic presence, but Wycliffe embraced the doctrine

Question 25

Did John Wycliffe and Jan Hus both advocate for the Bible to be in the people's language?

A) Yes, they argued that this would give people greater access
B) Yes, but Hus insisted that the original Greek be proclaimed during Eucharist
C) No, Wycliffe did, but Hus did not
D) No, they both thought it was important, but Wycliffe believed they people were not ready for it

Question 26

What happened to Jan Hus?

A) He was made the archbishop of Bohemia
B) He became Pope Julius IV
C) He was burned at the stake
D) He fled to Amsterdam and was celebrated as the first great reformer

Question 27

What does the bonfire of the vanities refer to?

A) A large trial in Rome that resulted in a mass burning of heretics
B) Florentine citizens collectively burning immoral or vain items
C) Burning of the Castle of Florence where the Medici family lived
D) The mass burning of all classical books in Vienna

Question 28

Who was Ximenes de Cisneros?

A) A Spanish monarch who tried to separate Spain from the Roman Catholic Church
B) A reforming cardinal in Spain
C) A Spanish reformer who tried to undermine the papacy
D) A Spanish farmer who created the greatest land-reform project of the premodern era

Question 29

What is an oratory?

A) A new kind of Spanish monastery
B) A Bible that has several languages side-by-side
C) A form of debate intended for reform of the church
D) An association of priests, particularly interested in church reform

Question 30

According to the author, how successful were the reforms of Pope Paul III?

A) Initially, they were wildly successful, but failed as soon as he died
B) They collapsed due to cardinals' infighting
C) His reform efforts were modest
D) The author says that he never really intended any reform at all

Question 31

Dante Alighieri wrote his Divine Comedy as a way to criticize the Renaissance.

Question 32

In the Renaissance, scholars realized that their own culture was strikingly similar to that of the classical period.

Question 33

Spain only united when Ferdinand and Isabella married.

Question 34

Gutenberg's great invention was the moveable type.

Question 35

Renaissance thinkers felt free to draw even from texts and images of pagan deities.

Question 36

Renaissance thinkers came to realize that Cicero's works were a forgery.

Question 37

The gothic cathedral was regularly considered the height of Renaissance architecture. .

Question 38

The Donation of Constantine was considered one of the greatest pieces of classical form.

Question 39

Renaissance artists were far more famous than medieval artists.

Question 40

The upshot of the Council of Pisa was that there were now supposedly three popes at one time.

Question 41

The author claims that the spirit of conciliarism has died in the Catholic Church.

Question 42

Popes tried in vain to keep the Renaissance out of Rome.

Question 43

The northern Renaissance was more interested in biblical studies than the Southern Renaissance.

Question 44

Erasmus of Rotterdam was one of the greatest challengers to Renaissance scholarship.

Question 45

Jerome's Latin translation of the Bible depicted Moses as wearing horns.

Question 46

As noted in this chapter, the Middle Ages can be distinguished from the Renaissance by the shift in focus from the community to the individual. What are some of the assets and liabilities of such a shift?

Question 47

Given that some of the reform voices in the Renaissance taught things at variance than what the church historically believed, do you think they were treated fairly? Why or why not?

Question 48

The author notes that the medieval hero was Francis of Assisi, "a poor, simple saint who fasted assiduously, placed great importance on submission and humility, and understood the gospel as the joy of being little." In contrast, the "Renaissance world celebrated learned men, explorers, artists, poets, and architects." Do you think this shift in who or what was inspiring is a positive shift? Explain.

Question 49

Renaissance popes were responsible for much of the architectural glory of Rome, some of which was achieved at their own expense. Given that they also lived lavishly, do you think that their witness of Christianity was basically admirable or basically scandalous?

Question 50

The pope moved the papacy to Avignon, France because Rome was a dangerous place to live for the pope, and he risked assassination. Eventually, this move proved disastrous for the papacy and its spiritual legitimacy. But do you think that the pope initially acted wisely to move? Why or why not?