Deck 15: The Baroque Age I: Glamour and Grandiosity

Question 1

The most spectacular representative of absolutism in the baroque age was

A) James I of England.
B) Louis XIV of France.
C) Charles II of England.
D) Henry IV of France.

Answer 1

B

Question 2

Which of the following is the ornate canopy placed inside St. Peter's Basilica to cover the spot where the bones of St. Peter are believed to lie?

A) baldacchino
B) chiaroscuro
C) clavier
D) fugue

Answer 2

A

Question 3

Which state briefly became a republic (called the Commonwealth) in the mid-seventeenth century?

A) England
B) France
C) Spain
D) Austria

Answer 3

A

Question 4

By 1715, the principle that government could not rule without the participation of the governed was successfully established in

A) France.
B) England.
C) Prussia.
D) Austria.

Question 5

What was a major side effect of the use of balance-of-power principles in Europe?

A) ending the need for standing armies
B) reducing the importance of direct state-to-state diplomacy
C) ending any significant role for lesser states such as Florence and Venice
D) reducing the role of absolutist monarchs in foreign or military policy

Question 6

During Louis XIV's reign,

A) political power was in the hands of the business class.
B) the state teetered on the edge of revolution.
C) all religious faiths enjoyed toleration.
D) the government emphasized the power and glory of the king.

Question 7

The term baroque probably derives from the Portuguese word barocco meaning

A) an irregular pearl.
B) a sinking boat.
C) a labyrinthine palace.
D) a concave mirror.

Question 8

Louis XIV's economic policy was called

A) laissez-faire.
B) mercantilism.
C) the guild system.
D) capitalism.

Question 9

The restrained baroque was

A) aristocratic and courtly.
B) in keeping with Protestant culture.
C) centered in Italy and Spain.
D) dominated by Christian themes.

Question 10

The Thirty Years' War was fought largely in

A) France.
B) Italy.
C) Germany.
D) Bohemia.

Question 11

As a result of the Treaty of Utrecht, which nation gained control of Gibraltar and Minorca, and acquired portions of Canada?

A) Italy
B) Spain
C) France
D) England

Question 12

The classical baroque

A) was dominated by Roman Catholic religious ideals and themes.
B) fit well with the absolutist policies of Louis XIV.
C) was middle class and respectable.
D) was characterized by extravagance and profusion.

Question 13

Over the course of the seventeenth century, England

A) enjoyed a hundred years of domestic peace.
B) reconverted to Roman Catholicism.
C) underwent a power struggle between the monarchy and Parliament.
D) entered the industrial age.

Question 14

The Council of Trent led church leaders to call for a new art that resulted in portrayals of

A) simple people leading ordinary lives.
B) athletic nudes engaged in heroic action.
C) saints enthralled by ecstatic visions.
D) aristocrats in stately repose.

Question 15

Which of the following technological advances in warfare made pikemen obsolete and marked the end of medieval military equipment and infantry?

A) the arquebus
B) the bayonet
C) the musket
D) the rifle

Question 16

The baroque artistic ideal can be characterized as

A) valuing repose.
B) exuberant, with grand, sweeping gestures.
C) a single, static perspective.
D) a design complete in itself.

Question 17

Under France's King Louis XIII, actual power was wielded by

A) his wife Anne of Austria.
B) his son Louis XIV.
C) his brother Gaston d'Orléans.
D) Cardinal Richelieu and Cardinal Mazarin.

Question 18

The florid baroque

A) was a product of the Counter-Reformation.
B) was aristocratic and courtly.
C) had a strong classical dimension.
D) was centered in the Netherlands.

Question 19

Which of the following is true of politics and power in the seventeenth century?

A) Kings and their advisers did not want to share power with church officials.
B) The heads of state claimed their power by divine right arguments.
C) Machiavelli's influence was evident in the acts and thoughts of many of the rulers.
D) All these answers are correct.

Question 20

The preeminent expression of florid baroque architecture is

A) St. Paul's cathedral, London.
B) the palace at Versailles.
C) the church of St. Peter's in Rome.
D) Villa Rotondo, Vicenza.

Question 21

The Netherlands in the seventeenth century

A) was ruled by an absolutist king.
B) lagged behind Europe's other trading states.
C) was dominated by the sober values of the Calvinist religion.
D) was conquered by Louis XIV of France.

Question 22

Rembrandt's painting style was typified by all of the following EXCEPT

A) the portrayal of figures modeled on ancient statuary.
B) the use of dramatic chiaroscuro.
C) forceful expressiveness.
D) an ability to depict the full range of human moods and emotions.

Question 23

Anthony van Dyck's painting style was characterized by

A) elegant likenesses and psychological insight.
B) dramatic chiaroscuro and emotionalism.
C) quiet elegance and detached feelings.
D) "night pictures" and moody expressiveness.

Question 24

Painting in seventeenth-century England

A) reflected the fluctuation of the local art market.
B) was controlled by the courtly but restrained taste of the aristocracy.
C) responded to the demands of middle-class patrons for a civic-minded art.
D) had religious themes as the dominant subject.

Question 25

A baroque theme in Velázquez's painting Las Meninas, or The Maids of Honor, is

A) the interplay of space and illusion.
B) the love of infinite space.
C) the intersection of the supernatural and the natural.
D) monumentality.

Question 26

What was the distinguishing quality of the classical baroque?

A) glorification of the common people
B) simplicity in the service of God
C) exuberant expression of emotions
D) influence of the royal court

Question 27

Which is NOT correct about seventeenth-century French drama?

A) It observed the unities of time, place, and action.
B) It dealt with the lives of ordinary people.
C) It focused on universal problems.
D) It employed formal language.

Question 28

The Dutch painter Vermeer specialized in

A) still lifes.
B) landscapes and seascapes.
C) domestic genre scenes.
D) portraits.

Question 29

Who of the following created an oratorio based on biblical texts and sung in English?

A) Johann Sebastian Bach
B) Jean-Baptiste Lully
C) George Frideric Handel
D) Antonio Lucio Vivaldi

Question 30

Gentileschi's painting style was

A) flamboyant and dramatic.
B) devoted to grave beauty and illusion.
C) characterized by ripe sensuality and gorgeous color.
D) geared to domestic subjects rendered in basic colors (mainly blue and yellow).

Question 31

Sir Christopher Wren's St. Paul's cathedral represented the climax of

A) the florid baroque.
B) the classical baroque.
C) Calvinist influence in architecture.
D) the restrained baroque.

Question 32

Which of the following is NOT among the traits shared by baroque writers?

A) ornate language
B) a preference for plot over characterization
C) plots loaded with emotional extremes
D) dramatic rhetoric and sometimes empty bombast

Question 33

Which of the following selected his models directly from the street, banished landscape from his canvases, and depended on chiaroscuro in many of his works?

A) Andrea Pozzo
B) Peter Paul Rubens
C) Caravaggio
D) Diego Velázquez

Question 34

In The Ecstasy of St. Teresa, Bernini was able to

A) create a sculpture that characterized the restrained baroque.
B) carve, in marble, a saint administering to the poor.
C) make the saint appear in a state of forgiveness.
D) capture a moment when the saint sees the Holy Spirit.

Question 35

Rubens's paintings are known for their

A) disciplined order.
B) ripe sensuality.
C) calm beauty.
D) domestic tranquility.

Question 36

Which of the following artists was Flemish, studied under Rubens, and eventually became court painter to England's Charles I?

A) Andres de Islas
B) Jan Vermeer
C) Rembrandt van Rijn
D) Anthony van Dyck

Question 37

Pozzo's Allegory of the Missionary Work of the Jesuits illustrates the baroque love of

A) infinite space.
B) repose.
C) serenity.
D) antinaturalism.

Question 38

Which of the following artists, as a master of printmaking, was able to support himself because he was able to reap higher prices for his prints than for his paintings?

A) Andres de Islas
B) Jan Vermeer
C) Rembrandt van Rijn
D) Anthony van Dyck

Question 39

Baroque writers made major contributions in all of the following genres EXCEPT

A) romance.
B) tragedy.
C) comedy.
D) epic.

Question 40

The Education of Marie de' Medici can be characterized as a

A) work in the mannerist style.
B) painting that deals with the subject's psychological state.
C) work that combines Roman mythology with the queen's life.
D) painting produced at the command of Louis XIV.

Question 41

Define florid baroque. Which building best embodies the style of the florid baroque? Explain.

Question 42

Discuss baroque literature in England, focusing on John Milton and Aphra Behn, their accomplishments, and the cultural influences that helped shape their writing.

Question 43

What were Louis XIV's political aims? What were the various means he used to achieve those aims?

Question 44

Who of the following created a collection of musical pieces that contributed to the standardization of the pitches of the notes of the musical scale and of the tuning of keyboard instruments?

A) Johann Sebastian Bach
B) Jean-Baptiste Lully
C) George Frideric Handel
D) Antonio Lucio Vivaldi

Question 45

What new musical form developed in the baroque period? Why is this new form so expressive of baroque cultural values?

Question 46

Molière's plays were

A) verse tragedies based on Spanish legends and Roman themes.
B) psychological dramas that depicted the struggle between the will and the emotions.
C) satiric comedies that exposed the follies of French society.
D) romantic dramas devoted to exploring the varied forms of love.

Question 47

How did political systems develop in France, England, and the Netherlands during the baroque age? What impact did they have on the evolution of the baroque cultural style?

Question 48

Baroque music reached its climax after 1715. Which of the following composers were responsible for this development?

A) Monteverdi and Lully
B) Haydn and Mozart
C) Palestrina and Byrd
D) Bach and Handel
Essay Questions

Question 49

Compare and contrast the baroque nature of the church of St. Peter's in Rome with the palace at Versailles.

Question 50

Discuss baroque artistic developments in the Netherlands. How were they related to conditions in the Calvinist Dutch Republic?

Question 51

The baroque literary work Paradise Lost is a

A) Christianity-themed epic.
B) satirical epic based on a trivial episode in middle-class life.
C) continuation of Homer's Odyssey, picking up the story where the original work ended.
D) historical epic based on the English Civil War.

Question 52

In Oroonoko, Aphra Behn

A) repeated the themes found in Paradise Lost.
B) examined political tensions created by the reign of Louis XIV.
C) wrote a novel about a love affair set in a non-European land.
D) relied on neoclassical themes to illustrate her beliefs.

Question 53

How did the Council of Trent affect the ideals of the baroque arts and architecture?

Question 54

Identify the three variations on the international baroque style. What were the leading formal characteristics of each?

Question 55

Describe Caravaggio's painting style, focusing on one of his works. How did his work influence that of Gentileschi?