World History Course Prior Knowledge Check

Which statement BEST describes this social structure?

Hierarchical Social Structure

King

Nobles and Church Leaders

BaronsKnights

Freemen and Serfs

• the division of Christianity during the Reformation

• militant culture of ancient Sparta

• the division of orders in the Roman Republic

• feudalism in medieval Europe

The signing of the Magna Carta was important because it:

• Promoted a feudal society in the New World.

• Gave all government to the king and nobleman.

• Established the principle of limited government power.

• Concentrated government powers in a few individuals.

Use the information in the chart to answer the question.

Which statement BEST describes the result of these events?

• Muslims controlled Jerusalem but allowed Christians access to its holy sites.

• Saladin and King Richard I worked together to fight the Byzantine Empire.

• The failure to defeat Saladin caused a split between Eastern and Roman Christianity

• Christians controlled Jerusalem but allowed Muslims access to its holy sites.

The text describes the economic impact of the introduction of the textile industry in England in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries:

This industry (manufacture of cloth) brought a new factor into the economic world, the capitalist employer. There arose a new class of men whose capital made it possible to hire a large number of workers. Not only the cloth industry but other trades were organized in this way. In the working world there came to be accordingly several distinct classes, including merchants, manufacturers, and artisans, in addition to unskilled hands. The scheme meant wealth to the capitalist and merchant and a living to the artisan.

Adapted from A Brief History of the World, with Especial Reference to Social and Economic Conditions

by George Willis Botsford and Jay Barrett Botsford, 1917

Based on the text, what was the role of the textile industry in the development of medieval society?

• It shifted economic power from the guilds to those with money to invest.

• It heightened the economic power of unskilled laborers.

• It strengthened the traditional social system.

• It enabled the guilds to control the production of finished goods.

Commerce with distant parts of Asia grew enormously as a result of the Crusades. All these commercial transactions called for money. The system of barter and exchange of services by which Europe had largely lived for centuries was outgrown, and the coinage of money grew rapidly. After money had become common, the relations between tenant and landlord, and lord and vassal no longer needed to rest upon exchange of services for land. Thus the economic basis of feudalism was weakened or destroyed.

Adapted from The Modern World from Charlemagne to the Present Time

by Francis S. Betten and Alfred Kaufmann, 1919

Based on the text, what was the relationship between trade and feudalism?

• The expansion of trade stimulated the growth of towns, which undermined the feudal system.

• The expansion of trade improved the economic status of peasants and serfs, strengthening their ties to feudal lords.

• The expansion of trade hurt the agricultural economy, increasing the dependence of peasants and serfs upon their feudal lords.

• The expansion of trade led to the emergence of towns, which became the geographic centers of the feudal system.

What was one direct result of the reforms described below?

Reforms of Protestant Reformation

• Religion should be personal, immediate, and based on faith

• Focus on the scriptures and abolish ritualistic ceremony

• Increase literacy so all could read the Bible in their own language

• development of new faiths

• acceptance of radical political groups

• end of absolute monarchies

• expansion of a traditional economic system

ith this I could have been content, had he but taught the gospel pure and clear, and not introduced human inventions and lies in its stead. . . . The pope attributes more power to the church, which is begotten and born, than to the Word, which has begotten, conceived, and born the church.

“Against Catholicism” by Martin Luther

Quoted in The Library of Original Sources edited by Oliver J. Thatcher, 1907

According to Martin Luther, what caused the Protestant Reformation?

• The Catholic Church failed to include people of all faiths in its worship practices.

• The Catholic Church celebrated the Bible by remaining true to its actual text.

• The Catholic Church failed to include people of all faiths in its worship practices.

• The Catholic Church devalued the Bible by placing more importance on the views of church leaders.

If we ask the students of art what they mean by the Renaissance, they will reply that it was the revolution effected in architecture, painting, and sculpture by the recovery of antique monuments. Students of literature, philosophy, and theology see in the Renaissance that discovery of manuscripts, that passion for antiquity, that progress in philology and criticism, which led to a correct knowledge of the classics, to a fresh taste in poetry, to new systems of thought, to more accurate analysis, and finally to the Lutheran schism and the emancipation of the conscience.

Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7), by John Addington Symonds, 1888

Based on the text, what caused the Renaissance to happen?

• A new appreciation and practice of religion by everyone who could read the Bible led to an appreciation of pagan religions.

• A new requirement for public schooling led to increased exposure to classical literature.

• A new understanding of classical knowledge led to the development of new ideas.

• A new requirement that all feudal tenants would be emancipated from their obligations increased interest in classical education.

The great intellectual movement of Renaissance Italy was humanism. The humanists believed that the Greek and Latin classics contained both all the lessons one needed to lead a moral and effective life and the best models for a powerful Latin style. They developed a new, rigorous kind of classical scholarship, with which they corrected and tried to understand the works of the Greeks and Romans, which seemed so vital to them.

“Humanism,” Rome Reborn: The Vatican Library and Renaissance Culture

Library of Congress

Based on the text, how did interest in learning during the Renaissance affect global interaction?

• It led to new inventions worldwide.

• It stimulated interest in other cultural eras.

• It created a respect for other places.

• It expanded the influence of nationalist beliefs.

How did the Jesuit Order contribute to the Catholic Counter-Reformation during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries?

• It converted European Protestants and natives worldwide to Catholicism.

• It prevented the spread of new knowledge that arose as a result of the Renaissance.

• It mediated political conflicts that arose as a result of the Protestant Reformation.

• It mediated political conflicts that arose as a result of the Protestant Reformation.