final

Question 1

Which of the following statements best explains the doctrine (church teaching) behind the practice of baptism in the Latin Church in the high Middle Ages?

Answer 1

The baptism of an infant – as quickly as possible following the child’s birth, usually by the parents in the home in which the child was delivered – was believed to remove the stain of original sin and induct the child into the community of Christian believers. Baptism was necessary for salvation.

Question 2

The medieval church taught the doctrine of “transubstantiation,” which maintains that the at the moment the priest says the words, “Hoc est corpus meum,” (“This is my body”) the consecrated bread and the wine substantially (or actually) become the body and blood of Christ, while the appearance of bread and wine are retained.

Answer 2

true

Question 3

In the early twelfth century, when the church began increasingly to teach that marriage was a sacrament and thus subject to the definitions and regulations of canonists (ie. church lawyers), the canonical definition of a marriage required only 1. consent of the husband and wife to be married and 2. consummation of the marriage through conjugal union.

Answer 3

true

Question 4

The marriage ceremony, generally celebrated publicly, before the door of a church by a parish priest and modeled after the ceremony of feudal commendation, wherein a vassal swore an oath of fidelity to a lord, was required in order for a marriage to be considered sacramental.

Answer 4

false

Question 5

In the Middle Ages prohibitions against consanguinity (ie. marriage between relatives) was generally much more lax than modern state legislation against incestuous marriage in the United States. It was not uncommon in rural villages to find married first cousins.

Answer 5

false

Question 6

Which of the following statements best defines the practice of the sacrament of Confirmation in the Latin Christian churches in the Middle Ages?

Answer 6

Confirmation, usually performed between the ages of 3-4, was generally described as a formal, ritual confirmation by the parish priest or bishop of the baptism that had been performed in the home by the parents.

Question 7

The author of the Summa Theologiae, this famous thirteenth-century philosopher and theologian (and patron saint of education for Catholic christians), can be argued to show the culmination of numerous developments we have discussed in this course: the growing urbanism of Western Europe, the rising influence of the mendicants orders (Dominicans and Franciscans), the culmination of scholastic methods and of the university, the clarification and systematization of church doctrine, among other developments.

Answer 7

Thomas Aquinas

Question 8

Which of the following is most true of the methods, scope, and content of scholastic culture?

Answer 8

Scholastic culture arrives at a rational system of knowledge about the celestial (heavenly) and material worlds through the accumulation and reconciliation of authoritative sources, both pagan and Christian.

Question 9

Born to a peasant family in southern France in the mid tenth century, this man eventually traveled to rare centers of learning in Spain, Italy, Saxony, and Francia, personally gathering together from the four corners of Western Europe the various disciplines and domains of knowledge of the ancient world that had been fragmented and localized in the decades following the decline of the Carolingian empire.

Answer 9

Gerbert of Rheims

Question 10

The author of the Historia Calamitatum and one of the most learned and intellectually brilliant men of the early twelfth century, this philosopher and dialectician centered his intellectual career on the schools in and around Paris. It is evident that by the time of his career, the monastery and cathedral schools in Paris were developing into a proto-University.

Answer 10

Peter Abelard

Question 11

The privilege of access to ecclesiastical courts and protection from secular jurisdictions, automatically conferred on all university students in the middle ages:

Answer 11

privilegium fori (entailed in the privilegium canonis)

Question 12

The work, written by Peter Abelard, pointed the way toward a technique of application of the arts of grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic to the study of theological questions. The work was widely censured by his contemporaries, though its method was soon developed by Peter Lombard in his Sententiae (which became the primary textbook for the study of theology in the Middle Ages).

Answer 12

Sic et Non

Question 13

Which of the following best explains the theology behind the practice of the disciplines of Confession and Penance in the Middle Ages?

Answer 13

Sin is not only an offense to God, which damages the relationship between the individual Christian soul and its creator, it is also a sickness, a disease of the soul, that requires the medicine of confession and penance. Penance is a kind of treatment or medicine for the damage sin has wrought on the life of the individual believer.

Question 14

Which of the following options best describes the methods, aims, and scope of the sort of education available in the monastery schools of early medieval Europe?

Answer 14

In the early medieval monastery, the disciplines of the verbal arts, the trivium of grammar, rhetoric, and logic, were studied at an advanced level and directed primarily toward the goal of reading scripture well in fulfillment of the monastic requirement of lectio divine. The goal of education in the monastery was ultimately aimed at the contemplation of God.

Question 15

Friend and adviser of King Louis VI who pioneered a new style of ecclesiastical architecture based on his understanding of the importance of light as a metaphor for Divine presence.

Answer 15

Suger of St. Denis

Question 16

The University of Paris was primarily a secular institution, one which grew out of the King’s court, based in Paris on the Isle de Paris, and, as such, the university was a powerful secular forced used to counter the growing power of the church in the thirteenth century.

Answer 16

false

Question 17

The University of Bologna, arguably the oldest university in the world, developed out of the cathedral school of Bologna and was formed primarily from the law students in the city of Bologna. In Bologna, the student union hired and fired faculty, set the dress code, established the curriculum, and generally presided over university matters that were generally reserved for faculty in Northern European schools.

Answer 17

true

Question 18

Which of the following is the best definition of the Latin word “summa” within the context of thirteenth century scholastic textbooks?

Answer 18

The scholastic “summa” is a genre of school text, the product of the medieval university classroom, which aimed to be both the “summation” and the “high point,” or “culmination,” of a tradition of learning in specific disciplines. The “summa” represents an encyclopedic approach to the organization of knowledge.

Question 19

Which of the following is an etymological definition of “encyclopedia” that best agrees which the explanation of scholastic culture?

Answer 19

An encyclopedia is a compilation of knowledge that assumes the connectedness of all history, politics, law, art, literature, science, and theology. The encyclopedia is a “circle of knowledge” that one can walk around.

Question 20

In Christ in Majesty scenes (whether medieval, Renaissance, or modern), the Griffin or winged Lion represent which of the evangelists?

Answer 20

Mark

Question 21

Which of the following best explains the identity of Beatrice and her role in the development of Dante’s unique poetic and philosophical vision?

Answer 21

Beatrice was very probably was a historical person. Known from charters and other documents of late thirteenth century Florence as “Bice Portinari,” she lived near the home of Dante’s family. She became a central figure in Dante’s early poetry, in which she is describes as a “living miracle,” and in his poetic masterpiece, the Divine Comedy, in which she represents Divine grace (among many other meanings potentially ascribed to her).

Question 22

Which of the following statements best accords with the doctrines of love expressed in the poetry of Guido Guinizzeli?

Answer 22

Love is an ennobling force that catalyzes the innate capacity in a “gentle heart” or “or noble heart.” It makes more virtuous the poet-lover who gazes on the beauty of his beloved.

Question 23

The earliest book-length work of Dante Alighieri, this text is a prosi-metric work inspired by Augustine’s Confessions and Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy, in which the author narrates the “conversion” of his understanding of the nature, dignity, and effect of Romantic love.

Answer 23

La Vita Nuova

Question 24

Which of the following views best describes the doctrine of love manifest in the Troubadour Lyrics of Southern France in the first half of the twelfth century?

Answer 24

Pursuit of love within the sensuous environment of the medieval court and pursuit of God (and eternity with God in heaven) are ultimately incompatible ends. But the love of a beautiful lady is a pursuit appropriate to the young knight of the court, even if this pursuit leads to the knight’s ruin.

Question 25

This grandfather of Eleanor of Aquitaine was among the earliest and most famous troubadours. He was excommunicated twice by the church, once for refusing to pay his tithes, another for kidnapping and carrying on an extended affair with the wife of a vassal.

Answer 25

William IX of Aquitaine

Question 26

Which of the following Doctrines of Love best describes the themes explored in the poetry of Guido Cavalcanti?

Answer 26

Love is a “beautiful disorder,” which upends the natural hierarchy of the soul and makes reason a slave to desire.

Question 27

Which of the following twelfth-century transformations of court culture best explains why courtly literature and courtly love emerges during the high Middle Ages (in a period contemporaneous with the stabilization and institutionalization of secular political courts)?

Answer 27

The courts of kings, dukes, counts, and non-titled lords shifted from predominantly “itinerant courts” to “settled courts” in the twelfth century. Alongside the shift from itinerant to settled courts came elaborate stone palaces, more comfortables banquet halls and residences, new cuisines, and in general an environment characterized by luxury and comfort. This changes permitted the court center to attract a mixed following of lords, ladies, artists, poets, who resided semi-permanently at court in order to seek the patronage of the Lord.