Vocabulary Quiz #1 Flashcards
abbess:
the head of a convent or a monastery for women
abbot:
the head of a monastery
absolutism:
a form of government in which the sovereign power or ultimate authority rested in the hands of a monarch who claimed to rule by divine right and was therefore responsible only to God
Abstract Expressionism:
a post-World War II artistic movement that broke with all conventions of form and structure in favour of total abstraction
abstract painting:
an artistic movement that developed early in the twentieth century in which artists focused on colour to avoid any references to visual reality
aediles:
Roman officials who supervised the public games and the grain supply of the city of Rome
agricultural revolution:
the application of new agricultural techniques that allowed for a large increase in productivity in the eighteenth century
Agricultural (Neolithic) Revolution:
a shift from hunting animals and gathering plants for sustenance to producing food by systematic agricultural that occurred gradually between 10,000 and 4,000 B.C.E (the Neolithic or “New Stone” Age).
anarchism:
a political theory that holds that all governments and existing social institutions are unnecessary and advocates a society based on voluntary cooperation
anticlericalism:
opposition to the power of the clergy, especially in political affairs
anti-Semitism:
hostility toward or discrimination against Jews
apartheid:
the system of racial segregation practiced in the Republic of South Africa until the 1990s, which involved political, legal, and economic discrimination against nonwhites
appeasement:
the policy, followed by the European nations in the 1930s, of accepting Hitler’s annexation of Austria and Czechoslovakia in the belief that meeting his demands would assure peace and stability
Arianism:
a Christian heresy that taught that Jesus was inferior to God. Though condemned by the Council of Nicaea in 325, Arianism was adopted by many of the Germanic peoples who entered the Roman Empire over the next centuries
aristocracy:
a class of hereditary nobility in medieval Europe; a warrior class who shared a distinctive lifestyle based on the institution of knighthood, although there were social divisions within the group based on extremes of wealth
audiencias:
advisory groups to viceroys in Spanish America
Ausgleich:
the “Compromise” of 1867 that created the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary. Austria and Hungary each had its own capital, constitution, and legislative assembly but were united under one monarch
authoritarian state:
a state that has a dictatorial government and some other trappings of a totalitarian state but does not demand that the masses be actively involved in the regime’s goals as totalitarian states do
auxiliaries:
troops enlisted from the subject peoples of the Roman Empire to supplement the regular legions composed of Roman citizens
balance of power:
a distribution of power among several states such that no single nation can dominate or interfere with the interests of another
Baroque:
an artistic movement of the seventeenth century in Europe that used dramatic effects to arouse the emotions and reflected the search for power that was a large part of the seventeenth-century ethos
bicameral legislature:
a legislature with two houses
Black Death:
the outbreak of plague (mostly bubonic) in the mid-fourteenth century that killed from 25 to 50 percent of Europe’s population
blitzkrieg:
“the lightning war”. A war conducted with great speed and force, as in Germany’s advance a the beginning of World War II
Bolsheviks:
a small faction of the Russian Social Democratic Party who were led by Lenin and dedicated to violent revolution. They seized power in Russia in 1917 and were subsequently renamed the Communists
bourgeoisie (burghers):
inhabitants (merchants and artisans) of boroughs and burghs (towns)
boyars:
the Russian nobility
Brezhnev Doctrine:
the doctrine, enunciated by Leonid Brezhnev, that the Soviet Union had a right to intervene if socialism was threatened in another socialist state; used to justify moving Soviet troops into Czechoslovakia in 1968
Burschenschaften:
student societies in the German states dedicated to fostering the goal of a free, united Germany
caliph:
the secular leader of the Islamic community
capital:
material wealth used or available for use in the production of more wealth
capitalism:
beginning the the Middle Ages, an economic system in which people invested trade and goods to make profits
cartel:
a combination of independent commercial enterprises that work together to control prices and limit competition
Cartesian dualism:
Descartes’s principle of the separation of mine and matter (mind and body) that enabled scientists to view matter as something separate from themselves that could be investigated by reason
Catholic Reformation:
the movement for the reform of the Catholic Church in the sixteenth century. It included a revived papacy; the regeneration of old religious orders and the founding of new ones, most notably the Jesuits; and the reaffirmation of traditional Catholic doctrine at the Council of Trent
celibacy:
complete abstinence from sexual activity. Many early Christians viewed celibacy as the surest way to holiness
centuriate assembly:
the chief popular assembly of the Roman Republic. It passed laws and elected the chief magistrates
chansons de geste:
a form of vernacular literature in the High Middle Ages that consisted of heroic epics focusing on the deeds of warriors
chivalry:
the ideal of civilized behaviour that emerged among the nobility in the eleventh and twelfth centuries under the influence of the church; a code of ethics that knights were expected to uphold
cholera:
a serious and often deadly disease commonly spread by contaminated water; a major problem in nineteenth-century European cities before sewerage systems were installed
Christian (northern) humanism:
an intellectual movement in northern Europe in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries that combined the interest in the classics of the Italian Renaissance with an interest in the sources of early Christianity, including the New Testament and the writings of the church fathers
civic humanism:
an intellectual movement of the Italian Renaissance that saw Cicero, who was both an intellectual and a statesman as the ideal and held that humanists should be involved in government and use their rhetorical training in the service of the state
civil disobedience:
a policy of peaceful protest against laws or government policies in order to achieve political change
