Foundations of Western Civilization
Textbook Exam Questions
Course Introduction
Foundations of Western Civilization explores the origins and development of Western society from the ancient Near East through the medieval period. Emphasizing major historical events, ideas, and cultural achievements, the course examines the influence of Greek and Roman civilizations, the emergence of Christianity, the feudal system, and the transformation of Europe during the Renaissance. Through analysis of primary sources and key historical figures, students gain an understanding of the social, political, religious, and philosophical foundations that have shaped the modern Western world.
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World History Volume I To 1800 7th Edition by William J. Duiker
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18 Chapters
2212 Verified Questions
2212 Flashcards
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Chapter 1: Early Humans and the First Civilizations
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Sample Questions
Q1) During the Babylonian Captivity
A) the Chaldeans were able to conquer the Persians.
B) the Persians gave up control of the Kingdom of Judah.
C) many upper-class Israelites were deported to Babylonia.
D) Egypt freed the Hebrews.
E) the Hittites were held as slaves by the Babylonians.
Answer: C
Q2) Scholars have found a larger,highly significant Neolithic urban center at A) Nairobi.
B) Mumbai.
C) Hokkaido.
D) Machu Picchu.
E) Catal Huyuk.
Answer: E
Q3) Unlike Mesopotamia's rivers,the flooding of Egypt's Nile was gradual and usually predictable,and the river seen as life-enhancing rather than life-threatening.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
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Chapter 2: Ancient India
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Sample Questions
Q1) The caste system
A) was applicable to every member of Indian society.
B) was a central element of Buddhist belief.
C) was actually more flexible than the Egyptian social structure.
D) originated in Macedonia.
E) was unsuccessfully opposed by Aryan warriors' wives.
Answer: A
Q2) The ultimate goal of Hindus is to
A) attain a blissful, eternal afterlife.
B) attain an ultimate spiritual reunion with Brahman and escape the pain of living.
C) attain eternal life by exchanging one's karma for Atman.
D) be reborn again and again.
E) achieve enlightenment in the Western Paradise.
Answer: B
Q3) karma
Answer: Answer not provided.
Q4) Aryans
Answer: Answer not provided.
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Chapter 3: China in Antiquity
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Sample Questions
Q1) In ancient China,aristocrats
A) often were required to work on dikes to protect the irrigation system.
B) performed physical labor for others, for two weeks at a time, two times each year.
C) often served as government officials in peace and war.
D) served only as bureaucratic advisors.
E) rarely played any political or military role.
Answer: C
Q2) The conversations between Confucius and his disciples are found in the A) Book of Changes.
B) Book of Histories.
C) Analects.
D) Book of Songs.
E) Way of the Dao.
Answer: C
Q3) The Qin Dynasty based its rule upon the philosophy of Confucius.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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Chapter 4: The Civilization of the Greeks
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Q1) Darius and Xerxes
Q2) the Greek Dark Ages
Q3) Olympic Games and Zeus
Q4) All of the following are correct about warfare in ancient Greece except
A) the use of light infantry in battle because of greater mobility.
B) the use of excellent weapons and armor.
C) the employment of citizen-soldiers in battle.
D) a willingness to engage the enemy head-on, thus deciding a battle quickly.
E) the use of heavy infantry.
Q5) Antigonid,Seleucid,Attalid,and Ptolemaic dynasties
Q6) Socrates and his "Socratic method"
Q7) The tragic Greek tale of the man who killed his father and married his mother was written by
A) Thespis.
B) Sophocles.
C) Aeschylus.
D) Euripides.
E) Lycurgus.
Q8) polis
Q9) tyrants
Page 6
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Sample Questions
Q1) The Roman general who returned from Spain as a military hero in 71 B.C.E.was
A) Marius.
B) Sulla.
C) Caesar.
D) Pompey.
E) Cato.
Q2) tribunes
Q3) The Roman general who began a new system of military recruitment that made soldiers loyal to their general and not the Senate was
A) Marius.
B) Tiberius Gracchus.
C) Crassus.
D) Caesar.
E) Pompey.
Q4) Which of the following were among the Jewish population of Judea?
A) Latians
B) Essenes
C) Mithraists
D) Kuomintang
E) Zanj
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Chapter 6: The Americas
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Sample Questions
Q1) chinampas
Q2) Which of the following was not a characteristic of the large kinship groups of the Aztecs?
A) They were the people's main link with the central government.
B) They often specialized in some particular area of responsibility.
C) They contained subdivisions of smaller family units.
D) Women were required to work in the fields five days each week.
E) In general, males were the dominant gender.
Q3) The first urban settlements in South America were established as early as 3500
B.C.E.,much earlier than the earliest known cities in Mesoamerica.
A)True
B)False
Q4) In which areas were the Mayan and Aztec civilizations similar?
A) They both practiced human sacrifice.
B) Both had religious practices and beliefs brought from Asia in the eleventh century.
C) Both used sophisticated alphabets with thirty-nine letters.
D) They were both seafaring societies.
E) Volcanic eruptions destroyed both civilizations.
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Chapter 7: Ferment in the Middle East: The Rise of Islam
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Sample Questions
Q1) sultan
Q2) Muhammad began the solitary meditations during which he received the revelations underlying Islam because of
A) a dispute with his wife.
B) his desire to expand his knowledge of the message of Allah.
C) the difficulties created in his mind by the corrupt and decadent society of his day.
D) the call of the angel Gabriel.
E) his desire to convert the people of Mecca to Islam.
Q3) Saladin was the Muslim leader who recaptured Jerusalem from the Christians in 1187. A)True B)False
Q4) The Seljuk Turks were originally a nomadic people from southern Mesopotamia. A)True B)False
Q5) Islam
Q6) Maimonides
Q7) Shi'ites and Sunnis
Q8) Five Pillars of Islam
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Chapter 8: Early Civilizations in Africa
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Q1) savannas
Q2) Coptic Christianity
Q3) African culture
A) is notable for its use of bards to retain and spread communal history and religious beliefs.
B) rapidly did away with bards once the Arabic and Swahili languages were established.
C) never used the storytelling talents of women to spread and perpetuate knowledge and beliefs.
D) used only wooden carvings for religious purposes, reserving terra-cotta and metal objects for secular occasions.
E) was never subject to outside influences.
Q4) The local chieftain of a Mali farming village was called a A) mansa.
B) nkisi.
C) bantu.
D) saba.
E) sheikh.
Q5) Saba
Q6) Nyame
Page 11
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Chapter 9: The Expansion of Civilization in South and Southeast Asia
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Q1) In medieval India
A) trade was so small in scale that cities shrank and overall wealth declined.
B) the Parsis dominated the Hindu priestly caste by the eighth century C.E..
C) merchants were universally poor, a reflection of the areas hostility to merchants.
D) cotton goods, spices, and sandalwood were major exports.
E) warfare disappeared.
Q2) Thai and Burmese
Q3) Mount Kailasa
Q4) Rajputs
Q5) Which of the following was not a factor in the decline of Buddhism in India?
A) Hinduism's increasing appeal
B) Buddhism's reinforcement of the Indian caste system
C) Hinduism's increasing religious ardor
D) the growing attractiveness of bhakti to the Indian masses
E) Buddhism's rejection of the caste system
Q6) In what way was Islam established in India? To what extent was this new religion able to gain converts from the indigenous Hindu and Buddhist populations? How did the introduction of Islam impact India's caste system?
Page 12
Q7) Dandin's The Ten Princes
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Chapter 10: The Flowering of Traditional China
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Q1) Grand Council
Q2) One of the main reasons for the demise of the Tang Dynasty was its inability to effectively solve the problem of land distribution.Which of the following statements can serve as a valid explanation for this policy failure?
A) The increasing concentration of land in the hands of the rich and politically influential, coupled with rising food production, led to increasing pressure on the land distribution system.
B) The receipt of large, permanent land grants by government officials fundamentally strengthened the system but undermined the concept of the Mandate of Heaven.
C) Equality in land distribution was successfully maintained through the tax regulations of the central government.
D) Mongol invaders destroyed the Chinese government's bureaucratic infrastructure.
E) Empress Wu confiscated all land, distributing it to illiterate and unprepared peasants.
Q3) "The Yuan dynasty was a brief irrelevance in China's long history." Discuss critically.
Q4) Gobi Desert
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Chapter 11: The East Asian Rimlands: Early Japan, korea, and Vietnam
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Sample Questions
Q1) The Onin War
A) brought Shitoku Taishi to power.
B) drove the Mongols from Japan after only eleven years in power there.
C) was the major event which caused the collapse of the Kamakura Shogunate in 1256.
D) finally restored absolute power to the shogun, Minamoto Yoritomo.
E) effectively destroyed the power of the shogunate in the 1470s.
Q2) Minamoto Yoritomo
Q3) Jimmu
Q4) bonsai
Q5) Fujiwara clan
Q6) The Japanese word that refers to the "divine wind" of the massive typhoon that destroyed the invading Mongol fleet of Khubilai Khan is
A) sayonara.
B) shogun.
C) bakufu.
D) kamikaze.
E) daimyo.
Q7) Mongol invasions
Q8) the Trung Sisters
Page 14
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Chapter 12: The Making of Europe
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Q1) The Slavs
A) divided into seven specific groups during the Middle Ages.
B) became Roman Catholic, with the exception of the Russians, Turks and Magyars.
C) were divided into two religious groups, with most southern and eastern Slavs becoming Orthodox and most northern and western Slavs becoming Roman Catholic.
D) converted to Islam after the First Crusade.
E) briefly occupied northern Italy.
Q2) chivalry
Q3) The missionary brothers who converted the Slavic peoples of Moravia to the Orthodox Christianity of the Byzantine Empire were
A) Francis and Wilbur.
B) Vladimir and Alexander.
C) Ivan and Peter.
D) Bernard and Boris.
E) Cyril and Methodius.
Q4) Why did the revival of trade during the High Middle Ages occur as,and when,it did?
Back up your ideas with supporting evidence.
Q5) Edward I and Parliament
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Chapter 13: The Byzantine Empire and Crisis and Recovery in the West
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Q1) What were some of the issues that divided Orthodox Christianity from Roman Catholic Christianity? What were the long-term political implications of these differences?
Q2) Renaissance
Q3) Nika Revolt
Q4) War of the Roses
Q5) In 1453,the Byzantine Empire fell to the A) Arabs.
B) Seljuk Turks.
C) Ottoman Turks.
D) Bulgars and Ukranians.
E) the crusaders.
Q6) Flagellants
A) was the term used to describe the aristocratic opponents of rebelling serfs.
B) were Jews who beat themselves in an effort to avoid harsher abuse by Christians.
C) were a new order of friars which were established in France by Joan of Arc.
D) were Christian fanatics who physically scourged themselves during the Black Death.
E) were hereditary slaves in fifteenth-century Italy.
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Chapter 14: New Encounters: The Creation of a World Market
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Sample Questions
Q1) sternpost rudder,compass,and astrolabe
Q2) Compare and contrast slavery in Africa before the sixteenth century to African slavery after the arrival of the Europeans.What are the continuities,if any,and what are the differences?
Q3) The European power that emerged triumphant in the Indonesian archipelago,and took over virtually the entire region by the end of the eighteenth century,was
A) Spain.
B) France.
C) the Netherlands.
D) Britain.
E) Portugal.
Q4) The Spanish base of operations in Southeast Asia was established in A) Malacca.
B) Vietnam.
C) Burman lands.
D) Java.
E) the Philippines.
Q5) John Cabot
Q6) Songhai
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Chapter 15: Europe Transformed: Reform and State Building
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Q1) Compare and contrast the absolute monarchies that emerged in France,Prussia,Austria,and Russia.How did England avoid the path of absolutism?
Q2) Advocates of "mercantilism" argued for all of the following except
A) governments should abstain from any involvement in the economy.
B) a nation prosperity depended upon a plentiful supply of bullion (gold and silver).
C) exports must exceed imports.
D) tariffs should be placed on foreign goods.
E) governments should improve transportation facilities and grant trade monopolies to businesses.
Q3) Which of the following was not a result of the development of printing in Europe?
A) Research and learning increased.
B) Standard textbooks were developed.
C) More people began to read.
D) Chinese influence over European affairs rose sharply because of their invention of paper.
E) It played a major role in the Protestant Reformation.
Q4) Frederick William the Great Elector
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Chapter 16: The Muslim Empires
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Sample Questions
Q1) Mughal architectural developments
A) were always undertaken after making certain that expenditures on them would not injure mass living standards.
B) often blended Persian and Indian styles to achieve new and beautiful results.
C) borrowed heavily from Tibetan and Ottoman styles
D) were influenced by the construction techniques of Yuan China.
E) were imposed on the Mughals by the British East India Co.
Q2) zamindars
Q3) The status of women under the Mughal regime
A) varied greatly, with women at court sometimes receiving education as under Emperor Akhbar.
B) was universally poor, as all women were forbidden to own property.
C) declined sharply when the Emperor ordered that Muslim women practice sati.
D) was higher for Hindu women than for Muslim women.
E) both b and c
Q4) Battles of Mohács and Vienna
Q5) caliph
Q6) Serbs
Q7) beg/beys
Q8) Bosporus and Dardanelles
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Chapter 17: The East Asian World
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Q1) Matteo Ricci,and Jesuits v.Dominicans and Franciscans
Q2) Discuss the three unifiers of Japan in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries,and the possible reasons for their success.
Q3) The Portuguese base of operations in China,granted when they arrived in China,was the territory of A) Xian.
B) Canton.
C) Macao.
D) Hong Kong.
E) Shanghai.
Q4) The boundary dispute between the Russian tsar and the Qing was settled by the Treaty of A) Kazan.
B) Kiakhta.
C) Nerchinsk.
D) Nanking.
E) Sinkiang.
Q5) Was Japan,after the expulsion of foreigners,actually more of a "Hermit Kingdom" than Korea? Why or why not?
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Chapter 18: The West on the Eve of a New World Order
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Q1) How "revolutionary" was the French Revolution? How was France changed by the revolutionary events between 1789 and 1799,and who benefited the most from these changes?
Q2) the Third Estate
Q3) Which of the following was <u>not</u> achieved during the regime of Napoleon?
A) The legal position of women was weakened with the activation of the Civil Code.
B) A concordat was arranged with the pope.
C) The laws of France were codified in the Civil Code.
D) A powerful, centralized bureaucracy was established.
E) All divorces were outlawed.
Q4) Robert Clive
Q5) "Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen"
Q6) By 1763,Great Britain had become the world's greatest colonial power.
A)True
B)False
Q7) John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding
Q8) Montesquieu's The Spirit of the Laws
Q9) daily newspapers and coffeehouses
Q10) Napoleon's Civil Code
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