The Gothic Age Practice Flashcards

Vocabulary and key concept flashcards covering the Gothic Age, including architectural styles, historical conflicts, religious power, and vernacular literature.

The Gothic Age

A historical period following the Crusades characterized by the restoration of the Silk Road, increased trade, development of urban areas, and the growth of the middle class.

Ecclesiastical Courts

Church-run legal systems where defendants had no access to lawyers, could be imprisoned without charge, and might be tortured into confessions.

Excommunication

A Church punishment where a person is declared not Christian and denied contact with other Christians or access to the Church.

Interdict

The act of excommunicating an entire group, such as a city or a kingdom.

Thomas Becket

The Archbishop killed by knights of Henry II after refusing to grant the King an annulment from Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Medieval Universities

Institutions that grew around locations like Notre Dame in Paris starting around $1150\,CE$, shifting education away from monasteries toward classical studies.

Humanism

A movement placing man at the center of life rather than the Church, emphasizing individual values and a direct relationship with God.

Thomas Aquinas

A scholar who argued that human reason and divine revelation are in harmony, making classical studies compatible with Christianity.

Magna Carta

A treaty signed to end a civil war between King John and his nobles, resulting in the curtailment of monarchical power and the beginning of British Parliament.

Hundred Years’ War

A conflict starting in $1337$ that lasted $114$ years, leading to the end of the feudal era due to the introduction of the longbow, cannon, and gunpowder.

Hildegard of Bingen

The Abbess of a German monastery who wrote and published extensively, providing an alternative path for women in a patriarchal society.

Romanesque Architecture

An architectural style characterized by rounded arches, heavy/thick columns, narrow interior spaces, and small windows.

Gothic Architecture

An architectural style featuring pointed arches, flying buttresses, thinner walls, and large windows.

Chartres Cathedral

A Gothic cathedral featuring a large open sanctuary, rib vaults, over $2,000$ windows, and a labyrinth at the floor's center.

Seven Sacraments

The essential Church rites: Baptism, Eucharist, Confirmation, Penance, Marriage, Ordination, and Extreme Unction.

Extreme Unction

Also known as Last Rights or Anointing the Sick, one of the seven sacraments required of parishioners.

St. Francis of Assisi

Founder of the Franciscan Order known for his stigmata and vows of poverty, who criticized Church corruption and espoused humanism.

Fresco

An art technique involving painting on wet plaster, which allows the paint to set and become durable over time.

Cult of the Virgin

A focus in art and religion that transposed the ideals of 'Courtly Love' and the unattainable noblewoman onto the figure of the Virgin Mary.

Vernacular

The common language of a local culture, such as Italian, French, or English, as opposed to the scholarly Latin.

Dante Alighieri

The Florentine poet who wrote the 'Divine Comedy' in the Italian vernacular, depicting levels of sin in the Inferno and Purgatorio.

Boccaccio’s Decameron

A collection of $100$ tales told by storytellers retreating to the countryside to escape a wave of the Black Plague.

Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales

A collection of stories told by $24$ distinct characters on a pilgrimage to the relics of St. Thomas Becket.