Renaissance and Reformation Vocabulary

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering art, politics, religion, and printing history during the Italian and Northern Renaissance.

Fresco

Technique of painting on moist plaster with colors ground up in water or a limewater mixture plaster.

Patron

Wealthy, influential supporter of the arts.

Giornata

A day’s work.

A secco

The art of painting on dry plaster.

Sfumato

Smoky.

Antiquity

Ancient history, the time when Greek & Roman civilizations flourished.

Classical

That which belongs to the ancient Greek or Romans or their cultures; in the style of ancient.

Vernacular

In the everyday language of the people in a country or region, the official language.

Allegory

A symbolic work in which the characters and events are understood to represent other things, expressing a deeper often spiritual, moral or political meaning.

Humanism

System of thought where the prime importance is human potential value and goodness rather than divine or supernatural matters, with emphasis on common human needs and rational ways to solve human problems.

Renaissance

Rebirth.

Scholasticism

Medieval theological (religious) and philosophical system of learning based on logic and the writings of early church fathers, characterized by a strong commitment to tradition and doctrine.

Chiaroscuro

The use of light and shade in paintings and drawings.

Signora

The council which ran the republican government of Florence.

Gonfalonier

The head of the Signora, chosen by lottery/chance from a pool of candidates from all 21 guilds.

Baptistery

A part of a Christian church used for baptisms.

Apprentice

Somebody being trained by a skilled professional in an art, craft, or trade.

Quatrefoil

A 4-lobed foliation (leaf/clover leaf) in architecture.

Linear perspective (art)

Representation in a drawing or painting of parallel lines as converging in order to give the illusion of depth and distance.

Contrapposto

A relaxed asymmetric pose of the human body in art, especially sculpture, in which the shoulders and hips are turned in different planes.

Foreshortening

In visual arts, to make something appear shorter than it actually is in order to create a three-dimensional effect on the basis of the laws of perspective.

Proportion

The correct or desirable relationship of size, quantity, or degree between two or more things.

Shading

An area of relatively dark tone or close lines, dots, or hatching that produces darkness or shadow in a drawing or picture.

Color wheel

An abstract illustrative organization of color hues around a circle, that shows relationships between primary, secondary, and complementary.

Primary colors

Colors that cannot be made from other colors (red, blue, yellow); artists create all the other colors of the rainbow by mixing them together.

Secondary colors

Colors made by mixing two primary colors (green, orange, purple); each is made from the two primary colors closest to it on the color wheel.

Tertiary colors

Combinations of primary and secondary colors; there are six: yellow-orange, yellow-green, blue-green, blue-violet, red-orange, and red-violet.

Complimentary colors

Colors opposite each other on the color wheel.

Warm colors

Colors based on yellows, oranges, browns, yellowish greens, warm reds…

Cool colors

Colors based on blues, greens, pinks, purples, blue-greens, magentas, & true "blue-based" reds.

Tint

A gradation of color made by adding white.

Shade

A gradation of color made by adding black.

Hue

A color or shade.

Doge

The elected chief of state in a number of Italian "crowned republics."

Commune

An intentional community of people living together, sharing common interests, property, possessions, resources, work, and income.

Campanile

Bell tower.

St. Mark’s Basilica

The cathedral church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Venice, which lies on Piazza San Marco adjacent and connected to the Doge's Palace.

Bucentaur (boat)

A boat used every year on Ascension Day up to 1798 to take the doge out to the Adriatic Sea to perform the ceremony of wedding Venice to the sea.

Gondola

A traditional, flat-bottomed Venetian rowing boat.

Doge’s Palace

A gothic palace in Venice, the residence of the Doge of Venice.

Sumptuary laws

Laws that attempt to regulate habits of consumption, to restrain luxury or extravagance, particularly against inordinate expenditures in the matter of apparel, food, furniture, etc.

Cross hatching

The layering of planes of parallel lines on top of each other in order to create a gradient or texture in a drawing, used to shade and enhance details.

Archetype

A typical, ideal, or classic example of something.

Overlapping

Techniques used when artists do not include the parts of an object hidden from sight by a closer object; adds depth to a painting by positioning some objects behind others.

Encaustic

An object or work of art whose colors are fused to a surface by the application of heat.

Aerial perspective

Technique that produces distance by painting the background paler, bluer and blurry.

Apex

The highest point.

Palazzo

Grand Italian building (palace).

Nepotism

Favoritism by somebody in power to relatives & friends, esp appointing them to good positions.

Simony

The buying or selling of sacred Christian objects.

Sacristy

A room in a Christian church in which sacred objects: vessels and vestments are kept.

Machiavellian

Using clever trickery, amoral methods, and expediency to achieve a desired goal, esp in politics.

Monsignor

A title used when speaking or referring to some clerics of the Roman Catholic Church, especially bishops or officials of the papal court.

Parish

A region with its own church and member of the clergy (priest/bishop) in the Roman Catholic church.

Papal bull

An official document issued by the Pope or his offices.

Baldachin

A canopy carried above a priest or venerated object during a religious procession.

Confession

In the Catholic Church, a formal declaration of sins confidentially to a priest.

Swiss Guard

A group of Swiss-born soldiers employed to protect the pope at the Vatican.

Penance

A sacrament in some churches in which a person confesses sins to a priest and is told they will be forgiven after performing a religious devotion (work) or duty such as praying or fasting.

Conquistador

A Spanish conqueror or adventurer.

Circumnavigate

To sail around something such as the world or an island.

Profane

Showing disrespect for God.

Viscous

Sticky fluid, as in typesetting ink, sticks to paper, leaves printing block.

Moveable type

A system invented by Chinese and Koreans where each Chinese character is separately carved, then placed into slots in a frame; the entire frame was printed, and the words removed to be reused.

Psalter

A volume containing the Book of Psalms, often with other devotional material bound in as well, such as a liturgical calendar and litany of the Saints.

Folio

One fold, four pages.

Quarto

Fold paper in half twice, 8 pages.

Ascetic

Person who dedicates his/her life to a pursuit of contemplative ideals and practices extreme self-denial or self-mortification for religious reasons.

Heresy

Adherence to an opinion or belief that contradicts established religious teaching.

Excommunicate

Exclude from the communion of believers and the privileges and public prayers of the Church.

Transubstantiation

Roman Catholic doctrine where God is summoned by the priest at “consecration” when lifting the “host” to heaven, God comes down at his beckoning and the bread and wine of Communion become, in substance, but not appearance, the body and blood of Jesus Christ.

Perjury

Telling a lie after taking an oath to tell the truth, usually in a court of law.

Eulogy

A speech at a funeral about the person who has died.

Lollards

The name given to the followers of John Wycliffe.

Waldensians

Followers of Peter Waldo believed that only by knowing God’s word would people be able to live as God commanded.

Recant

To deny believing in something or withdraw something previously said.

Martyr

Witness; somebody who chooses to die rather than deny a strongly held religious belief.