Key Concepts of the Renaissance, Reformation, and Scientific Revolution

The Crusades

Christian military campaigns to reclaim holy land from Muslims

Holy Land

Jerusalem, sacred to Christians, Muslims, and Jews

Council of Clermont

1095 meeting where Pope Urban II launched the First Crusade

Italian Renaissance

rebirth of art, learning, and culture starting in Italy

Secular

non religious, focused on worldly life

Humanism

philosophy centered on human potential, not just God

Medici Family

wealthy Florence family who funded Renaissance art

Machiavelli

Italian writer who argued rulers should prioritize power over morality, wrote The Prince

Michelangelo

sculptor painter, Sistine Chapel, David

Protestant Reformation

movement that broke from the Catholic Church

Martin Luther

monk who challenged the Church, sparked the Reformation

Printing Press

Gutenberg's invention that spread ideas rapidly

Indulgences

payments to the Church to reduce punishment for sins

95 Theses

Luther's list of complaints against the Church, 1517

Excommunication

being expelled from the Catholic Church

Protestantism

Christianity that broke from Catholic authority

Henry VIII

English king who split from Rome to form the Church of England

John Calvin

reformer who taught predestination

European Scientific Revolution

1500s to 1700s shift to reason and observation

Scientific Method

observe, question, experiment, conclude

Galileo

used evidence over tradition, house arrest for heliocentrism

Copernicus

first to formally propose the heliocentric model

Heliocentric Theory

the sun, not Earth, is the center of the solar system