AP European History - Unit 1 & 2 Vocabulary

Flashcards covering vocabulary from the AP European History course framework, focusing on Renaissance and Exploration, and Age of Reformation.

Renaissance Humanism

A revival of classical texts led to new methods of scholarship and new values in both society and religion.

Renaissance Art

The visual arts incorporated the new ideas of the Renaissance and were used to promote personal, political, and religious goals.

Age of Discovery

European nations were driven by commercial and religious motives to explore overseas territories and establish colonies.

Commercial Revolution

Innovations in banking and finance promoted the growth of urban financial centers and a money economy.

Petrarch

Italian Renaissance humanists, including Petrarch, promoted a revival in classical literature and created new philological approaches to ancient texts.

Machiavelli

Individuals promoting secular models for individual and political behavior such as Niccolò Machiavelli, Baldassare Castiglione, and Francesco Guicciardini.

Geometric Perspective

In the Italian Renaissance, rulers and popes concerned with enhancing their prestige commissioned paintings and architectural works based on classical styles and often the newly invented technique of geometric perspective.

Northern Renaissance Art

The Northern Renaissance retained a more religious focus, which resulted in more human-centered naturalism that considered individuals and everyday life appropriate objects of artistic representation.

Erasmus

Christian humanism, embodied in the writings of Erasmus, employed Renaissance learning in the service of religious reform.

Vernacular Literature

The invention of the printing press in the 1450s helped spread the Renaissance beyond Italy and encouraged the growth of vernacular literature, which would eventually contribute to the development of national cultures.

Religious Reform

Monarchs and princes initiated religious reform from the top down in an effort to exercise greater control over religious life and morality.

New Monarchies

New monarchies laid the foundation for the centralized modern state by establishing monopolies on tax collection, employing military force, dispensing justice, and gaining the right to determine the religion of their subjects.

Navigational Technology

Advances in navigation, cartography, and military technology enabled Europeans to establish overseas colonies and empires.

Luxury Goods

European states sought direct access to gold, spices, and luxury goods to enhance personal wealth and state power.

Mercantilism

The rise of mercantilism gave the state a new role in promoting commercial development and the acquisition of colonies overseas.

Spanish Colonies

The Spanish established colonies across the Americas, the Caribbean, and the Pacific, which made Spain a dominant state in Europe in the 16th century.

Colonial Expansion

Europe’s colonial expansion led to a global exchange of goods, flora, and fauna; a shift toward European dominance; and the expansion of the trade in enslaved persons.

Economic Power Shift

The exchange of goods shifted the center of economic power in Europe from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic states and brought the latter into an expanding world economy.

Slave Trade

Europeans expanded the trade of enslaved Africans in response to the establishment of a plantation economy in the Americas and demographic catastrophes among indigenous peoples.

Banking Innovations

Innovations in banking and finance promoted the growth of urban financial centers and a money economy.

Population Growth

Population recovered to its pre-Great Plague level in the 16th century, and continuing population pressures contributed to uneven price increases.

Mannerism

Artistic style of the 16th century that employed distortion, drama, and illusion.

Predestination

The doctrine that God has decided all things beforehand, including which people will be eternally saved.

Catholic Reformation

A 16th-century movement in which the Roman Catholic Church sought to make changes in response to the Protestant Reformation.

Enlightened Monarchs

Rulers who embraced the ideals of the Enlightenment, such as Frederick II of Prussia and Joseph II of Austria.

Mercantilism

An economic policy under which nations sought to increase their wealth and power by obtaining large amounts of gold and silver and by selling more goods than they bought.