Western Heritage Short Answers/Quote ID Summaries

What is the connection between these dates and how they affected church/state relationships? (313 CE Edict of Milan, 325 CE Council of Nicaea, 380 CE Edict of Thessalonica, 410 CE Visigoths sack Rome)

The Edict of Milan, issued by Constantine, granted official toleration of Christianity, ending centuries of persecution and transforming the church from an illegal, underground movement to a legally protected religion within the Roman Empire. Just twelve years later, the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE marked the first time a Roman emperor directly intervened in Christian doctrinal disputes, showing the emperors could now control church teachings. The Edict of Thessalonica in 380 CE went far beyond toleration by declaring Christianity the sole legitimate imperial religion. When the Visigoths sacked Rome in 410 CE, pagans blamed the Christians for angering the gods; Augustine answered this claim with the City of God, saying the Church and the state are separate and a Christian’s true home is Heaven, not Rome. In less than 100 years, Christianity went from being illegal to tolerated, to favored by emperors, to the only allowed religion, and the Church began claiming its higher authority above the state.

What is the connection between these dates and their political significance? (800 CE Charlemagne crowned emperor, 936 CE Otto I crowned King, 1076 CE Investiture Controversy, 1215 CE Magna Carta)

On Christmas Day 800 CE, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne as “emperor of the Romans,” showing that the Pope now had the power to create an emperor in the West, placing the church above the ruler. In 936 CE, Otto I was crowned in Aachen and later asked the Pope to make him emperor, continuing the idea that a strong German king needed the Pope’s blessing to claim the imperial title. By 1076 CE, the Investiture Controversy exploded when Pope Gregory VII clashed with Henry IV over who could appoint bishops. This long fight between popes and emperors weakened royal power and strengthened the rights of the nobles; this set the stage for 1215 CE, when English barons forced King John to sign the Magna Carta, declaring that even the king was not above the law. Together, these events shifted power away from absolute kings: the church first claimed authority over the emperors, then lost some of that power to nobles and law, beginning the move towards limited government and the separation of royal and papal authority.

Discuss the emergence of medieval European culture via monastic mission to the Germanic Kingdoms.

Medieval Europe’s special mix of Roman learning, Christian faith, and Germanic spirit was mostly created by monks who brought Christianity to the Germanic tribes after Rome fell. From the 500s to the 900s, missionary monks like Augustine built monasteries. These monasteris became new centers for life as the monks turned Germanic ideas of loyalty and bravery into Christian ideas of obedience and holiness. And, when Charlemagne wanted one big Christian empire, he used these monks to teach everyone the same prayers, law, and writing. By the year 1000, the Roman cities were gone, but monasteries had taken their place. They gave Europe a shared Christian culture that joined German warriors and Roman books together.

How did the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution begin to overturn the medieval worldview? How did they provide a foundation for what we might call modernity?

The medieval world saw a God-centered universe with the Earth in the middle and human life aimed only at heaven, with the truth fixed in the Bible. The Renaissance cracked open this theory by bringing back Greek and Roman writings, celebrating human talent, and putting individual people at the center of attention. Then the scientific revolution delivered the final blow, with thinkers like Nicholas Copernicus and Galileo Galilei proving that the Earth goes around the sun using simple mathematical laws discovered through experiments, not by Church teachings. Together, these changes replaced the old, heaven-focused medieval worldview with a new modern one: the universe works by natural laws, truth comes from reason and evidence, and humans can improve life on Earth through knowledge and invention.

Date Comprehension: What is the significance of each of these? 509 BC, 399 BC, and 27 BC

509 BC (Republic of Rome established): the overthrow of the last king and the creation of the Roman Republic replaced monarchy with a system of elected magistrates and a powerful senate, launching the political structure that would govern Rome for almost 500 years

399 BC (Death of Socrates): Socrates was sentenced to death for “corrupting the youth,” an event that exposed the dangers of unchecked majority rule and inspired his student Plato to question democracy and search for eternal truth through reason

27 BC (Octavian heralded as “Augustus”): The Roman senate granted Octavian the title of “Augustus” and extraordinary powers, effectively ending the Republic and begging ghte Roman Empire under a monarchy

Outline the views of the following six figures on the good life: David, Socrates, Cato, Perpetua, Julian of Norwich, and Pico. In a final paragraph, what is the personal heritage of the West?

David: Good life centers on a deep, personal relationship with God marked by trust in the covenant and joyful obedience.

Socrates: Eudamonia was achieved through the relentless pursuit of wisdom and virtue via living a rational life in the polis

Cato: The good life involves devotion to country by following the mos maiorum through their values, customs, and traditions

Perpetua: Portrayed metanoia and kenosis through her unwavering faithfulness to Christ and discipleship even in the face of death

Julian of Norwich: described the Good Life as one of soteriological salvation, where sin and suffering were transformed into opportunities of grace through the sacramental system

Pico: The good Life stemmed from humans’ unique freedom to cultivate the individual self through the study of humanities such as grammar, history, and rhetoric.

The personal heritage of the West, as seen through these figures, is a tapestry of individuals striving towards transcendence, blending the biblical call to communion with the divine, the Greek emphasis on living a raitonal and virtuous life, Roman Stoic virtue, Christian sacrificial love and mysticism, and Renaissance celebration of human potential. This is a legacy that prizes personal agency adn a desire for meaning beoyond the material, in which an individual’s inner life and ethical choices define ulitmate worth.

Discuss the major differences between classical and medieval political culture.

Classical political culture was built around the city-state/empire in which politics was seen as a human creation for earthly glory, citizens or elites were given power through laws and elections, and the state was treated as the highest authority. Medieval political culture, in contrast, placed the main goal of life in salvation rather than civid greatness, organized society as a ladder of loyalties, and accepted that true universal authority belonged to the church alone. Ultimately, the classical world was horizontal, man-centered, and focused on this life while the medieval world was vertical, god-centered, and focsued on the next life.