Comprehensive Guide to Native American Cultures and Renaissance Italy

longhouse

Long wooden dwelling of the Iroquois that housed several related families

adobe

Sun-dried clay brick used for building by Southwest peoples like the Anasazi

pueblo

Multistory adobe apartment-style village built by Southwest Native Americans

Bering Strait

Waterway between Siberia and Alaska; early hunters likely crossed the land bridge here into the Americas

Inuit

Native people of the Arctic who adapted to the cold by hunting seals, whales, and caribou

Gulf of Mexico

Body of water along the Mesoamerican coast where the Olmec civilization arose

Hopewell

Mound-building culture of the Ohio River valley known for wide trade networks

Cahokia

Largest Mississippian mound-building city, near present-day St. Louis

Iroquois

Native confederacy of the Northeast Woodlands; lived in longhouses and farmed corn, beans, and squash

Plains Indians

Nomadic peoples of the Great Plains who hunted buffalo

Anasazi

Ancestral Pueblo people of the Southwest who built pueblos and cliff dwellings

Mesa Verde

Colorado site of well-known Anasazi cliff dwellings

tribute

Payments of goods or labor demanded from conquered peoples (e.g., by the Aztec)

Mesoamerica

Region of Mexico and northern Central America where the Olmec, Maya, and Aztec arose

Olmec

Earliest Mesoamerican civilization (Gulf coast); known for colossal stone heads

Teotihuacán

Huge planned city north of modern Mexico City with the Pyramids of the Sun and Moon; major trade center

Yucatán Peninsula

Peninsula in southeastern Mexico that was the heartland of the Maya

Maya

Mesoamerican civilization of independent city-states; known for a writing system, math (zero), astronomy, and calendars

Tikal

Major Maya city-state in present-day Guatemala with towering temple pyramids

Toltec

Warrior people who dominated central Mexico after Teotihuacán fell; capital at Tula

Chichén Itzá

Maya city on the Yucatán later influenced by the Toltec; famous for El Castillo pyramid

Aztec

Civilization that dominated central Mexico from the 1300s until Cortés in 1521

Tenochtitlán

Aztec capital built on an island in Lake Texcoco (site of modern Mexico City)

Lake Texcoco

Lake in the Valley of Mexico where the Aztecs built Tenochtitlán

maize

Corn; the staple crop of Mesoamerica and the Americas

quipu

Inca system of knotted strings used for record keeping

Caral

Oldest major city in the Americas (Peru)

Chavin

Early Andean culture in Peru known for its religious center and art

Nazca

Andean culture of coastal Peru known for giant line drawings in the desert

Ecuador

Andean country in northwest South America; the northern edge of the Inca Empire

Moche

Coastal Peruvian culture known for irrigation, pottery, and metalwork

Inca

Andean empire centered at Cuzco with a strong emperor, road system, and terrace farming

Cuzco

Capital of the Inca Empire (in Peru)

Pachacuti

Inca ruler who began the empire's rapid expansion in the 1400s

Machu Picchu

Inca mountain city/estate high in the Andes

Urubamba River

River in Peru running below Machu Picchu

urban society

Society in which cities dominate economic, political, and cultural life

mercenaries

Soldiers hired for pay; used by Italian city-states

secular

Worldly; concerned with material life rather than the religious (a Renaissance focus)

dowry

Money or property a bride's family gives at marriage

Italian Renaissance

"Rebirth" of interest in classical culture and human achievement that began in Italy's city-states (c. 1350-1550)

Leonardo da Vinci

Renaissance "universal man": painter (Mona Lisa, Last Supper), scientist, inventor

Milan

Italian city-state ruled by the Sforza family

Venice

Wealthy Italian trading republic on the Adriatic

Florence

Renaissance center of art and banking, dominated by the Medici

Francesco Sforza

Mercenary leader who seized Milan and became its duke

Cosimo de' Medici

Wealthy banker who dominated Florence from 1434

Lorenzo de' Medici

Cosimo's grandson, "the Magnificent"; ruled Florence and was a great patron of artists

Rome

Seat of the papacy; center of High Renaissance art under the popes

humanism

Intellectual movement based on the study of classical texts and human potential and achievements

vernacular

The native language of a region (instead of Latin)

fresco

Painting done on wet plaster

Petrarch

"Father of humanism"; collected classical manuscripts and wrote in Latin and Italian

Dante

Wrote the Divine Comedy in vernacular Italian

Chaucer

English author of The Canterbury Tales, written in vernacular English

Canterbury

English cathedral city; destination of the pilgrims in Chaucer's tales

Christine de Pizan

Writer who defended women in The Book of the City of Ladies

Raphael

High Renaissance painter known for graceful Madonnas and The School of Athens

Michelangelo

High Renaissance sculptor/painter: David, Pietà, Sistine Chapel ceiling

Flanders

Region (now Belgium) that was a center of Northern Renaissance art

Jan van Eyck

Flemish painter who used oil paint to create detailed, realistic works

Albrecht Dürer

German artist famous for woodcuts and engravings who brought Italian ideas north

Niccolò Machiavelli

Author of The Prince; said a ruler's goal is gaining and keeping power

Martin Luther

German monk whose ideas launched the Protestant Reformation

Christian humanism

Northern Renaissance movement combining classical learning with a call for Church reform

Desiderius Erasmus

Dutch Christian humanist who criticized Church abuses (The Praise of Folly)

salvation

Eternal life with God

indulgence

Pardon reducing punishment for sins; the Church's sale of them angered Luther

Wittenberg

German town where Luther taught and posted his Ninety-five Theses

Ninety-five Theses

Luther's 1517 arguments against indulgences and Church abuses

Edict of Worms

1521 order declaring Luther an outlaw and heretic

Lutheranism

Protestant faith based on Luther's teachings: salvation by faith alone and the authority of the Bible

Charles V

Holy Roman Emperor (Habsburg) who opposed Lutheranism but was distracted by wars

Bohemia

Kingdom in the modern Czech Republic under the Habsburgs; its 1618 revolt began the Thirty Years' War

Hungary

Kingdom threatened by the Ottoman Turks, which distracted Charles V

Peace of Augsburg

1555 agreement letting German princes choose Lutheranism or Catholicism for their territories

Ulrich Zwingli

Swiss reformer who led the Reformation in Zürich

Zürich

Swiss city where Zwingli's reforms took hold

John Calvin

French reformer in Geneva who taught predestination; wrote Institutes of the Christian Religion

predestination

Calvinist belief that God chose those to be saved from the beginning of time

annul

Declare a marriage invalid

Geneva

Swiss city that Calvin turned into a model Protestant community

King Henry VIII

English king who broke from Rome after the pope refused to annul his marriage; made himself head of the Church of England

Ignatius of Loyola

Founder of the Jesuits (1540), a Catholic order loyal to the pope

Trent

Italian city where the Council of Trent reaffirmed Catholic doctrine

conquistadors

Spanish conquerors of the Americas

encomienda

System granting Spanish settlers the right to demand labor from Native peoples

Columbian Exchange

Transfer of plants, animals, people, and diseases between the Old and New Worlds

Hernán Cortés

Spanish conquistador who conquered the Aztec (1519-1521)

Portugal

Leader of early European exploration; sought a sea route to Asia around Africa

Vasco da Gama

Portuguese explorer who sailed around Africa to India (1498)

Melaka

Trading port in Southeast Asia captured by the Portuguese

Christopher Columbus

Italian explorer sailing for Spain who reached the Americas in 1492

Cuba

Caribbean island Columbus reached in 1492; became a Spanish colony

Ferdinand Magellan

Led the first expedition to sail around the world; killed in the Philippines

John Cabot

Italian explorer for England who explored the North American coast

Amerigo Vespucci

Explorer who argued the Americas were a "new world"; America is named for him

Montezuma

Aztec emperor when Cortés arrived

Francisco Pizarro

Spanish conquistador who conquered the Inca

King Afonso

Christian ruler of Kongo who protested Portuguese involvement in the slave trade