Byzantium and the Early Islamic World

In the first two centuries after the fall of Rome in 376 C.E., which of the following happened?

• Islam became a major religion in the Mid-East, North Africa, and southern Spain

• the Byzantine Empire became dominant in large swaths of Europe and Southwest Asia

• the eastern portion of the old Roman Empire became impoverished and fell to barbarian nomads

• politically fragmented city-states developed in both Western and Eastern Europe

A major difference between Islamic and Christian art is that

• Christian art avoided visual portrayals of the faith's central figures whereas Islamic art embraced it

• Islamic art avoided visual portrayals of the faith's central figures whereas Christian art embraced it

• Islamic art was mainly in the form of painting, Christian art was mainly in the form of woodcutting

• Christian art was mainly in the form of architecture, whereas Islamic art was mainly in the form of woodcutting

The Justinian Code is significant because

• it expanded to Hagia Sophia, a landmark cultural feature of two major belief systems

• it showed a complete break from the Rome's system of rule by custom as opposed to rule by law

• it was a concession to early Church leadership in the Roman Catholic tradition

• it remained a foundation of legal knowledge in Europe from the 6th century to the 19th century

Why did the Byzantine Empire contract following the reign of Justinian?

• The Ottoman Empire unified all of Western and Eastern Europe

• Successor emperors sold large portions of Byzantium to neighboring states to pay off debts from its highly centralized government

• Turkic, Germanic, and Arab peoples took over pieces of it with military conquest

• Historians cannot discern the failures of Byzatine history in the 7th and 8th centuries

Leo III's policy on iconoclasm

• encouraged the creation and worship of religious images and icons

• resulted in the covering or destruction of images and paintings in churches

• converted most of Europe to Islam

• converted most of Europe to Orthodox Christianity

All of the following are significant features of Byzantine religion EXCEPT

• lack of separation between church and state

• the patriarch's complete independence from Byzantine monarchs

• many monasteries founded in the 4th and 5th centuries

• proselytizing the faith to neighboring non-Christian peoples in Central Europe

Which is NOT true of Orthodox Christianity

• it outlasted the Byzantine Empire

• it emphasizes the veneration of Mary as well as the Holy Spirit

• it broke from the Roman Catholic Church in the 11th century

• it blends many aspects of Islam, Catholicism, and Zoroastrianism

A historian making a claim that the Byzantine state was influential in trade could best use which of the following as evidence

• Byzantine gold coins became a common currency around the Mediterranean

• Byzantine Greek was the lingua franca all over Europe, the Mid-East, and North Africa

• Byantium gave of agriculture for industrialization centuries before anywhere in Western Europe

• land was equally distributed between people of all socioeconomic groups in the Empire

The illuminated manuscript from the Byzantine Empire circa the 12th century could be used as evidence that

• elaborate decoration of religious items was not in concert with Orthodox Christianity

• Byzantine art was often devotional (religious) in nature

• Byzantine art and culture failed to influence European and Islamic cultures

• Byzantine art was most often secular (non-religious) in nature

The greatest city in the Byzantine Empire was

• Constantinople

• Rome

• Athens

• Cologne