1. Which of the following statements is true of
second-wave empires?
a. They imposed cultural uniformity on their
subjects.
b. They stimulated the exchange of ideas and
cultures.
c. They tended to coalesce peacefully among people
who shared a common culture.
d. They hindered economic development by devastating
large territories.
The answer b. By bringing together people of
different traditions and religions, second-wave empires stimulated the exchange
of both cultures and ideas.
2. In 500 B.C.E., which of the world’s empires was
the largest and most impressive?
a. Mauryan Empire
b. Qin Empire
c. Greek Empire
d. Persian Empire
The answer is d. The enormous Persian Empire had
somewhere between 35 and 50 million subjects and enormous territories, making it
the world’s largest and most impressive.
3. What was the ruling dynasty of the Persian
Empire?
a. The Achaemenid dynasty
b. The Seleucid dynasty
c. The Mauryan dynasty
d. The Darian dynasty
The answer is a. The Achaemenid dynasty, founded by
Cyrus the Great in 557 B.C.E., ruled Persia until Alexander the Great’s
conquest.
4. The god Ahura Mazda gave authority to the rulers
of which empire?
a. Qin
b. Persian
c. Roman
d. Mauryan
The answer is b. The majority religion of Persia was
Zoroastrian, and Ahura Mazda was the major god.
5. Of what empire was it said that “there is no
nation which so readily adopts foreign customs”?
a. Greek
b. Mauryan
c. Persian
d. Roman
The answer is c. The Persians were very willing to
adopt the customs both of the people they conquered and of their neighbors.
6. Which of the following best describes ancient
Greece?
a. It consisted of many city-states that usually
were able to coexist peacefully.
b. It consisted of a number of federated states,
loosely ruled by a council of religious elders.
c. It was a unified state, with its capital at
Athens.
d. It consisted of many city-states that were in
frequent conflict but united by a common religion and language.
The answer is d. The Greeks enjoyed a growing sense
of common cultural identity even though the larger city-states fought each
other with depressing frequency.
7. Which of the following statements is true of the
ancient Greek concept of citizenship?
a. The rights of citizens were most developed in
Greece’s overseas colonies.
b. Greek ideas of citizenship varied over time and
place, but on the whole, the Greeks gave an extraordinary public role to their
citizens.
c. Citizenship was open only to the wealthy, giving
both elite men and women the right to speak and vote on public business.
d. Citizenship was open only to wealthy men.
The answer is b. Different parts of Greece developed
very differently politically, but all gave citizens the right to speak and vote
on public business.
8. Why is Solon important to ancient history?
a. He was the great reformer of the Roman state.
b. He created the Persian Empire.
c. He was the first Chinese emperor.
d. He reformed the Athenian political system.
The answer is d. Solon’s reforms vasty expanded
Athens’s democracy.
9. What victory over the Persians in 490 B.C.E. was
touted as a great victory of Greek freedoms over Asian despotism?
a. The Battle of Thermopylae
b. The Battle of Issus
c. The Battle of Marathon
d. The Battle of Actium
The answer is c. Greece’s victory over the Persians
at Marathon in 490 B.C.E. helped shape the notion of an East/West divide.
10. Which Greek state practiced the most radical
form of democracy?
a. Macedonia
b. Athens
c. Sparta
d. Corinth
The answer is b. Athens had the most radical
democracy of any Greek state, giving full citizenship to the men of the poorer
classes who provided rowers for her fleet.
11. How did ancient Greece come to be unified?
a. It was defeated by Macedonian king Philip II.
b. Sparta defeated Athens in the Peloponnesian War.
c. The Greek states joined together voluntarily to
fight the Persian threat.
d. Greece was only unified when the Romans conquered
it.
The answer is a. Philip defeated a coalition of
Greek states and unified the Greeks.
12. What was the most important historical effect of
Alexander the Great’s conquests?
a. He created a lasting empire that transformed
Eurasian society.
b. His conquest of China exposed the Chinese for the
first time to European culture.
c. His conquest allowed the widespread dissemination
of Greek culture.
d. His conquest led to a massive inflow of Persian
culture into Greece.
The answer is c. Thanks to Alexander, Greek
“Hellenistic” culture spread beyond the Mediterranean to Egypt, Mesopotamia,
and India.
13. Which of the following statements is true of the
Hellenistic states?
a. They lasted only briefly before being swallowed
up.
b. They spread and furthered the democratic
political principles of Greece.
c. They quickly adopted the bureaucratic systems and
languages of the regions they ruled.
d. They were monarchies whose rulers rejected
democracy.
The answer is d. The Hellenistic states were
imperial states whose monarchs more closely resembled the kings of the peoples
they now ruled rather than the political systems of Greece.
14. What is a consul?
a. A Greek priest
b. An elected Roman state executive
c. A member of the Roman elite
d. A Hellenistic king
The answer is b. In the Republic, Romans elected two
consuls each to carry out the executive functions of government.
15. Who fought the Punic Wars?
a. Greece and Persia
b. Persia and Rome
c. Rome and Carthage
d. Persia and Carthage
The answer is c. Called “Punic” because of
Carthage’s Phoenician origins, this series of wars between Rome and Carthage
cemented Rome’s position as the great power of the Mediterranean world.
16. What is the name for the Roman head of
household, the man who exercised absolute rights over his wife, children, and
slaves?
a. patrician
b. mos maiorum
c. patriarch
d. pater familias
The answer is d. Literally meaning “father of the
family,” the pater familias was a head of household with sweeping rights over
wife, children, and slaves, although his power eroded over time.
17. Which of the following was a reason why Rome was
transformed from being a republic to the rule of an emperor?
a. Rome had acquired so much territory that republic
government could no longer function.
b. A charismatic leader rose whose conquests won so
much territory that Rome made him emperor to govern it all.
c. The senate, unable to govern Rome’s large
territory, chose an emperor from among themselves.
d. The last consul of Rome simply failed to step
down after his term of office ended, becoming emperor.
The answer is a. Rome’s expansion led to violent
upheavals, as a few men were enriched and many others impoverished, leading to
civil wars and the eventual triumph of Augustus as the first emperor.
18. This second-wave empire for centuries maintained
an “empire in disguise” that kept the appearance of government by the people
while in reality being controlled by a single emperor.
a. Mauryan Empire
b. Persian Empire
c. Chinese Empire
d. Roman Empire
The answer is d. Growing out of the Roman Republic,
for centuries Roman emperors—beginning with Augustus—maintained the form of a
republican government while keeping the reality of power for themselves.
19. The creation of this empire was regarded as a
restoration of an earlier age of unity.
a. Mauryan Empire
b. Chinese Empire
c. Roman Empire
d. Persian Empire
The answer is b. China had been a unified state
under the Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, only to fall apart in the Warring
States period; the various states fought to reunify China, with the state of
Qin eventually triumphing.
20. This empire-builder’s chosen name actually means
“first emperor.”
a. Chandragupta Maurya
b. Augustus
c. Qin Shihuangdi
d. Cyrus
The answer is c. Qin Shihuangdi literally means
“first emperor from the state of Qin.” It was the name assumed by the ruler who
united China in the late third century B.C.E.
21. Which of the following statements is true of
China’s Qin dynasty?
a. It united China, but its rule was so brutal that
the dynasty lasted less than twenty years.
b. It united China and ruled for about four
centuries.
c. It united China by creating a loose overlordship
that tolerated diversity among its subjects.
d. It ruled for a short time and then passed peacefully
to the Han dynasty.
The answer is a. It was only the successor to the
Qin, the Han dynasty, that succeeded in ruling China for four centuries. Qin
Shihuangdi united China beginning in 221 B.C.E. and instituted centralizing
policies that were so repressive that his dynasty collapsed by 206 B.C.E. in
the reign of his son.
22. This Chinese dynasty established the political
patterns that continued to govern China until the twentieth century.
a. Qin
b. Xhou
c. Tang
d. Han
The answer is d. The Han dynasty built their state
upon Confucian political principles, establishing political patterns that
lasted into the twentieth century.
23. Which of the following statements is true of
both the Roman and the Chinese Empires in the early years of the Common Era?
a. Both empires imposed a high degree of cultural
uniformity on their subjects.
b. Both empires claimed divine support to help
sustain their rule.
c. Both empires repressed foreign religious ideas.
d. Both empires created an elaborate bureaucracy.
The answer is b. Both empires invoked supernatural
sanctions, the Chinese emperors claiming to rule by the mandate of heaven while
the Romans began to deify dead emperors.
24. Which of the following statements is true of
Roman citizenship in the imperial period?
a. It was given only to people who had adopted Latin
and other elements of Roman culture.
b. It remained restricted to the people of Italy and
only a few special allies of the Roman state.
c. It gave legal status but did not mark cultural
assimilation.
d. The number of citizens gradually declined as
Italians tried to maintain their privileges among the large number of
non-Italians in the empire.
The answer is c. Roman citizenship was highly prized
because it gave particular legal rights; it did not require a person to be
culturally Roman.
25. Which of the following statements accurately
reflects Roman cultural attitudes?
a. Many elite Romans regarded Greek culture as
superior to their own.
b. Romans displayed a cultural arrogance that
assumed that everything non-Roman was “barbarian.”
c. Romans prided themselves on their warlike nature
and largely dismissed literature, art, and other elements of high culture as
effeminate.
d. Romans actively sought to impose their culture on
their subjects.
The answer is a. Romans admired Greek literature,
philosophy, and art, and elite Romans received a Greek education.
26. This second-wave empire created a civil service
system that provided a special education for bureaucrats, complete with
examinations and selection by merit.
a. Roman Empire
b. Persian Empire
c. Greek Empire
d. Chinese Empire
The answer is d. Emperor Wudi first established an
imperial academy to train officials for the Chinese bureaucracy, thus beginning
China’s civil service system.
27. The major revolt that led to the fall of China’s
Han dynasty is known as the
a. Yellow Turban Rebellion.
b. Taiping Rebellion.
c. Great Slave Rebellion.
d. Great Buddhist Rebellion.
The answer is a. The Yellow Turban Rebellion of 184
C.E. so badly undermined the Han dynasty that it soon fell.
28. Which of the following statements is true of
Indian civilization?
a. It has often been politically fragmented but is
united by a common culture.
b. It is both politically fragmented and culturally
diverse.
c. It is culturally diverse but has usually united
politically.
d. Through history, it has usually been united both
politically and culturally.
The answer is b. Through many centuries, Indian
history has been shaped by its combination of political fragmentation and vast
cultural diversity.
29. Which statement accurately describes the
political philosophy of the Mauryan treatise called Arthashastra?
a. It advocates brotherly love and care for neighbor
as the key to successful political organization.
b. It advocates careful subordination of inferiors
to superiors and a sense of filial duty.
c. It advocates using the moral system of Hinduism
as the basis for the Mauryan state.
d. It advocates that rulers ignore considerations of
morality and act pragmatically to do whatever is best for the state.
The answer is d. The Arthashastra is pragmatic and
even amoral in its recommendations that kings act as brutally as necessary for
the common good.
30. Why is Ashoka important to world history?
a. He was the Han emperor of China who created China’s
civil service system.
b. He was a Mauryan emperor, an enlightened ruler
who tried to govern in accord with religious values.
c. He was the last ruler of the Persian Empire.
d. He was a Central Asian military leader whose
invasion brought down China’s Han dynasty.
The answer is b. Ashoka (268–232 B.C.E.) has been
regarded as a model enlightened ruler of India, who tried to rule in accord
with the moral teachings of both Buddhism and Hinduism.
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