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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Walter Isaacson states that Leonardo's Vitruvian Man perfectly symbolizes the ideal of what?
(a) Science.
(b) Individuality.
(c) Humanism.
(d) Aesthetic beauty.

2. The commission of what art piece led to Leonardo's official appointment in the court of Ludovico Sforza and its accompanying salary and accommodations?
(a) The spire of the Milan Cathedral.
(b) A massive horse monument.
(c) The Last Supper.
(d) Lady with an Ermine.

3. What was the population of Florence in 1300 before the devastation caused by the Black Death?
(a) 100,000.
(b) 140,000.
(c) 50,000.
(d) 80,000.

4. While Leonardo often drew and painted full-body male nudes, by contrast, almost all of the women he painted were what?
(a) Clothed and shown from the waist down.
(b) Hiding their nakedness with their hair.
(c) Clothed and shown from the waist up.
(d) Turned away from the viewer.

5. The squaring of a circle was a concept first discovered and discussed by what great thinker?
(a) Plato.
(b) Aristotle.
(c) Hippocrates.
(d) Archimedes.

Short Answer Questions

1. Homosexuality was so common in Renaissance Florence that what word became slang in Germany for gay?

2. In what season of 1452 was Leonardo born?

3. When Donato Bramante was hired by Ludovico Sforza to remodel the dining hall of the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie, what painting was Leonardo hired to create on the dining hall's wall?

4. In what year was Leonardo brought to Florence to live with his father?

5. The troops of which French king marched through Italy, putting a halt to Leonardo's creation of the horse monument, since his materials were needed to construct cannon?

Short Essay Questions

1. What were the main techniques Leonardo adopted from his mentor, Andrea del Verrocchio, that would go on to be featured prominently in all of Leonardo's later works?

2. What occasion prompted Leonardo to paint The Last Supper?

3. What was revealed about Leonardo's looks and personality in early works written about his person?

4. Discuss an example of Leonardo's use of analogies that led him to new scientific discoveries.

5. The essayist Benedetto Dei wrote in 1972 that Florence "has all seven of the fundamental things a city requires for perfection" (26). What were the seven things he named?

6. How did Johannes Gutenberg's invention of the printing press in 1452 affect Leonardo's life and work?

7. When Leonardo joined a competition of architects, what was the assigned task for the contest?

8. What language did Leonardo decide to teach himself in the early 1490s and what was the result?

9. What symbolism did Leonardo see in the reeds he included in his drawing of Pleasure and Pain?

10. What major difference does the author depict when comparing and contrasting Leonardo's personality with Leon Battista Alberti's personality?

(see the answer keys)

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