Select any four of the six questions of your choice. Each question should be at a minimum of two pages with all parts answered. No title page necessary, you can use any sources to develop your answers and you do not need to cite the sources. This first research set the foundation, parameters expectations for all other critical thinking assignments. Once completed submit as up load into canvas. Grader will be posted to the grade book. This first essay exam counts for twenty percent of your overall grade.

1. Define the origins of Renaissance. Why did the Italian Renaissance produce such a strong spirit of Humanism? Discuss the major contribution Leonard da Vinci? How was the Northern Renaissance in Northern Europe different from the Italian Renaissance?
2. Discuss the importance of the Maritime Exploration prior to 1450 and after 1450. Who opened up the Window of Exploration and what technological innovations did the Europeans employ?

3.Discuss the origins of the Protestant Reformation? Martin Luther and John Calvin were contemporaries of one another, but different from a religious theology, how?

4.Why was Oliver Cromwell important? Discuss the significance of the English Civil War and Glorious Revolution and the Bill of Rights.

1. Why caused the Thirty Years’ War and why did it become the first modern war and the treaty of the Peace of West Westphalia was the first modern peace?
2. Why is Machiavelli usually considered the “father of modern political thought “? Why was Machiavelli more interested in “what is “rather than “what ought to be”? According to Machiavelli what was wrong with Italy of his own day?