SANT NIRANKARI PUBLIC SCHOOL

SUBJECT- HISTORY
CLASS – XI
CASE STUDY BASED QUESTIONS.

1. Read the following source and answer the following questions:

When in April the sweet showers fall

And pierce the drought of March to the root

And the Small birds are making melody

That sleep away the night with open eye...

(So Nature pricks them and their heart engages);

Then people long to go on pilgrimages,

And palmers* long to seek the foreign shrines

Of far-off saints, revered in various lands.

And especially from every shire

Of England, to Canterbury they make their journey.’

-Geoffrey Chaucer (c.1340-1400), The Canterbury Tales. This was

written in Middle English, and the verse is a translation in modern
English.’

a) Who is the Author of these lines ?

b) What is the theme of this poem ?
c) What can we ascertain about the beliefs of medieval European people?

2. Read the following source and answer the following questions:

The Capture of Bukhara
Juwaini, a late-thirteenth- century Persian chronicler of the Mongol rulers of Iran,
carried an account of the Bukhara in 1220. After the conquest of the city, Juwaini
reported. Genghis Khan went to the festival ground where the rich residents of the
city were and addressed them:’O people know that you have committed great sins,
and that the great ones among you have committed these sins. If you ask me what
proof I have for these words, I say it is because I am the punishment of God. If you
had not committed great sins, God would not have sent a punishment like me upon
you’…Now one man had escaped from Bukhara after its capture and had come to
Khurasan. He was questions about the fate of the city and replied: ‘They came,
they [mined the walls], they burnt, they slew, they plundered and they departed.’

a) Who was Juwaini?

b) What did Genghis khan tell to the residents of Bukhara?
c) What was the situation of Bukhara after the Mongol invasion?

3. Read the following source and answer the following questions:

Income of the Roman Aristocracy, Early Fifth Century
‘Each of the Great houses of Rome contained within itself everything which a
medium-sized city could hold, a hippodrome, for , temples, fountains and different
kinds of baths… Many of the Roman households received an income of four
thousand pounds of gold per year from their properties, not including grain, wine
and other produce which, if sold, would have amounted to one-third of the income
in gold. The income of the households in Rome of the second class was one
thousand or fifteen hundred pounds of gold.’
-Olympiodorus of Thebes.

a) How were the great houses of Rome in the fifth century?

b) What was the income of second class people in Rome?
c) Throw a light on the income of rich Roman families.

4. Read the text carefully and answer the questions:

Copernicus asserted that the planets, including the earth, rotate around the sun. A
devout Christian, Copernicus was afraid of the possible reaction to his theory by
traditionalist clergymen. For this reason, he did not want his manuscript, De
revolutionibus (The Rotation) to be printed. On his deathbed, he gave it to his
follower, Joachim Rheticus. It took time for people to accept this idea. It was much
later – more than half a century later, in fact – that the difference between ‘heaven’
and earth was bridged through the writings of astronomers like Johannes Kepler
(1571-1630) and Galileo Galilei (1564-1642). The theory of the earth as part of a
sun-centred system was made popular by Kepler’s Cosmographical Mystery,
which demonstrated that the planets move around the sun not in circles but in
ellipses. Galileo confirmed the notion of the dynamic world in his work The Motion.
This revolution in science reached its climax with Isaac Newton’s theory of
gravitation.

a. Explain the Christian notion of the universe and earth.

b. Why did Copernicus not print his manuscript?
c. Name the manuscript that Copernicus hand over to his follower Joachim
Rheticus.

5. A major difference between the two superpowers and their respective empires
was that the Roman Empire was culturally much more diverse than that of Iran.
The Parthians and later the Sasanians, the dynasties that ruled Iran in this period,
ruled over a population that was largely Iranian. The Roman Empire, by contrast,
was a mosaic of territories and cultures that were chiefly bound together by a
common system of government. Many languages were spoken in the empire, but
for the purposes of administration Latin and Greek were the most widely used,
indeed the only languages. The upper classes of the east spoke and wrote in
Greek, those of the west in Latin, and the boundary between these broad language
areas ran somewhere across the middle of the Mediterranean, between the African
provinces of Tripolitania (which was Latin speaking) and Cyrenaica (Greek
speaking). All those who lived in the empire were subjects of a single ruler, the
emperor, regardless of where they lived and what language they spoke.

Questions:

a) How would you differentiate the Roman Empire from Iran?

b) Name two dynasties who ruled over Iran during this period.
c) Which empire was bound together by a common system of
government and why?

6. A major difference between the two superpowers and their respective empires
was that the Roman Empire was culturally much more diverse than that of Iran.
The Parthians and later the Sasanians, the dynasties that ruled Iran in this period,
ruled over a population that was largely Iranian. The Roman Empire, by contrast,
was a mosaic of territories and cultures that were chiefly bound together by a
common system of government. Many languages were spoken in the empire, but
for the purposes of administration Latin and Greek were the most widely used,
indeed the only languages. The upper classes of the east spoke and wrote in
Greek, those of the west in Latin, and the boundary between these broad language
areas ran somewhere across the middle of the Mediterranean, between the African
provinces of Tripolitania (which was Latin speaking) and Cyrenaica (Greek-
speaking). All those who lived in the empire were subjects of a single ruler, the
emperor, regardless of where they lived and what language they spoke.

Questions:

a) How would you differentiate the Roman Empire from Iran?

b) Name two dynasties who ruled over Iran during this period.
c) Which empire was bound together by a common system of
government and why?

7. The Roman Empire can broadly be divided into two phases, ‘early’ and ‘late’,
divided by the third century as a sort of historical watershed between them. In
other words, the whole period down to the main part of the third century can be
called the ‘early empire’, and the period after that the ‘late empire’. A major
difference between the two superpowers and their respective empires was that the
Roman Empire was culturally much more diverse than that of Iran. The Parthians
and later the Sasanians, the dynasties that ruled Iran in this period, ruled over a
population that was largely Iranian. The Roman Empire, by contrast, was a mosaic
of territories and cultures that were chiefly bound together by a common system of
government. Many languages were spoken in the empire, but for the purposes of
administration Latin and Greek were the most widely used, indeed the only
languages. The upper classes of the east spoke and wrote in Greek, those of the
west in Latin, and the boundary between these broad language areas ran
somewhere across the middle of the Mediterranean, between the African
provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. All those who lived in the empire were
subjects of a single ruler, the emperor, regardless of where they lived and what
language they spoke.

a. Which two dynasties ruled Iran during this period?

b. What do you infer from the statement, “the Roman Empire was a mosaic of t
territories and cultures
c. Identify the two rival superpowers and state how they differed.

8. Read the text carefully and answer the questions:

The nobility had, in reality, a central role in social processes. This is because they
controlled land. This control was the outcome of a practice called ‘vassalage’. The
kings of France were linked to the people by ‘vassalage’, similar to the practice
among the Germanic peoples, of whom the Franks were one. The big landowners
– the nobles – were vassals of the king, and peasants were vassals of the
landowners. A nobleman accepted the king as his seigneur (senior) and they made
a mutual promise: the seigneur/lord would protect the vassal, who would be loyal
to him. This relationship involved elaborate rituals and exchange of vows taken on
the Bible in a church. At this ceremony, the vassal received a written charter or a
staff or even a clod of earth as a symbol of the land that was being given to him by
his master. The noble enjoyed a privileged status. He had absolute control over his
property, in perpetuity. He could raise troops called ‘feudal levies’. The lord held
his own courts of justice and could even coin his own money. He was the lord of all
the people settled on his land. He owned vast tracts of land which contained his
own dwellings, his private fields and pastures and the homes and fields of his
tenant-peasants. His house was called a manor. His private lands were cultivated
by peasants, who were also expected to act as footsoldiers in battle when
required, in addition to working on their own farms.

a) Examine the relationship between a vassal to his master or lord under the
vassalage system.
b) Trace the origin of the title lord within the nobility.
c) State two examples to show how the noble enjoyed a privileged status.

9. The CCP had been founded in 1921, soon after the Russian Revolution. The
Russian success exercised a powerful influence around the world and leaders
such as Lenin and Trotsky went on to establish the Comintern or the Third
International in March 1918 to help bring about a world government that would end
exploitation. The Comintern and the Soviet Union supported Communist parties
around the world but they worked within the traditional Marxist understanding that
revolution would be brought about by the working class in cities. Its initial appeal
across national boundaries was immense but it soon became a tool for Soviet
interests and was dissolved in 1943. Mao Zedong (1893-1976), who emerged as a
major CCP leader, took a different path by basing his revolutionary programme on
the peasantry. His success made the CCP a powerful political force that ultimately
won against the Guomindang.

a) When did the foundation of the CCP took place?

b) Who established the comintern ?
c) What do you know about Mao Zedong ?

10. The position of women in the families of merchants, however, was somewhat
different. Shopkeepers were very often assisted by their wives in running the shop.
In families of merchants and bankers, wives looked after the businesses when the
male members were away on work. The early death of a merchant compelled his
widow to perform a larger public role than was the case in aristocratic families. A
few women were intellectually very creative and sensitive about the importance of
a humanist education. ‘Even though the study of letters promises and offers no
reward for women and no dignity’, wrote the Venetian Cassandra Fedele (1465-
1558), ‘every woman ought to seek and embrace these studies.’ She was one of a
handful of women who questioned the idea that women were incapable of
achieving the qualities of a humanist scholar. Fedele was known for her proficiency
in Greek and Latin and was invited to give orations at the University of Padua.
Fedele’s writings bring into focus the general regard for education in that age. She
was one of many Venetian women writers who criticised the republic ‘for creating a
highly limited definition of freedom that favoured the desires of men over those of
women’.

Another remarkable woman was the Marchesa of Mantua, Isabella d’Este (1474-
1539). She ruled the state while her husband was absent, and the court
of Mantua, a small state, was famed for its intellectual brilliance. Women’s writings
revealed their conviction that they should have economic power, property and
education to achieve an identity in a world dominated by men.

a) How the position of the women in the merchants and bankers

family was different?

b) What was the idea of Cassandra Fedele about the capability of the women?
What was her view on education for women?

11. o the natives, the goods they exchanged with the Europeans were gifts,
given in friendship. For the Europeans, dreaming of becoming rich, the fish and
furs were commodities, which they would sell for a profit in Europe. The prices
of the goods they sold varied from year to year, depending on the supply. The
natives could not understand this – they had no sense of the ‘market’ in
faraway Europe. They were puzzled by the fact that the European traders
sometimes gave them a lot of things in exchange for their goods, sometimes
very little. They were also saddened by the greed of the Europeans*. In their
impatience to get furs, they had slaughtered hundreds of beavers, and the
natives were very uneasy, fearing that the animals would take revenge on them
for this destruction.

a) How did the natives perceive the products they exchanged with the
Europeans?
b) How did Europe see the fish and furs?
c) Why did the Europeans give products in varying quantities to the natives in
different parts of the year?