Rome

Which of the following is not true of ancient Rome?

The region in which Rome was located was Latium - hence their language, Latin.

Rome had two major foundation myths, one revolving around Romulus and another revolving around Remus.

The formation of Roman culture was most influenced by the Greeks and the Etruscans.

The last king of Rome was Tarquin the Proud; then the republic was founded.

Which of the following is not true of Rome during the period of the republic?

Julius Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus formed the so-called First Triumvirate.

The highest office of the state was held by the consuls.

Rome conquered Greece and as a result was culturally "conquered" by Greece.

Octavian was defeated at the Battle of Actium.

In the Punic Wars

Rome fought against Carthage for dominance of the western Mediterranean.

Hannibal was Rome's greatest general.

Rome fought against the Gauls for control of Italy.

Scipio was defeated at the Battle of Zama.

Which of the following is not true of Augustus?

He was the adopted son and heir of Julius Caesar.

He formed part of the Second Triumvirate.

He was the first emperor of Rome and ushered in the so-called Pax Romana.

He was one of the "five good emperors".

Which of the following is not true of ancient Roman religion?

The (Gregorian) calendar we use today has its basis in ancient Rome's religious calendar.

Roman religion was not concerned with morality in the same way that most major world religions of today are.

Roman religion was based on mutual trust between god and man in a kind of quid-pro-quo system.

Ancient Rome was the first culture to introduce a clear distinction between religion and socio-political life.

Which of the following is not true regarding the relationship between the emperor and Roman religion?

Good emperors were typically deified after death.

Augustus, like Julius Caesar before him, was pontifex maximus of the state religion.

As Augustus was conceived of as the paterfamilias of the Roman Empire, his genius received a style of worship throughout the empire.

The emperor was identified as the very incarnation of Jupiter on earth.

Which of the following correspondences between Greek and Roman deities is incorrect?

The Roman equivalent of Zeus was Jupiter.

The Roman equivalent of Ares was Mars.

The Roman equivalent of Hera was Juno.

The Roman equivalent of Athena was Venus.

Which of the following is not true of the gladiatorial games?

Gladiatorial games probably originated as games in honor of dead ancestors.

The Colosseum was known in antiquity as the Flavian Amphitheater since it was built by the emperors of the Flavian dynasty.

Gladiators were paradoxically in the lowest of society and yet able to gain great fame and celerity status.

Gladiators got their name from the gladius, which was the gladiatorial shield.

Which type of gladiator was a "net-and-trident" fighter, the only one who fought without a helmet or protective face gear?

Retiarius

Secutor

Bestiarius

Thracian

Which of the following is incorrect of ancient Roman (Classsical Latin) literature?

The Golden Age consists of the Ciceronian period and the Augustan Age.

The earliest Roman literature to survive intact is that of Plautus.

Cicero had a transforming effect on Latin literature, achieving in the language a degree of eloquence previously thought only attainable in Greek.

Its influence faded in medieval Western Europe whereas Greek and the works of Greek literature continued to thrive in the West.

In the Augustan Age

Virgil became part of the circle of Maecenas, a counselor of Augustus and leading patron of the arts in Rome.

Julius Caesar and Catullus were major literary figures.

The historian Polybius wrote his massive works The Histories.

Latin literature saw a definite decline in quality.

Which of the following is not true of Virgil?

His influence died out during the Middle Ages.

His poetry was largely a celebration of the reign of Augustus.

He was the greatest poet of ancient Rome.

He became to Roman culture what Homer had been to Greek culture.

Which of the following is not true regarding the Aeneid?

It was Virgil's conscious reconception of and response to Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.

It has as its central theme that of order over chaos.

In it, Virgil's ideal vision of Rome is put forth, but not without cracks.

The hero of the story, Aeneas, is modeled after the great Homeric hero, Achilles.

Which of the following is not true of Ovid.

His poetry, unlike Virgil's, is centrally concerned with pathos and sexuality.

His Metamorphoses may in a sense be seen as an "anti-epic", in which history changes from one state to another but with no higher or ultimate purpose.

His masterpiece, the Metamorphoses, serves as a vast repository of Greco-Roman myths.

He was one of the most favored poets of Augustus.

Livy

Sought to explain the unfolding of history principally through the lens of the moral character of persons rather than through political events.

Was part of the court circle of Maecenas.

Was the greatest Roman historian of the Silver Age.

Wrote Satires, which portray his rejection of public life and his aim instead at attaining wisdom through serenity.

Which of the following statements on Latin Silver Age literature is not true?

Seneca wrote tragedies based on the work of Sophocles and Euripides, which later influenced great playwrights like Shakespeare.

Pliny the Elder wrote the Natural History, a scientific and encyclopedic work.

Tacitus wrote Germania, which serves as a historical introduction to the Germanic people.

Suetonius wrote Parallel Lives, a series of biographies comparing great Greek and Roman figures.

According to the reading from Tacitus' Annals, Nero sought to cause the death of

Agrippina.

Poppaea.

Pharasmanes.

Julia.

Which of the following statements is not true regarding philosophy of the Hellenistic period?

Four major schools of philosophy emerged: Academic, Paripatetic, Epicurean, and Stoic.

Epicureans were atomists who held pleasure to be chief of human life, which paradoxically entailed limiting human desire to the simple and fulfillable.

Stoicism emphasized duty and virtue above all else, sought to be unmoved by the external world, and metaphysically held to a form of pantheism.

Stoicism was founded by the philosopher Stoa Poikile.

Which of the following statements on Roman philosophy is not true?

Epictetus was a Stoic philosopher whose teachings were recorded by Arrian in the Discourses and the Enchiridion.

Cicero was crucial for the Western philosophical tradition in transmitting Greek philosophy to the Latin-speaking world and giving Latin a philosophical vocabulary.

One of the greatest representatives of Epicurean philosophy was the Roman philosopher Lucretius, author of On the Nature of Things.

The philosophy that was most amenable to Roman sensibilities, and therefore most influential among Romans, was Epicureanism.

Seneca

Was a Stoic philosopher, ultimately put to death by Nero.

Wrote the Moral Letters, a series of practical letters on various experiences and concerns common to human life.

Was the tutor of Nero and greatly influential on the politics of his time.

All of the above.

Which of the following is not true regarding ancient Roman sculpture?

The most distinctly Roman contribution to sculptural art was verism, an extremely realistic style capturing even every imperfection of the subject.

The Augustan Age harkened back to the Classical Greek style of idealism.

The famous Augustus of Prima Porta took its inspiration from Polyclitus' Doryphoros, with which it shares the same idealized proportions of the human body.

The famous Capitoline Wolf is a sculptural expression of the Roman foundation myth revolving around Aeneas.

Which of the following is not true of the Colosseum?

When it opened in 80 AD, there was allegedly staged in the arena a genuine sea-battle in water.

It was capable of holding about 50,000 spectators.

Its construction was funded by spoils from the Jewish War.

It was built as the crowning achievement of the building project of Augustus.

Which of the following is not true of the Pantheon?

It was built in under the emperor Hadrian as a temple to "all the gods", the literal meaning of its name.

Built around 120 AD, its massive concrete dome was the largest in the world for well over a thousand years.

The circular opening at the center peak of the dome is known as the oculus.

Its dome was reinforced with steel rods, the only way the Roman engineers could make it at such size.

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