The Answers You've All Been Waiting For

Congratulations to Rachel and Nadezhda, who tried their hand at the first Renaissance quiz. I'm hoping others of you read the questions and thought about the choices, even if you didn't make a formal response. Here are the correct answers:

1. B François I.

I've said plenty about him already!

2. D All of the above.

Marguerite d'Angoulême, François's only sibling, was an accomplished author who wrote L'Heptaméron and numerous works of poetry. After her first husband died, she married Henri d'Albret and became Queen of Navarre in 1527. She was very sympathetic to the new religious ideas of the time and welcomed reformers like Calvin and Farel to her court at Nérac. She had one daughter, Jeanne d'Albret, who gave birth to King Henri IV of France. (Marguerite de Navarre is not to be confused with the Reine Margot of Alexandre Dumas's novel. That Margot was François's granddaughter and married Henri IV in 1572.)

3. A Michelangelo

Although François did invite Michelangelo to France, the artist never accepted. Leonardo, however, lived in France for three years at the end of his life and died at an estate near the château d'Amboise in 1519. Andrea del Sarto worked in France for a year in 1518 before he absconded to Florence with money François had given him to buy artwork. Cellini worked in France for a period in the early 1540's, during which time he fashioned his famous saltcellar.

4. B Lyon

Lyon was the second largest city in France after Paris during the sixteenth century, boasting a population of nearly 60,000. At the crossroad of several routes to Italy, Lyon became a center of banking, silk working, and literature. The city hosted trade fairs several times a year that attracted merchants, bankers and peddlers from throughout Europe. My novel The Measure of Silence is set in Lyon.

5. A gargantuan

Rabelais named his main character Gargantua. This character was a giant whose name has persisted through the centuries in the adjectival form gargantuan.

Did you get many correct? Rachel got three right; Nadezhda all five. Bravo, ladies! Thanks so much for participating. We'll try another quiz again sometime.