During the Italian Renaissance, the country we now know as Italy was divided up into several independent city-states. All of the answer choices were city-states except for the United Provinces. The United Provinces refers to territory in what is now the Netherlands and Belgium during the time when this territory was under Spanish control.

The Medici rose to prominence in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in Florence. The Medici were a banking family, and in the fifteenth century, the Medici Bank was the largest in Europe. The Medici are significant because they were frequent and enthusiastic patrons of the early Renaissance in Italy. They funded artistic works and spectacular architectural wonders.

The Columbian Exchange describes the widespread exchange of animals, human populations, cultures, religions, diseases, and plants between the Old World of Europe, North Africa, and Asia and the New World of North and South America. It took place, primarily from the late fifteenth century through the seventeenth century and changed the very nature of the human experience.

Only one of these answer choices, the earliest one, falls within the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, so if you know enough about the Elizabethan Era you can easily determine the correct answer from that alone. 1588 was the year that the infamous Spanish Armada sailed for England to try and defeat the English navy and establish a landing base that Spain could use to conquer the British Isles. A combination of terrible weather, poor tactics, and brilliant English defensive strategy led to the complete annihilation of the Spanish Armada, an event often considered the high water mark of the Elizabethan era.

The Rurik family ruled over Russia from its inception in the ninth century until 1613 when they were replaced by the Romanov family. The Romanovs ruled from 1613 until they were ousted from power during the Russian Revolution of 1917. Notable Romanovs include Catherine the Great, Peter the Great, Alexander I and II, and Nicholas I.

The Divine Comedy was written by the famous Italian writer Dante in the fourteenth century. It tells the tale of the salvation of the human soul and was wildly popular as it was written in the vernacular language.

The Columbian Exchange describes the widespread exchange of animals, human populations, cultures, religions, diseases, and plants between the Old World of Europe, North Africa, and Asia and the New World of North and South America. It took place, primarily from the late fifteenth century through the seventeenth century and changed the very nature of the human experience.

The Courtier is an important literary work of the Italian Renaissance. It was written by Baldassare Castiglione in the early sixteenth century. In the book, Castiglione describes the ideal Renaissance Man: how he should be artistic, athletic, scientifically-minded, etc.

The Russian serfs were emancipated in 1861 by Tsar Alexander II. The institution of serfdom was very similar to the institution of slavery and underpinned the whole feudal system of economic and social life throughout much of Europe from the fall of the Roman empire until the Industrial Revolution. It is worth noting that the emancipation of the serfs in Russia and the slaves in the United States happened at very much the same time. Clearly there was a global movement away from forced labor.

Mendeleev is most famous for his work in "perfecting" the periodic table of elements. His work allowed people to understand similarities and differences between chemical elements with greater clarity. The theory of relativity was an idea of Albert Einstein's, and Newton invented the system of calculus. Alchemy, the practice of trying to turn materials into precious metals, was very popular during the Scientific Revolution.