| A | B |
|---|
| Hernando Cortez | Spanish conquistador who conquered the Aztecs in Mexico |
| Prince Henry the Navigator | Portuguese royalty, he had a pioneering role in exploration |
| Leonardo da Vinci | painted the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper |
| Michelangelo | sculptor of David & painter of Sistine Chapel |
| Erasmus | Dutch humanist, author of In Praise of Folly |
| William Shakespeare | English playwright, famous for sonnets & plays (comedies & tragedies) |
| Martin Luther | German monk whose 95 theses began the Reformation |
| King Henry VIII | broke with the Catholic Church when the Pope wouldn't grant him a divorce |
| John Calvin | this Reformer's ideas included predestination |
| Vasco da Gama | Portuguese explorer; first to find maritime route to India |
| Magellan | sponsored by Spain, he led the first voyage around the world |
| Hapsburg family | rulers of the Holy Roman Empire; supporters of Catholic Church |
| Huguenots | French Protestants granted freedom of worship by the Edict of Nantes |
| Gutenberg | his printing press stimulated the growth of literacy |
| Jesuits | Catholic missionaries; the Society of Jesus |
| Queen Elizabeth I | made the Anglican Church the national church throughout the British Isles |
| Sir Francis Drake | English explorer for Queen Elizabeth I; he also explored |
| Jacques Cartier | French explorer who sailed from France to Canada |
| Christopher Columbus | sponsored by Spain, tried to find a westward route to Asia; instead he discovered a New World |
| Cardinal Richelieu | advisor to the French monarch who changed the focus of the Thirty Years War from a religious to a political conflict |
| Francisco Pizarro | Spanish explorer who conquered the Incan Empire in South America |
