The Renaissance, a period of remarkable cultural rebirth spanning from the 14th to the 17th century in _____ marked a...

Let's begin by understanding the meaning of this sentence. We'll use our understanding of pause points and segment the sentence as shown - understanding and assimilating the meaning of each segment bit by bit!

Sentence Structure

• The Renaissance,
• a period of remarkable cultural rebirth
• spanning from the 14th to the 17th century
• in Europe [?],
• marked a decisive break from medieval traditions
• and
• fostered unprecedented innovation in art and science.

Where [?] represents what we need to decide:

• Choice A: "and"
• Choice B: ","
• Choice C: nothing
• Choice D: "—"

Understanding the Meaning

Let's start reading from the beginning:

The sentence starts with 'The Renaissance,'

• followed by 'a period of remarkable cultural rebirth spanning from the 14th to the 17th century in Europe...'

This is where we have the blank.

Let's look at the choices:

• A adds "and"
• B adds a comma
• C adds nothing
• D adds an em dash

To see what works here, let's read the rest of the sentence and understand what it's saying!

After the blank, the sentence continues:

• 'marked a decisive break from medieval traditions and fostered unprecedented innovation in art and science.'

Now let's understand what this is telling us:

• 'The Renaissance' is the subject of the sentence
• 'marked' and 'fostered' are the main actions
  • The Renaissance did two things: it marked a break and it fostered innovation
• 'a period of remarkable cultural rebirth spanning from the 14th to the 17th century in Europe'
  • This entire phrase is giving us extra descriptive information about what the Renaissance was
  • It's positioned right after 'The Renaissance' and describes/renames it

What do we notice about the structure here?

• We have: The Renaissance, [descriptive information about the Renaissance], marked...
• This descriptive phrase is inserted in the middle of the main sentence flow
  • If we removed it, the core sentence would be: "The Renaissance marked a decisive break... and fostered innovation..."
  • That works perfectly as a complete sentence!
• When you insert extra descriptive information in the middle of a sentence like this, you need to set it off with matching commas on BOTH sides
  • We have the opening comma after 'The Renaissance,'
  • So we need the closing comma after 'Europe' to complete the pair

So we need Choice B - the comma that closes off the descriptive phrase.

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Using Comma Pairs to Set Off Descriptive Information

When you insert extra descriptive information about a noun in the middle of a sentence, you need to set it off with commas on BOTH sides (called a non-essential appositive or non-restrictive modifier in grammar terms). This creates a "comma pair" that shows the information is additional and could be removed without breaking the core sentence.

Pattern:

• Core sentence: The Renaissance marked a decisive break from medieval traditions
• With descriptive information inserted: The Renaissance, [a period of remarkable cultural rebirth spanning from the 14th to the 17th century in Europe], marked a decisive break from medieval traditions
• Opening comma after "The Renaissance"
• Closing comma after "Europe"
• The descriptive phrase can be lifted out, and the sentence still works perfectly

Test for comma pairs:

• Remove the information between the commas
• Does the remaining sentence still make grammatical sense?
• If yes, you need both commas to set off that descriptive information

In our question:

• Remove the phrase: "The Renaissance marked a decisive break from medieval traditions and fostered unprecedented innovation in art and science."
• Perfect! This confirms we need the comma pair.