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  3. Reconstructing Ancient Environments P1: Archaeology is particularly important for learning about prehistoric societies, for whom

Reconstructing Ancient Environments P1: Archaeology is particularly important for learning about prehistoric societies, for whom

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问题 Reconstructing Ancient Environments
P1: Archaeology is particularly important for learning about prehistoric societies, for whom there may be no written records to study. Besides, global climates, topographical features and constituents of the Earth’s crust have considerably changed with the passing of time. The first effort archaeologists should make is to use evidence preserved in historical sites to reconstruct the ancient physical environment of a region.
P2: One of the most important sources of information for reconstructing human’s adaptive response to prehistoric environments is the faunal remains found in archaeological sites. Faunal remains are considered to include fish, birds, and mammals. These remains are used to reconstruct past environments and human diet. The prehistoric record of the meat-eating habits of early humans is far from clear about the prevalence of scavenging. One faction of prehistorians argues there is evidence that early humans were primarily scavengers who found the remains of animals killed by lions and other carnivores, and then butchered them. Another faction disagrees, proposing that early humans hunted for their own meat. Marks left by humans cutting up animals with stone tools are now being analyzed to help distinguish between cases in which people butchered animals they had killed themselves and those in which they butchered animals they scavenged from the kills of other animals.
P3: Another source to reconstruct ancient environments comes from the study of the remains of plants cultivated or used by man in ancient times, which have survived in archaeological contexts. Carbon is chemically quite stable, so charred plants (plants converted to charcoal or carbon) and seeds preserve well. Charred plant remains are usually retrieved by flotation: excavated sediments are mixed with water or some other fluid. Heavy fractions will sink to the bottom and less dense organic material such as charred seeds, grains, and charcoal will tend to float to the surface. The importance of such analyses lies in the fact that these plants indicate much about the climates and vegetation of the periods in which the animals lived. For example, there are ongoing debates about when and where various animals were domesticated. If phytoliths (tiny mineral particles formed inside plants) of domesticated grains are found on the teeth of these animals, the probability is high that they were part of an agricultural economy.
P4: Apart from faunal and floral remains, human bodies, especially well-preserved ones, can also be of extraordinary significance to archaeological discoveries. For example, eleven naturally mummified bodies were found in beach sand in northern Chile and date to about 1000 B.C. Chemical reconstruction of their diet demonstrates that one of them was a coca leaf chewer, and they had the kinds of dental problems and missing teeth associated with the sticky starches of an agricultural diet, although their principal food was derived from marine resources with only minor supplementation from terrestrial hunting and food-gathering. Then, during bones analysis, the bodies showed the changes of the bones of the inner ear that are characteristic of people who frequently dive in freezing water.
P5: To better interpret these prehistorical mysteries, a technical specialty is combined with archaeology, which is know as geoarchaeology. ■ Geoarchaeologists’ work frequently involves studying soil and sediments, as well as other geographical alterations, to contribute to an archaeological study. ■ Geoarchaeological analyses also involve many different kinds of questions and techniques. ■ In the Egyptian Delta region, for example, many of the earliest communities were built on large sand-and-gravel mounds created by the Nile River as it deposited the sediments it carried. ■ But many of these communities have been buried under meters of sediment from numerous ancient floods, and by other factors as well. On top of this, the streams feeding into the Nile River in the delta have changed course many times, leaving a maze of crisscrossed, buried river channels. Finding these buried sand-and-gravel mounds and the archaeological sites on them often requires complex geological analyses involving special digging, satellite image analysis, and many other techniques.
According to paragraph 4, all of the following were true of some people in northern Chile around 1000 B.C. EXCEPT:
选项 A、They were divers.
B、They chewed coca leaves.
C、They had dental problems caused by eating food from marine resources.
D、They ate plants grown on land.
答案C
解析 【否定事实信息题】第4段说十一具公元前1000年自然风干的木乃伊遗体，他们饮食的化学重建表明其中一个是咀嚼古柯叶的；他们有多种牙齿问题和牙齿缺损。这些问题都与农业饮食中的粘性淀粉有关。然后在骨骼分析的过程中，这些木乃伊的内耳骨头显示出的变化是那些在冰水里大量潜水的人才会有的。C与原文不符。
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