Agricultural Origins
It is tempting to think that people started domesticating plants and animals because hunting and gathering was laborious and then someone had the brilliant idea of agriculture to make life easier. However, the roughly contemporary appearance of domesticates around the world and the several millennia it took for hunting and gathering to give way to farming in most areas make this scenario improbable, and several other hypotheses have been proposed.
Harold Peake and Herbert Fleure suggested in 1926 that the first domesticates and agriculturalists would have appeared in the upper valley of the Euphrates River because they knew that this is the natural habitat of wild species of wheat and barley. In the early 1950s Robert Braidwood of the University of Chicago organized a series of excavations to evaluate post-Pleistocene (after about 11,700 years ago) climatic changes and to look for early farming communities. His expeditions were among the first to include specialists in botany, geology, and zoology as well as archaeology, and this multidisciplinary approach proved to be a highly successful research strategy. This work redefined the natural zone of plants to include many areas outside the upper Euphrates valley.
Braidwood’s excavations at Jarmo, in the hill country of northern Iraq, revealed an agricultural settlement dating to about 6500 B.C. – much earlier than had been found elsewhere. Jarmo was a settlement of a few dozen mud-walled huts inhabited by people who relied partly on wild plants and animals, such as snails, pistachios, and acorns, and who also seem to have been involved in herding domesticated goats and, perhaps, sheep. Braidwood also found at Jarmo the remains of partially domesticated wheat in association with grinding stones, sickle blades, and storage pits. Braidwood suggested that the cumulative effects of generations of interaction between people, plants, and animals in these natural habitat zones led to agriculture.
Braidwood’s research into agricultural origins was one of the few systematic investigations into this problem at the time, and he provided crucial evidence for the next stage of research on this problem – trying to understand the precise mechanisms by which agriculture appeared. Evidence that some of the earliest agricultural communities had appeared, not in the middle of the natural habitat, but on the margins or outside of it raised the possibility that agriculture was not just a natural result of people exploiting wild stands of wheat and barley.
A series of experiments was performed by botanist Jack Harlan in eastern Anatolia in 1966 in which, using a crude tool made with flint blades set in a wooden handle, he was able to harvest wild emmer wheat at the rate of about 6.25 pounds per hour. A family of four or five could probably have collected a year’s supply of grain with only a few weeks’ labor, and this would seem to suggest that the people who lived in the natural habitat of wheat and barley had perhaps the least incentive to domesticate and farm it because they could collect more than enough from wild stands.
Population growth has also been an important element in most accounts of agricultural origins. Mark Cohen, for example, argues that “the nearly simultaneous adoption of agricultural economies throughout the world could only be accounted for by assuming that hunting and gathering populations had saturated the world approximately 10,000 years ago and had exhausted all possible (or palatable) strategies for increasing their food supply within the constraints of the hunting-gathering life-style. The only possible reaction to further growth in population, worldwide, was to begin artificial augmentation of the food supply.”
A major problem in assessing any hypothesis based on ancient population densities is the difficulty of estimating changes in these densities with any precision using archaeological data.One has to locate all the relevant archaeological sites (of which many are certain to have been destroyed or not found), then estimate the numbers of people at each site, and then develop a chronology for these sites that is fine enough to reconstruct changes over fairly short periods of time.Consequently, most population estimates based on archaeological data must be considered extremely speculatively, and the relationship between agriculture and demographic change remains complex and not well understood.
1
It is tempting to think that people started domesticating plants and animals because hunting and gathering was laborious and then someone had the brilliant idea of agriculture to make life easier. However, the roughly contemporary appearance of domesticates around the world and the several millennia it took for hunting and gathering to give way to farming in most areas make this scenario improbable, and several other hypotheses have been proposed.
What can be inferred from paragraph 1 about the theory that the introduction of agriculture made life easier for ancient people?
Inference Questions推理题
AIt is an appealing explanation for the rise of agriculture but probably not an accurate one.
BIt is a brilliant explanation of why agriculture took several millennia to develop.
CIt is one of several hypotheses that are all supported by evidence from around the world.
DThe theory has been popular because it takes into account the roughly contemporary appearance of domesticates.
2
Harold Peake and Herbert Fleure suggested in 1926 that the first domesticates and agriculturalists would have appeared in the upper valley of the Euphrates River because they knew that this is the natural habitat of wild species of wheat and barley. In the early 1950s Robert Braidwood of the University of Chicago organized a series of excavations to evaluate post-Pleistocene (after about 11,700 years ago) climatic changes and to look for early farming communities. His expeditions were among the first to include specialists in botany, geology, and zoology as well as archaeology, and this multidisciplinary approach proved to be a highly successful research strategy. This work redefined the natural zone of plants to include many areas outside the upper Euphrates valley.
According to paragraph 2, what led Peake and Fleure to identify the upper valley of the Euphrates River as the site of earliest farming?
Factual Information Questions事实信息题
AThe excavations and research work of Robert Braidwood of the University of Chicago
BTheir use of a multidisciplinary approach that combined information from botany, geology, and zoology
CTheir knowledge of post-Pleistocene climatic changes that occurred in the area
DTheir knowledge of where wheat and barley grew naturally
3
Harold Peake and Herbert Fleure suggested in 1926 that the first domesticates and agriculturalists would have appeared in the upper valley of the Euphrates River because they knew that this is the natural habitat of wild species of wheat and barley. In the early 1950s Robert Braidwood of the University of Chicago organized a series of excavations to evaluate post-Pleistocene (after about 11,700 years ago) climatic changes and to look for early farming communities. His expeditions were among the first to include specialists in botany, geology, and zoology as well as archaeology, and this multidisciplinary approach proved to be a highly successful research strategy. This work redefined the natural zone of plants to include many areas outside the upper Euphrates valley.
According to paragraph 2, what was significant about Braidwood’s approach to his excavations?
Factual Information Questions事实信息题
ABraidwood involved researchers from many different fields in his excavations.
BBraidwood was the first to investigate the upper valley of the Euphrates.
CBraidwood focused on evaluating the effect of climatic changes on farming.
DBraidwood sought to incorporate Peake and Fleure’s views.
4
Braidwood’s research into agricultural origins was one of the few systematic investigations into this problem at the time, and he provided crucial evidence for the next stage of research on this problem – trying to understand the precise mechanisms by which agriculture appeared. Evidence that some of the earliest agricultural communities had appeared, not in the middle of the natural habitat, but on the margins or outside of it raised the possibility that agriculture was not just a natural result of people exploiting wild stands of wheat and barley.
According to paragraph 4, why is it significant that the earliest agricultural communities did not appear within the natural habitat?
Factual Information Questions事实信息题
AIt demonstrated the need for a more scientific approach to the evidence from archaeological sites of agricultural communities
BIt provided the crucial evidence for a complete understanding of how agricultural communities were formed.
CIt confirmed that the earliest agriculture may have involved more crops than just wheat and barley.
DIt suggested that agriculture resulted from more involved processes than the simple exploitation of wild stands of grain.
5
A series of experiments was performed by botanist Jack Harlan in eastern Anatolia in 1966 in which, using a crude tool made with flint blades set in a wooden handle, he was able to harvest wild emmer wheat at the rate of about 6.25 pounds per hour. A family of four or five could probably have collected a year’s supply of grain with only a few weeks’ labor, and this would seem to suggest that the people who lived in the natural habitat of wheat and barley had perhaps the least incentive to domesticate and farm it because they could collect more than enough from wild stands.
The word “crude” in the passage is closest in meaning to
Vocabulary Questions词汇题
Asharp
Beffective
Cprimitive
Dancient
6
A series of experiments was performed by botanist Jack Harlan in eastern Anatolia in 1966 in which, using a crude tool made with flint blades set in a wooden handle, he was able to harvest wild emmer wheat at the rate of about 6.25 pounds per hour. A family of four or five could probably have collected a year’s supply of grain with only a few weeks’ labor, and this would seem to suggest that the people who lived in the natural habitat of wheat and barley had perhaps the least incentive to domesticate and farm it because they could collect more than enough from wild stands.
Which of the sentences below best expresses the essential information in the highlighted sentence in the passage? Incorrect choices change the meaning in important ways or leave out essential information.
Sentence Simplification Questions句子简化题
AA family of four or five would have had to work for weeks in order to collect enough grain to survive for a year.
BThe large wild stands of wheat suggest that families who lived near them learned to domesticate grain for their yearly food supply.
CIn only a few weeks, a family living in the natural habitat of the grains could have planted enough wheat and barley to live for a year.
DA family living near wild grains would not have needed to domesticate them because in just a few weeks they could have easily harvested enough for a year.
7
A series of experiments was performed by botanist Jack Harlan in eastern Anatolia in 1966 in which, using a crude tool made with flint blades set in a wooden handle, he was able to harvest wild emmer wheat at the rate of about 6.25 pounds per hour. A family of four or five could probably have collected a year’s supply of grain with only a few weeks’ labor, and this would seem to suggest that the people who lived in the natural habitat of wheat and barley had perhaps the least incentive to domesticate and farm it because they could collect more than enough from wild stands.
According to paragraph 5, the experiments done by Jack Harlan were important in that they
Factual Information Questions事实信息题
Aestablished the kind of wild wheat that was likely to have been harvested by early humans
Bidentified the design of the first tools used for harvesting
Chelped challenge previously held assumptions about domestication
Dexplained the importance of labor in the life of early human families
8
A major problem in assessing any hypothesis based on ancient population densities is the difficulty of estimating changes in these densities with any precision using archaeological data.One has to locate all the relevant archaeological sites (of which many are certain to have been destroyed or not found), then estimate the numbers of people at each site, and then develop a chronology for these sites that is fine enough to reconstruct changes over fairly short periods of time.Consequently, most population estimates based on archaeological data must be considered extremely speculatively, and the relationship between agriculture and demographic change remains complex and not well understood.
The word “assessing” in the passage is closest in meaning to
Vocabulary Questions词汇题
Aevaluating
Bcreating
Carguing
Dbelieving
9
[■] A major problem in assessing any hypothesis based on ancient population densities is the difficulty of estimating changes in these densities with any precision using archaeological data. [■] One has to locate all the relevant archaeological sites (of which many are certain to have been destroyed or not found), then estimate the numbers of people at each site, and then develop a chronology for these sites that is fine enough to reconstruct changes over fairly short periods of time. [■] Consequently, most population estimates based on archaeological data must be considered extremely speculatively, and the relationship between agriculture and demographic change remains complex and not well understood. [■]
Look at the four squaresthat indicate where the following sentence could be added to the passage
Clearly these requirements cannot be met for many of the sites.Insert Text Questions句子插入题
Where would the sentence best fit？Click on a square sentence to the passage.
10
The origins of agriculture have historically been the subject of debate among archaeologists.
Prose Summary Questions概要小结题
Select 3 answers
AArchaeologists have called into question the idea that domestication took place in the center of the natural habitat of wild grain.
BClimate changes allowed communities to move beyond their original sites and adopt farming practices they had developed in the Euphrates valley.
CGoats and sheep are thought to have been among the first animals domesticated by early agricultural societies.
DUsing a multidisciplinary approach, researchers have widened their view of agricultural origins to include locations where wild grains are not as naturally abundant.
EUsing ancient population densities to inform the study of early agriculture has brought about significant changes in hypotheses of agricultural origins.
FThe difficulty of accurately determining ancient population densities makes the relationship between agriculture and population complex and uncertain.
