托福机经：2012年9月16日托福阅读考题回顾1
托福机经：2012年9月16日托福阅读考题回顾1
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| 考试日期 | 2012.09.16 |
| Passage 1 | |
| Title: | Native American和欧洲人的Trade |
| 大致内容 | 第一段是综述，先和美洲人有交流的是一些欧洲人，然后Basque什么的人和美洲人正式开始贸易。 渐渐地，住在水边的居民开始建造一些storage去放东西，然后有了settlement。 大概有几个年份，这里有个插入题，我插在了settlement up to from 哪里到哪里之前。 第二段是说欧洲人的科技带来的变化，改变了美洲人做东西的一些方式。主要提到的是说一些铁啊钢啊之类的东西，还有黄铜啊什么的。然后举例说了梳子，说早期美洲人的梳子都很粗糙，只有2~3个tine, 是用海狸的牙做的。然后和他们有了贸易之后，梳子可以用steel blade来弄，就会比较精细，他们就开始搞装饰在梳子上了，梳子上有时候还会雕刻欧洲人的形象（有题：关于海狸牙可以推论什么？我选了不是很有效的雕刻工具）。 钢铁之类可以给他们带来安全感和日常操作便利的东西在市场饱和了之后，就开始有其他东西走红了，更多的是精神上的一些东西，比如原先的红色的黄色的装饰珠子开始被一些青铜和类似颜色的钢铁制品取代了。然后拥有这些的人就会多出一种地位、财富BLABLA的象征（有题：说这些东西的意义是什么？还有什么贸易变化这类的）。 |
| 相关阅读 | TPO17-1 Europe's Early Sea Trade with Asia In the fourteenth century, a number of political developments cut Europe's overland trade routes to southern and eastern Asia, with which Europe had had important and highly profitable commercial ties since the twelfth century. This development, coming as it did when the bottom had fallen out of the European economy, provided an impetus to a long-held desire to secure direct relations with the East by establishing a sea trade. Widely reported, if somewhat distrusted, accounts by figures like the famous traveler from Venice, Marco Polo, of the willingness of people in China to trade with Europeans and of the immensity of the wealth to be gained by such contact made the idea irresistible Possibilities for trade seemed promising, but no hope existed for maintaining the traditional routes over land A new way had to be found. The chief problem was technological: How were the Europeans to reach the East? Europe's maritime tradition had developed in the context of easily navigable seas—the Mediterranean, the Baltic, and, to a lesser extent, the North Sea between England and the Continent—not of vast oceans. New types of ships were needed, new methods of finding one's way, new techniques for financing so vast a scheme. The sheer scale of the investment it took to begin commercial expansion at sea reflects the immensity of the profits that such East-West trade could create. Spices were the most sought-after commodities. Spices not only dramatically improved the taste of the European diet but also were used to manufacture perfumes and certain medicines. But even high-priced commodities like spices had to be transported in large bulk in order to justify the expense and trouble of sailing around the African continent all the way to India and China. The principal seagoing ship used throughout the Middle Ages was the galley, a long, low ship fitted with sails but driven primarily by oars. The largest galleys had as many as 50 oarsmen. Since they had relatively shallow hulls, they were unstable when driven by sail or when on rough water: hence they were unsuitable for the voyage to the East. Even if they hugged the African coastline, they had little chance of surviving a crossing of the Indian Ocean Shortly after 1400. Shipbuilders began developing a new type of vessel properly designed to operate in rough, open water: the caravel. It had a wider and deeper hull than the galley and hence could carry more cargo: increased stability made it possible to add multiple masts and sails. In the largest caravels, two main masts held large square sails that provided the bulk of the thrust driving the ship forward, while a smaller forward mast held a triangular-shaped sail, called a lateen sail, which could be moved into a variety of positions to maneuver the ship. The astrolabe had long been the primary instrument for navigation, having been introduced in the eleventh century. It operated by measuring the height of the Sun and the fixed stars: by calculating the angles created by these points, it determined the degree of latitude at which one stood (The problem of determining longitude, though, was not solved until the eighteenth century.) By the early thirteenth century, Western Europeans had also developed and put into use the magnetic compass, which helped when clouds obliterated both the Sun and the stars. Also beginning in the thirteenth century, there were new maps refined by precise calculations and the reports of sailors that made it possible to trace one's path with reasonable accuracy. Certain institutional and practical norms had become established as well. A maritime code known as the Consulate of the Sea, which originated in the western Mediterranean region in the fourteenth century, won acceptance by a majority of sea goers as the normative code for maritime conduct; it defined such matters as the authority of a ship's officers, protocols of command, pay structures, the rights of sailors, and the rules of engagement when ships met one another on the sea-lanes. Thus by about 1400 the key elements were in place to enable Europe to begin its seaward adventure. |