A well-preserved tomb from the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 24), with a clear record of the year when it
According to Huang Wei, leader of the project,
Due to being filled with water, the tomb remained
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Based on
This is a major archaeological discovery with regard
2 . When the discovery of fossilized (化石的) footprints made in what’s now New Mexico was made public in 2021, it was an astonishing moment for archaeology (考古学), seemingly rewriting a chapter of the human story. Now new research is offering further evidence of their significance.
While they look like they could have been made yesterday, the footprints were pressed into mud 21,000 to 23,000 years ago, according to radiocarbon dating of the seeds of a water plant that were preserved above and below the fossils. This date dramatically pushed back the timeline of humans’ history in the Americas, the last land to be settled by prehistoric people. The 61 dated prints, which were discovered in the Tularosa Basin, near the edge of an ancient lake in White Sands National Park, were made at a time when many scientists think that massive ice sheets had stopped human passage into North America, indicating that humans arrived in the region even earlier.
However, some archaeologists questioned the age of the footprints established by those initial findings. They noted that water plants such as Ruppia cirrhosa — the one used in the 2021 study — can acquire carbon atoms from the water rather than the air, which can result in a misleadingly early date.
In a follow-up study published Thursday in the journal Science, researchers said they have produced two new lines of evidence to support their initial dates. “Even as the original work was being published, we were speeding up to test our results with multiple lines of evidence,” said Kathleen Springer, co-lead author on the new Science paper, in a news release. “We were confident in our original ages, as well as the strong evidence.”
When and how early humans first moved to the Americas has long been debated and remains poorly understood. Current estimates range from 13,000 years ago to more than 20,000 years ago. However, the earliest archaeological evidence for the region’s settlement is insufficient and often controversial, making the footprints especially important.
1. What is Paragraph 2 mainly about?| A．The purpose of the new research | B．The method of the dating |
| C．The significance of the footprints. | D．The efforts of the scientists |
| A．It goes against the prior knowledge. |
| B．The prints seem to be made recently. |
| C．The previous research method is improper. |
| D．The then massive ice sheets are misleading. |
| A．The doubt about the age of the footprints. |
| B．The new evidence of the fossilized footprints. |
| C．An agreement between the two sides of the debate. |
| D．Early humans hardship of moving to the Americas. |
| A．To explain the process of archaeological study. |
| B．To report the discovery of fossilized footprints. |
| C．To introduce a debate on the age of the footprints. |
| D．To present the progress of the footprint research. |
3 . Every year thousands of tourists visit Pompeii, Italy. They see the sights that Pompeii is famous for, like its stadium and theatres, its shops, and restaurants. The tourists do not, however, see Pompeii’s people. They do not see them because Pompeii has no people. No one has lived in Pompeii for almost 2,000 years.
Once, Pompeii was a busy city of 22,000 people. It lay at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, a grass-covered volcano. Mount Vesuvius had not erupted for centuries, so the people of Pompeii felt safe. But they were not.
In August of AD 79, Mount Vesuvius erupted. The entire top of the mountain exploded, and a huge black cloud rose into the air. Soon hot rocks and ash began to fall on Pompeii. When the eruption ended two days later, Pompeii was buried under 20 feet of stones and ashes. Almost all of its people were dead.
For centuries, Pompeii lay buried under stones and ashes. Then, in the year 1861, an Italian scientist named Ginseppe began to uncover Pompeii. Slowly, carefully, Ginseppe and his men dug. The city looked almost the same as it had looked in AD 79. There were streets and fountains, houses, and shops. There was a stadium with 20,000 seats. Perhaps the most important of all, there were everyday objects, which tell us a great deal about the people who lived in Pompeii. Many glasses and jars had some dark blue colour in the bottom, so we know that the people of Pompeii liked wine. They liked bread, too; metal bread pans were in every bakery. In one bakery there were 81 round, flat loaves of bread — a type of bread that is still sold in Italy today.
Ginseppe has died, but his work continues. One-fourth has not been uncovered yet. Scientists are still digging, still making discoveries that draw the tourists to Pompeii.
1. Why do large numbers of people come to Pompeii each year?| A．To visit the volcano. |
| B．To shop and eat there. |
| C．To watch sports and plays. |
| D．To see how the people of Pompeii lived. |
| A．Because the city nearby offered kinds of fun. |
| B．Because the area produced the finest wine in Italy. |
| C．Because few people expected the volcano to erupt again. |
| D．Because the mountain was beautiful and covered with grass. |
| A．Because Ginseppe and his men dug it slowly and carefully. |
| B．Because the city was buried alive and remained untouched. |
| C．Because scientists successfully rebuilt the city with everyday objects. |
| D．Because nobody had lived in the city ever since the volcano erupted. |
4 . More than 3,400 years after two ancient Egyptians were laid to rest, the jars of food left still smell sweet. A team of analytical chemists and archaeologists (考古学家) has analysed these smells to help identify the jars’ contents. The study shows how the exploration of smell can enrich our understanding of the past.
The 1906 discovery of the undisturbed tomb (墓穴) of Kha and Merit symbolized an important stage in Egyptology. The tomb remains the most complete non-royal ancient one ever found in Egypt, showing important information about how high-ranking individuals were treated after death.
Unusually for the time, the archaeologist who discovered the tomb resisted the temptation to open the sealed containers even after they were sent to the Egyptian Museum. The contents of many of these containers are still unknown, although there are some clues, says analytical chemist Ilaria Degano. “From taking with the museum keeper we knew there were some fruity smells in the display cases,” she says.
Degano and her colleagues placed various artefacts (人工制品) inside plastic bags for several days to collect some of the chemical substances they released. Then the team used a special machine to identify the components of the smells from each artefact. They found some chemicals associated with dried fish, and some chemicals common in fruits. The findings will feed into a larger project to reanalyse the tomb’s contents and produce a more comprehensive picture of burial customs for non-royals that existed when Kha and Merit died, about 70 years before Tutankhamun became the Egyptian ruler.
Aside from showing more about past civilizations, ancient smells could make museum visits more inviting. Usually, people admire exhibits with their eyes in museums. “Smell is a relatively unexplored gateway to the collective past for museum visitors,” says Cecilia Bembibre at University College London. “It has the potent alto allow us to experience the in a more emotional, personal way, through our nose.”
1. What can we describe the 1906 discovery of Kha and Merit’ tomb as?| A．A landmark in Egyptology. | B．A turning point in human history. |
| C．A breakthrough in archaeology. | D．A mirror of ancient non-royal life. |
| A．Pressure. | B．Ambition. | C．Desire. | D．Tendency. |
| A．protect them from harm | B．gather their smells |
| C．test the special machine | D．back up a larger project |
| A．They bring them back to the past. |
| B．They give them emotional support. |
| C．They change their view on civilizations. |
| D．They add to their experience. |
In AD 79, the ancient Roman city of Pompeii, in southern Italy,
Researchers, Danilo Campanaro and Giacomo Landeschi, from Lund University in Sweden, used data that were collected by drones to create
6 . According to a new research, published in the journal Nature by a team from the University of Liverpool, humans were building structures made of wood, dating back at least 476,000 years ago. The research team found well-preserved wood at the site of Kalambo Falls, Zambia. Stone tool cut-marks on the wood show that these early humans shaped and joined two large logs (原木) to make a structure, probably the foundation of a platform. This is the earliest evidence in the world of the designed arrangement of logs to fit together.
Until now, evidence for the human use of wood was limited to its use for making fire, digging sticks and other tools. Wood is rarely found in such ancient sites as it usually rots and disappears, but at Kalambo Falls permanently high water levels kept the wood.
This discovery challenges the prevailing view that Stone Age humans were moving around. Here humans not only had a constant source of water, but the forest around them provided enough food to enable them to settle and make structures. Professor Larry Barham, from the University of Liverpool, who leads the “Deep Roots of Humanity” research project said, “This find has changed how I think about our early ancestors. They used their intelligence, imagination, and skills to create something they’d never seen before, something that had never previously existed.”
The special new luminescence (冷光) dating technique was carried out by experts, which explains the last time materials in the sand surrounding the finds were exposed to sunlight, to determine their age. This research forms part of the pioneering “Deep Roots of Humanity” project. Professor Barham added, “Kalambo Falls is an extraordinary site in Zambia. The Deep Roots team is looking forward to more exciting discoveries coming from its waterlogged sands.”
1. What is the finding of the new research?| A．Wood was used for construction. | B．Wood pieces were joined for fun. |
| C．Ancestors were good at architecture. | D．Ancient people designed wood products. |
| A．Obvious. | B．Common. | C．Deep. | D．Strong. |
| A．Energy-saving. | B．Time-consuming. | C．Ground-breaking. | D．Problem-solving. |
| A．More discoveries come from Kalambo Falls. | B．Something can be done to protect Zambia. |
| C．The sands used for research can be saved. | D．The site is set aside for further studies. |
7 . Human footprints in White Sands National Park in New Mexico aroused an argument two years ago when scientists found the prints to be surprisingly old.
In 2021, researchers described more than 60 footprints preserved in New Mexico. Radiocarbon dating(放射性碳定年法)of an aquatic(水生的)plant’s seeds in and around the footprints suggested that the first humans in North America came from Siberia via a land bridge between 23,000 and 21,000 years ago, almost 7000 years earlier than the long-held theory.
But some scientists noted that the aquatic plants used to date the footprints could have absorbed ancient carbon in groundwater. “There’s a possibility then for the plant to give overstated viewpoints on its age,” says Davis, who wrote a criticism of the 2021 paper.
Now, two other ways probably solving the argument, researchers report in the Oct. 6 Science. Pigati and colleagues radiocarbon-dated pollen(花粉)stuck in the same layers as some of the footprints. The pollen came from land plants, mainly pine, avoiding the groundwater carbon issue. The researchers also collected stones above the lowest footprints and used a dating method that estimates how long the stones had been buried.
The pollen gave an age range of 23,400 to 22,600 years old, and the stone an age minimum of about 21,500 years old. Both results proved the previous age estimate. Despite possible errors in the individual dating methods, “the data overall from the new study strongly indicate human presence in the Americas” around 22,000 years ago, says Bente Philippsen, a physicist at the Norwegian University.
One thing is certain: There’s still plenty to uncover about the footprints.Coauthor Kathleen Springer says, “We are learning more every time we go out there,” she says. “This paper is literally the latest chapter in the White Sands story.”
1. How many possible methods does the text mention to settle the controversy?| A．Only one. | B．Two. | C．Three. | D．Four. |
| A．Aquatic plants might have absorbed groundwater. |
| B．Aquatic plant’s seeds in and around the footprints are different. |
| C．The method of radiocarbon dating is not scientifically reliable at all. |
| D．Groundwater carbon will affect the amount of radiocarbon detected. |
| A．How the age estimation proved to be wrong. |
| B．Whether radiocarbon dating method is effective. |
| C．Why there was human presence in the American. |
| D．What conclusion can be made through the research. |
| A．Supportive. | B．Uninterested. | C．Confused. | D．Critical . |
The Gansu Jiandu (简牍) Museum in northwest China’s Gansu Province on Sunday launched four online exhibitions related to the ancient Jiandu culture.
“Jiandu” refers to the bamboo and wooden slips on which ancient Chinese people wrote
Additionally, the exhibitions feature high-resolution
Distinguished as China’s only provincial-level museum focusing on bamboo and wooden slips, the Gansu Jiandu Museum boasts
9 . New research confirms that human footprints found in New Mexico are probably the oldest direct evidence of human presence in the Americas, a finding that upends what many scientists knew about human habitation and migration (迁徙).
The footprints were discovered at the edge of an ancient lakebed in White Sands national park. According to the new paper published in the journal Science, they date back to between 21,000 and 23,000 years ago. Actually, the estimated age of the footprints was first reported in Science in 2021, but some researchers raised concerns about the dates. Questions focused on whether seeds of water plants used for the original dating may have absorbed ancient carbon from the lake — which could, in theory, throw off radiocarbon dating by thousands of years. But the new study presents two additional lines of evidence for the older date range. It uses two entirely different materials found at the site, ancient pollen (花粉) and stone grains.
The reported age of the footprints challenges the once conventional wisdom that humans did not reach the Americas until a few thousand years before rising sea levels covered the Bering land bridge between Russia and Alaska, perhaps about 15, 000 years ago. “This is a subject that's always been controversial because it's so significant. It's about how we understand the last chapter of the peopling of the world,” said Thomas Urban, an archaeologist (考古学家) at Comell University, who was involved in the 2021 study but not the new one.
Thomas Stafford, an independent archaeological geologist in New Mexico, who was not involved in the study, said he “was a bit suspicious before” but now is convinced. The new study isolated about 75, 000 grams of pure pollen from the same stone layer that contained the footprints. ‘Dating pollen is laborious but worthwhile,” said Kathleen Springer, a research geologist at the US Geological Survey and a co-author of the new paper.
Ancient footprints of any kind can provide archaeologists with a quick look of a moment in time. While some archeological sites in the Americas point to similar date ranges — including necklaces carved from giant animal remains in Brazil — scientists still question whether such objects really indicate human presence. “White Sands is unique because there's no question these footprints were left by people,” said Jennifer Raff, a scientist at the University of Kansas, who was not involved in the study.
1. The underlined word “upends” (paragraph 1) is closest in meaning to “_______”.
| A．comprises | B．connects | C．challenges | D．compares |
| A．It shows the footprints were made by the Russians. |
| B．It offers more convincing lines of evidence for dating. |
| C．It confirms that the ancient humans enjoyed living by the lake. |
| D．It reveals the footprints are much younger than previously thought. |
| A．necklaces are valuable objects for archaeologists to date animals |
| B．human footprints are often sure signs of human presence |
| C．ancient objects in Brazil are excluded from the study |
| D．White Sands is one important archaeological site |
| A．Scientists Discovers New Species of Humans in Americas |
| B．Humans Reached Americas 15, 000 Years Earlier Than Believed |
| C．American Archaeologists Unearthed Valuable Manmade Objects |
| D．New Research Confirms Early Human Presence in Americas |
10 . Roughly 2,000 years ago, Mount Vesuvius erupted, destroying the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Now some scientists are working to decode (解码) one of the great mysteries of that time — the scrolls (卷轴) of Herculaneum.
In 1752, workers were digging in Herculaneum when they uncovered a home that had belonged to a rich person. Inside, under a layer of volcanic mud, they discovered over 600 scrolls — the largest library of the ancient world. Most of the scrolls were made from papyrus—a paper like material. The heat from the volcano had burned the scrolls so much that they looked like blocks of charcoal (木炭).
The scrolls were so fragile that just touching them could make them fall apart. So scientists have been looking for ways to read the scrolls without opening them. Dr. Seales developed a method of using a CT (computed tomography) scanner to take 3D X-ray images of a papyrus scroll. Then he used a computer program to “unroll” the scroll, and get pictures of what it looked like on the inside. In 2016, his team used this method to read a burned scroll found near the Dead Sea.
But the scrolls from Herculaneum are much harder. The ink is made from charcoal and water, and doesn’t show up well in CT scans. He trained an AI program to figure out the writing. Though Dr. Seales was making progress, it was slow going. Then Dr. Seales met with two businessmen, who had the idea of creating a contest.
About 1,500 people have taken part in the contest. These people are sharing information as they make progress, so everyone can build on those ideas. In August, Luke Farritor, a 21-year-old student at the University of Nebraska, created an AI program that found a whole word: “πορψúραc”, or “porphyras” which means “purple”.
“This is the first word ever read from these ancient scrolls. For me, reading words from within the Herculaneum scrolls is like stepping onto the moon,” Dr. Seales says. “Now I can’t wait to explore.”
1. What is known about the scrolls of Herculaneum?| A．They were stored in the library. | B．They were dug out by workers. |
| C．They were made from charcoal. | D．They were the largest in the world. |
| A．Easily broken. | B．Newly written. | C．Nicely wrapped. | D．Rarely seen. |
| A．To futher promote their products. |
| B．To find out who was more intelligent. |
| C．To encourage people to contribute ideas. |
| D．To cultivate a sense of business awareness. |
| A．Disappointed. | B．Ashamed. | C．Confused. | D．Excited. |
