1 . Directions: After reading the passage below, fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word; for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

The Antonine Plague (瘟疫)

The year was 166 C.E., and the Roman Empire was in its prime. The triumphant Roman troops, under the command of Emperor Lucius Verrus, returned to Rome victorious after     1     (defeat) their Parthian enemies. As they marched west toward Rome, they carried with them more than the spoils of plundered Parthian temples; they also carried an epidemic that     2     (ruin) the Roman Empire over the course of the next two decades.

The Antonine Plague,     3     was known later, would reach every corner of the empire and is     4     most likely claimed the life of Lucius Verrus himself in 169 — and possibly that of his co-emperor Marcus Aurelius in 180.   

The effect of the epidemic on Rome’s armies was apparently devastating. Closeness to sick fellow soldiers and less-than-optimal living conditions made it possible for the outbreak to spread rapidly throughout the troops, such as those     5     (base) along the northern frontier at Aquileia. Troops elsewhere in the empire were similarly stricken.     6     (reverse) their shrinking soldiers, they sent the sons of soldiers to troops. Army discharge certificates from the Balkan region suggest that there was a significant decrease in the number of soldiers who were allowed to retire from military service during the period of the plague.

The effect on the civilian population was evidently by no means     7     (severe). In his letter to Athens in 174, Marcus Aurelius loosened the requirements for membership to the ruling council of Athens,     8     there were now too few surviving upper-class Athenians who met the requirements he had introduced prior to the outbreak.

It has been estimated that the death rate over the 23-year period of the Antonine Plague was 7—10 percent of the population.     9     the practical consequences of the outbreak, such as the destabilization of the Roman military and economy, the psychological impact on the populations could by no means be ignored. It is easy to imagine the sense of fear and helplessness ancient Romans     10     have felt in the face of such a ruthless, painful, disfiguring and frequently fatal disease.