PrepTest 101, Section 3, Question 9
The play Mankind must have been written between(54 more words not shown)
The argument would be most(10 more words not shown)
- AThe Royal Theatre(12 more words not shown)
- BAnother coin mentioned(8 more words not shown)
- CThe rose noble(7 more words not shown)
- DAlthough Henry VI(13 more words not shown)
- EIn a letter(21 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Those dates give us two reasons for a proposed time window, not a guarantee that nothing could have happened outside it.
The lower boundary is 1431, when the rose noble first circulated. But could the playwright have heard about the coin before people began spending it? Perhaps its design was already known, or the writer had access to plans for it. Conceivably, a fictional coin could even inspire a later real one. These are ways to question whether mentioning the coin proves the play came after its circulation.
The upper boundary is 1471, when Henry VI died. Calling him a living monarch points toward an earlier date, but what if the writer hadn't heard the news? What if the dedication contained a mistake? Again, I don't know that either happened. I'm testing why that wording is supposed to make a later writing date impossible.
What we’re looking for
The weakener could attack either boundary. I don't yet know whether the answer will show that the play could be earlier than 1431 or later than 1471. I do want it to challenge when the play was written, rather than tell us when people happened to perform it.
Working the answers
- A
A performance in 1480 could use a play written years earlier. We still perform Romeo and Juliet long after Shakespeare wrote it. So the performance date doesn't show that Mankind was written after 1471. A changes the event being dated.
- B
Mentioning a coin first minted in 1422 fits perfectly well with writing the play between 1431 and 1471. The author could mention an older coin. We need a fact that undermines one of the proposed limits, not another old object that could appear within them.
- C
Ending circulation in 1468 doesn't conflict with the proposed 1431–1471 window. Nor must a writer stop mentioning a coin the moment it stops circulating. It therefore gives us no reason to doubt either proposed boundary.
- D
Being deposed and later restored changes Henry's political status during his lifetime. Both dates are inside the proposed window, and the restoration in 1470 is consistent with a dedication to him as a living monarch before his death in 1471. D doesn't undermine either reason the author gives for limiting the writing date.
- ECorrect
The coin was already being discussed in 1428, and a merchant had seen its design. The playwright therefore could have known of it before it first circulated in 1431. That directly weakens the claim that mentioning it makes a pre-1431 writing date impossible.
E doesn't prove that Mankind was written in 1428, or even that it was written before 1431. It removes the author's reason for ruling out that earlier possibility. That's enough to weaken the proposed certainty about the range.
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