PrepTest 146, Section 4, Question 18
Hundreds of clay tablets marked in cuneiform have(447 more words not shown)
According to the passage, the(2 more words not shown)
- Awas eventually abandoned(11 more words not shown)
- Bcame to designate(19 more words not shown)
- Ccould be understood(13 more words not shown)
- Dwas originally thought(10 more words not shown)
- Ebecame physically unwieldy(10 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
The second paragraph links the token system's expansion to growing industry. Hundreds of new forms appear, including bowls and jars, as crafts become more varied and sophisticated. That's an actual claim we can use.
What we’re looking for
Be careful with plausible objections of our own. Carrying lots of tokens might sound inconvenient, but this question asks what the account says, not what problems we can imagine.
Working the answers
- A
Tokens could represent quantity: two ovoid tokens recorded two jars of oil. Later numerals made quantity separately expressible, but the earlier system wasn't incapable of representing it. Greater flexibility isn't the same as creating a previously impossible function.
- BCorrect
New figurative forms and hundreds of additional token types accompany the diversification of crafts. This captures the stated connection between a wider range of represented objects and a more varied productive economy.
- C
The impressions and their connection to farm-product inscriptions support Schmandt-Besserat's interpretation. The author doesn't establish that inscriptions on some tokens were the only possible basis for understanding the system.
- D
Some archaeologists thought the objects were amulets or game pieces. That isn't a claim that most archaeologists assigned them a primarily religious function. Don't turn a limited, mixed description into a majority position.
- E
Physical awkwardness may seem plausible, but it isn't reported here as the consequence of diversifying agricultural products. An imagined practical difficulty cannot replace the stated development in B.
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