Palimpsest托福听力原文翻译及问题答案

Palimpsest托福听力原文翻译及问题答案

一、Palimpsest托福听力原文：

Narrator:Listen to part of a lecture in an art history class.

MALE PROFESSOR:Now,in Europe,in the Middle Ages,before the invention of printing and the printing press,all books,all manuscripts,were handmade.And the material typically used for the pages was parchment,which is animal skin that’s stretched and dried under tension so it becomes really flat and can be written on.

During the 1400s,when printing was being developed,paper became the predominant material for books in Europe,but prior to that,it was parchment.Parchment is durable—much more so than paper.And it could be reused,which came in handy since it was a costly material and in short supply.So it wasn’t uncommon for the scribes,or monks,who produced the manuscripts—uh remember,before printing,books were made mainly in monasteries—well,the scribes often recycled the parchment that’d been used for earlier manuscripts.

They simply erased the ink off the parchment and wrote something new in its place.A manuscript page that was written on,erased,and then used again is called a palimpsest.Palimpsests were created⋯well,we know about two methods that were used for removing ink from parchment.

In the late Middle Ages,it was customary to scrape away the surface of the parchment with an abrasive,which completely wiped out any writing that was there.But earlier in the Middle Ages,the original ink was usually removed by washing the used parchment with milk.That removed the ink,but with the passing of time the original writing might reappear.In fact,it might reappear to the extent that scholars could make out and even decipher the original text.

Perhaps the most famous example is the Archimedes palimpsest.Archimedes lived in Greece around 200 B.C.E.⋯And as you probably know,he's considered one of the greatest mathematicians who ever lived,even though many of his writings had been lost,including what many now think to be his most important work,called the Method.

But in 1998,a book of prayers from the Middle Ages sold at an art auction for a lot of money,more money than anyone would pay for a damaged book from the twelfth century,beautiful or not.Why?It had been discovered that the book was a palimpsest,and beneath the surface writing of the manuscript lay—guess what?—mathematical theorems and diagrams from Archimedes.Archimedes’writings were originally done on papyrus scrolls.Then in the tenth century,a scribe made a copy on parchment of some of his texts and diagrams,including as it turns out,the Method.This was extremely fortunate since later on,the original papyrus scrolls disappeared.

About 200 years later,in the twelfth century,this parchment manuscript became a palimpsest when a scribe used the parchment to make a prayer book.So the pages,the pieces of parchment themselves had been preserved,but the Archimedes text was erased and written over,and no one knew it existed.

It wasn't until 1906 that a scholar came across the prayer book in a library and realized it was a palimpsest,and that the underlying layer of text could only have come from Archimedes.That was when his work the Method was discovered for the first time.

Uh,the palimpsest then went through some more tough times,but eventually it ended up at an art auction,where it was bought and then donated to an art museum in Baltimore for conservation and study.To avoid further damage to the manuscript,the research team at the art museum has had to be extremely selective in the techniques they use to see the original writing.

They've used ultraviolet light and some other techniques,and if you are interested in that sort of thing,you can learn more about it in an art conservation class.But,actually,it was a physicist who came up with a method that was a breakthrough.He realized that the iron in the ancient ink would display if exposed to a certain x-ray imaging method.And except for small portions of the text that couldn't be deciphered,this technique’s been very helpful in seeing Archimedes’texts and drawings through the medieval overwriting.

二、Palimpsest托福听力中文翻译：

旁白：在艺术史课上听一节课的一部分。

男教授：在中世纪的欧洲，在印刷术和印刷机发明之前，所有的书和手稿都是手工制作的。通常用于制作页面的材料是羊皮纸，这是一种动物皮肤，在张力下拉伸和干燥，使其变得非常平坦，可以在上面书写。

在14世纪，当印刷术发展起来时，纸张成为欧洲书籍的主要材料，但在此之前，它是羊皮纸。羊皮纸比纸更耐用。而且它可以重复使用，这很方便，因为它是一种昂贵的材料，而且供应短缺。因此，抄写员或僧侣创作手稿的情况并不罕见。记住，在印刷之前，书籍主要是在修道院制作的。抄写员经常回收用于早期手稿的羊皮纸。

他们只是擦去羊皮纸上的墨水，在原处写下新的东西。一个手稿页被写在上面，删除，然后再次使用，被称为翻页。创建了翻页⋯我们知道有两种方法可以去除羊皮纸上的墨水。

在中世纪晚期，人们习惯于用研磨剂刮去羊皮纸的表面，从而彻底抹去纸上的任何文字。但在中世纪早期，原始墨水通常是通过用牛奶清洗用过的羊皮纸来去除的。这去除了墨水，但随着时间的推移，原始文字可能会再次出现。事实上，它可能会再次出现，以至于学者们能够辨认甚至破译原文。

也许最著名的例子是阿基米德回文。阿基米德大约生活在公元前200年的希腊。⋯正如你们可能知道的，他被认为是有史以来最伟大的数学家之一，尽管他的许多著作已经丢失，包括现在许多人认为是他最重要的作品，叫做方法。

但在1998年，一本中世纪的祈祷书在一次艺术品拍卖会上以高价售出，这比任何人买一本十二世纪的破损书所花的钱都要多，无论这本书是否漂亮。为什么？人们发现这本书是一本重印本，在手稿的表面下写着什么-阿基米德的数学定理和图表。阿基米德的作品最初写在纸莎草卷轴上。然后在十世纪，一个抄写员在羊皮纸上复制了他的一些文本和图表，包括后来证明的方法。这是非常幸运的，因为后来，原来的纸莎草卷轴消失了。

大约200年后，在12世纪，当一个抄写员用羊皮纸做祈祷书时，这张羊皮纸手稿变成了复写本。因此，这些纸页、羊皮纸本身都被保存了下来，但阿基米德文字被抹去并写了下来，没有人知道它的存在。

直到1906年，一位学者在图书馆偶然发现了这本祈祷书，并意识到它是一本复写本，而文字的底层只能来自阿基米德。那是他的工作首次发现这种方法。

嗯，这本复本后来经历了一些更艰难的时期，但最终它在一次艺术品拍卖会上被买下，然后捐赠给巴尔的摩的一家艺术博物馆进行保护和研究。为了避免进一步损坏手稿，美术馆的研究团队必须在观看原稿时使用极为挑剔的技术。

他们使用了紫外线和其他一些技术，如果你对这类事情感兴趣，你可以在艺术保护课上了解更多。但事实上，是一位物理学家提出了一种突破性的方法。他意识到，如果使用某种x射线成像方法，古代墨水中的铁就会显示出来。除了一小部分无法解读的文字外，这项技术在中世纪覆盖阿基米德的文字和绘画中非常有用。

三、Palimpsest托福听力问题：

Q1:1.What is the lecture mainly about?

A.How Archimedes was identified as the author of some ancient texts

B.The recovery of some ancient writings on mathematics

C.Differences among various writing materials used in the Middle Ages

D.Techniques for restoring ancient manuscripts

Q2:2.What are two points the professor makes about parchment?

A.It is more long lasting than paper.

B.It was inexpensive to produce during the Middle Ages.

C.It was the material Archimedes used for his writings.

D.Its use for books decreased after the 1400s.

Q3:3.What does the professor imply when he explains the washing and scraping methods that were used to remove ink from a parchment surface?

A.Washing made parchment more able to retain newly applied ink than scraping did.

B.Washing was less effective than scraping as a means of permanently erasing ink.

C.The scraping method was used in the creation of the Archimedes palimpsest.

D.Neither method completely erased the original text.

Q4:4.What type of book became known as the Archimedes palimpsest?

A.A history book

B.A physics book

C.A prayer book

D.An artist's book

Q5:5.What does the professor imply about the various techniques used to view Archimedes'text?

A.The students should be familiar with most of the techniques.

B.Different techniques were used to analyze the iron content of ancient ink.

C.The use of ultraviolet light was more damaging than the other techniques.

D.X-ray imaging was more effective than the other techniques.

Q6:6.What does the professor imply about the significance of the Archimedes palimpsest?

A.It is significant because it contains what may be Archimedes'most important work

B.It is significant because it proves that a certain mathematics text was written by Archimedes.

C.It is significant because it is the oldest one ever discovered.

D.It is significant because it is the first one to be completely deciphered.

四、Palimpsest托福听力答案：

A1:正确答案：B

A2:正确答案：AD

A3:正确答案：B

A4:正确答案：C

A5:正确答案：D

A6:正确答案：A

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