翻译考试历年中级口译真题(3)_第6页

Questions 11--15
I watched as Dr Ian Stead, the archaeologist in charge of the excavation, began carefully removing the peat with a clay modelling tool. X-rays taken through the box while it was at the hospital revealed ribs, backbone, arm bones and a skull (apparently with fractures). However, the bones showed up only faintly because acid in the peat had removed minerals from them. Using the X-rays, Stead started on what he thought might be a leg. By his side was Professor Frank Oldfield, of Liverpool University, an expert on peat who could identify vegetation from stems only a fraction of an inch long. “Similar bodies found in bogs in Denmark show signs of a violent death,” Stead said. “It is essential for us to be able to
distinguish between the plant fibres in peat and clothing or a piece of rope which might have been used to hang him.”
As Stead continued his gentle probing, a brown leathery limb began to materialise amidst the peat; but not until most of it was exposed could he and Robert Connolly, a physical anthropologist at Liverpool University, decide that it was an arm. Beside it was a small piece of animal fur—perhaps the remains of clothing.
Following the forearm down into the peat, Stead found a brown shiny object and then, close by, two more. Seen under a magnifying glass, he suddenly realised they were fingernails—“beautifully manicured and without a scratch on them,” he said. “Most people at this time in the Iron Age were farmers; but with fingernails like that, this person can t have been. He might have been a priest or an aristocrat.” Especially delicate work was required to reveal the head. On the third day, a curly sideburn appeared and, shortly afterwards, a moustache. At first it seemed that the man had been balding but gradually he was seen to have close-cropped hair, about an inch or two long.
“This information about his hairstyle is unique. We have no other information about what Britons looked like before the Roman invasion except for three small plaques showing Celts with drooping moustaches and shaven chins.”
The crucial clue showing how the man died had already been revealed, close to his neck, but it looked just like another innocent heather root. It was not recognised until two days later, when Margaret McCord, a senior conservation officer, found the sameroot at the back of his neck and, cleaning it carefully, saw its twisted texture. “He s been garrotted.” She declared. The ‘root    was a length of twisted sinew, the thickness of
strong string. A slip knot at the back shows how it was tightened round the neck.
“A large discoloration on the left shoulder suggests a bruise and possibly a violent struggle,” Stead said.

11. The X-rays that were taken showed Stead and Oldfield _____.
(A) a vague picture of the bones
(B) exactly what they were looking for
(C) which deposits were clay and which peat
(D) exactly how the man had died
12. The researchers suspected the man had met a violent death because _____.
(A) he was still wearing clothes
(B) similar bodies had been found elsewhere
(C) there were traces of a hanging rope in the peat
(D) he hadn t been buried in a coffin
13. It was the forearm they uncovered which _____.
(A) required the most delicate work
(B) indicated the age of the man
(C) told them something about the man s clothes
(D) led them to discover the fingernails
14. Why did the researchers think the man was possibly a priest?
(A) He had closely-cropped hair.
(B) His coat was fur-lined
(C) He had a drooping moustache and shaven chin.
(D) His fingernails were well looked after.
15. It was established that the man they dug out of the peat had been _____.
(A) beheaded
(B) strangled
(C) drowned
(D) stabbed in the neck