2016.3.5 雅思阅读 Easter Island 原文原题回忆
2016-04-11 10:51阅读：
A.
One of the world’s most famous
yet least visited archaeological sites, Easter Island is a small
hilly, now treeless island of volcanic origin. Located in the
Pacific Ocean at 27 degrees south if the equator and some 2200
miles (3600 kilometers) off the coast of Chile, it is considered to
be the world’s most remote inhabited island. The island is,
technically speaking, a single massive volcano rising over ten
thousand feet from the Pacific Ocean floor. The island received its
most well-known current name, Easter Island, from the Dutch sea
captain Jacob Roggeveen who became the first European to visit
Easter Sunday, April 5, 1722.
B.
In the early 1950s, the
Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl popularized the idea that the
island had been originally settled by advanced societies of Indians
from the
coast of South America. Extensive archaeological, ethnographic and
linguistic research has conclusively shown this hypothesis to be
inaccurate. It is now recognized that the original inhabitants of
Easter Island are of Polynesian stock (DNA extracts from skeletons
have confirmed this that they most probably came from the Marquesas
or Society island), and that they arrived as early as 318AD (carbon
dating of reeds from a grave confirm this). At the time of their
arrival, much of the island was forested, was teeming with land
birds, and was perhaps the most productive breeding site for
seabirds in the Polynesia region. Because of the plentiful bird,
fish and plant food sources, the human population grew and gave
rise to a rich religious and artistic culture.
C.
That culture’s most famous
features are its enormous stone statues called moai, at least 288
of which once stood upon massive stone platform called ahu. There
are some 250 of these ahu platform spaced approximately one half
mile apart and creating an almost unbroken line around the
perimeter of the island. Another 600 moai statues, in various
stages of completion, are scattered around the island, either in
quarries or along ancient roads between the quarries and the
coastal areas where the statues were most often erected. Nearly all
the moai are carved from the tough stone of the Rano Raraku
volcano. The average statue is 14 feet and 6 inches tall and weighs
14 tons. Some moai were as large as 33 feet and weighed more than
80 tons. Depending upon the size of the statues, it has been
estimated that between 50 and 150 people were needed to drag them
across the countryside on sleds and rollers made from the island’s
trees.
D.
Scholars are unable to
definitively explain the function and use of the moai statues. It
is assumed that their carving and erection derived from an idea
rooted in similar practices found elsewhere in Polynesia but which
evolved in a unique way on Easter Island. Archaeological and
iconographic analysis indicated that the statue cult was based on
an ideology of male, lineage-based authority incorporating
anthropomorphic symbolism. The statues were thus symbols of
authority and power. Both religious and political. But they were
not only symbols. To the people who erected and used them, they
were actual repositories of sacred spirit. Carved stone and wooden
objects in ancient Polynesian religions, when properly fashioned
and ritually prepared, were believed to be charged by a magical
spiritual essence called mana. The ahu platforms of Easter Island
were the sanctuaries of the people, and the moai statues were the
ritually charged sacred objects of those sanctuaries.
E.
Besides its more well-known
name, Easter Island is also known as Te-Pito-O-Te-Henua, meaning
“the Navel of the World”, and as Mata-Ki-Te-Rani, meaning “eyes
looking at Heaven”. These ancient names and a host of mythological
details ignored by mainstream archaeologists point to the
possibility that the remote island may once have been a geodetic
marker and the site of an astronomical observatory of a long
forgotten civilization. In his book, Heaven’s Mirror, Graham
Hancock suggests that Easter Island may once have been a
significant scientific outpost of this antediluvian civilization
and that its location had extreme importance in a planet-spanning,
mathematically precise grid of sacred sites. Two other alternative
scholars, Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas, have extensively
studied the location and possible function of these geodetic
markers. In their fascinating book, Uriel’s Machine, they suggest
that one purpose of the geodetic markers was as part of global
network of sophisticated astronomical observatories dedicated to
predicting and preparing for future commentary impacts and crystal
displacement cataclysms.
F.
In the latter years of the
20th century and the first years of the 21st
century various writers and scientists have advanced theories
regarding the rapid decline of Easter Island’s magnificent
civilization around the time of the first European contact.
Principal among these theories, and now shown to be inaccurate, is
that postulated by Jared Diamond in his book Collapse: How
Societies Choose to Fail or Survive. Basically these theories
state that a few centuries after Easter Island’s initial
colonization the resource needs of the growing population had begun
to outpace the island’s capacity to renew itself ecologically. By
the 1400s, the forests had been entirely cut, the rich ground cover
had eroded away, the springs had dried up, and the vast flocks of
birds coming to roost on the island had disappeared. With no logs
to build canoes for offshore fishing, with depleted bird and
wildlife food sources, and with declining crop yields because of
the erosion of good soil, the nutritional intake of the people
plummeted. First famine, then cannibalism, set in. Because the
island could no longer feed the chiefs, bureaucrats and priests who
kept the complex society running, the resulting chaos triggered a
social and cultural collapse. By 1700 the population dropped to
between one-quarter and one-tenth of its former number, and many of
the statues were toppled during supposed “clan wars” of the 1600
and 1700s.
G．The faulty notions presented in
these theories began with the racist assumptions of Thor Heyerdahl
and have been perpetuated by writers, such as Jared Diamond, who do
not have sufficient archaeological and historical understanding of
the actual events which occurred on Easter Island. The real truth
regarding the tremendous social devastation which occurred on
Easter Island is that it was a direct consequence of the inhumane
behavior of many of the first European visitors, particularly the
slavers who raped and murdered the islanders, introduced small pox
and other diseases, and brutally removed the natives to mainland
South America.
List of headings
i.
The famous moai
ii.
The status represented symbols of combined
purposes
iii.
The
ancient spots which indicates scientific application
iv.
The
story of the name
v.
Early immigrants, rise and prosperity
vi.
The
geology of Easter Island
vii.
The begin of Thor
Heyerdahl’s discovery
viii.
The countering explanation to
the misconceptions politically manipulated
ix.
Symbols
of authority and power
x.
The Navel of the world
xi.
The
Norwegian Invaders’ legacy
Paragraph A
iv
Paragraph B
Paragraph C
i
Paragraph D
Paragraph E
T/F/NG
1.
The first inhabitants of Easter
Island are Polynesian, from the Marquesas or Society
islands.
2.
Construction of some moai
statues on the island was not finished.
3.
The Moai can be found not only
on Easter Island but also elsewhere in Polynesia.
4.
Most archeologists recognized
the religious and astronomical functions for an ancient
society
5.
The structures on Easter Island
work as an astronomical outpost for extraterrestrial
visitors.
6.
The theory that depleted natural
resources leading to the fall of Easter Island actual has a
distorted perspective.
Summary
no more than three
words
Many theories speculated that Easter Island’s fall around the
era of the initial European contact. Some say the resources are
depleted by a _______. The erroneous theories began with a root of
the ______ advanced by some scholars. Early writers did not have
adequate ______ understandings to comprehend the true nature of
events on the island. The social devastation was in fact a direct
result of ________of the first European settlers.
同时欢迎您关注公众号yasiyuedu365
