8. Translate this text into English in writing.

Микенцы

С момента первой публикации в 1964 г. книга лорда Тейлора "Микенцы" (William Taylour "The Mycenaeans" [mai’sinianz]) зарекомендовала себя (has established itself) как лучшая исследовательская работа в области археологии о микенцах. В книге рассматриваются великие открытия, сделанные Шлиманом (Schliemann) и его последователями в цитаделях Микен (Mycenae [mai’sini]), Тиринфе (Tiryns [‘taiərins]), Пилосе (Pyloc [‘pailɔk]), подтверждающие, что рассказ Гомера (Homer) о Троянской войне (Troy [trɔi]) не сказка, а быль. В книге рассматриваются и произведения искусств, проливающие свет на блестящую цивилизацию; и, прежде всего, книга охватывает историю подъема и падения (the rise and fall) в течение 400 лет этой великой цивилизации, которая оставила свой отпечаток на (that set its trace on) на бронзовом веке Средиземноморья и завещала (bequeathed [bi'kwi:рt]) свое наследие Грекам Классического периода.

Vocabulary Study

9. Write out a)all the archaeological terms from the texts grouping them under the headings: 'Remains or Relics', 'Artifacts', 'Monuments'; b) all the verbs that deal with the work of archaeologists.

Speech practice

10. Choose one of the topics for a short talk to be given in class:

•Archaeology is a science.

•The main aims of archaeology.

•The specific features of archaeology.

•The profession of an archaeologist is important for present-day life.

•Tell your classmates about one of the most interesting (mysterious)

discoveries from your point of view.

•Tell your classmates about one of the most prominent archaeologists.

11. Have a round-table discussion on one of the topics given above.

Composition

12 a) Write a short definition of archaeology as a science.

b) Excite your friend's curiosity of archaeological profession.

c) Write a paragraph about the latest discovery in archaeology.

It's interesting to know.

13 a) Look through the text and explain the meaning of the phrase and say whether it is used nowadays. Give examples.

To bury one's talent

A talent was an ancient monetary unit, a gold or silver coin. The phrase to bury one's talent was taken from a Gospel parable. A slave buried in the ground the money (a talent) given to him by his master. When the man returned and asked the slave what he had done with the money, the latter replied that he had hidden the talent in the ground and had it quite safe. The master reproached his slave for being lazy, adding that he could have lent the money to the traders and thus have made more money.

In the course of time the word talent changed its meaning and came to denote the natural endowments of man. To bury one's talent means to disregard one's abilities and gifts, to make no use of them.

Notes:

Parable ['pжrəbl], course ['kɔ:s], endowments [in'daumənts]

13 b) Do the following two-way translation:

- Откуда возникло выражение зарыть талант в землю?

= The phrase is drawn from a Gospel parable about a slave and his

master.

- В притче, насколько я помню, слово талант имеет значение

отличное от современного.

= You are right. There talent is used in its original meaning and denotes

an ancient monetary unit.

- Как распорядился раб деньгами, полученными от хозяина?

= The slave secreted the talent in the ground and on his master's return

said that he had all his money safe.

- Но хозяин, кажется, вовсе не стал благодарить или хвалить его за

бережливость, не так ли?

= Just on the contrary. The master reproached the slave for being lazy.

- А как, по мнению хозяина, раб должен был распорядиться

деньгами?

= The master said that the slave could have lent the money to the

traders and thus could have made more money.

- С течением времени слово талант изменило свое значение и

стало синонимом природных способностей человека.

= And the expression 'to bury one's talent' changed the meaning

accordingly. Now it means to disregard one's abilities and gifts, to make

no use of them.

ROLEPLAY

You are a great scientist in antiquity. Mark the following statements as true or false, according to the contents of the article.

1. The most important heritage of antiquity in Italy was architecture.

2. The Greek and Latin writers’ influence on the Italian mind in the 14th century was great due to the discovery of new conception.

3. Only some privileged Latin writers can draw their inspiration from the ancient treasure.

4. Petrarch worshiped Homer as he could read Homer’s works in the original.

5. A complete Latin translation of Homer’s Iliad was not a good one.

6. The 15th century saw a real boom in the field of translation from Greek in Italy.

THE CLASSICS

But the literary bequests of antiquity , Greek as well as Latin, were of far more importance than architectural, and indeed than all the artistic remains which it had left. They were held in the most absolute sense to be springs of all knowledge. The literary conditions of that age of great discoveries have often been set forth; no more can here be attempted than to point out a few less-known features of the picture.

Great as was the influence of the old writers on the Italian mind in the 14th century and before, yet that influence was due rather to the wide diffusion of what had long been known than to the discovery of much that was new. The most popular Latin poets, historians, orators and letter-writers, together with the number of Latin translations of single works of Aristotle, Plutarch, and a few other Greek authors, constituted the treasure from which a few favoured individuals in the time of Petrarch and Boccaccio drew their inspiration. The former, as is well known, owned and kept with religious care a Greek Homer, which he was unable to read. A complete Latin translation of the Iliad and Odyssey, though a very bad one, was made at Petrarch’s suggestion, and with Boccaccio’s help, by a Calabrian Greek, Leonzio Pilato. But with the 15th century began the long list of new discoveries, the systematic creation of libraries by means of copies, and the rapid multiplication of translations from the Greek.

UNIT 5 CALENDARS, ALPHABETS, LIBRARIES

Before you start:

In the course of history men used various calendar systems.

Could you name some of them?

How many alphabetic scripts do you know of?

What was the largest and the most famous library in the ancient world?

1 a) Read and translate the text.

How the Calendar Came about

The word "calendar" has been derived from the Latin "calends", the day of the new moon and the first day of the ancient Roman month. The calendar now in use throughout the world is called the Gregorian calendar; it was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII in the 16th century.

Though in early days a calendar was required primarily for religious observance, it was used for civil purposes as well. Unlike modern man, who uses artificial time intervals, primitive man utilized the cycle of recurring natural phenomena, the most obvious and most precise of which were the alternation of night and day and phases of the moon. Other less precise but naturally recurring phenomena were also made use of for calendar purposes, e.g. the sprouting of leaves, the coming of the rains, etc. Longer periods of time were often marked off by the number of harvests, the number of winters or some other occurrences. Thus a child who had lived through ten harvests or ten snows was ten years old.

Primitive man was intrigued by various celestial phenomena which displayed themselves in the clear night skies. He had recognized stars long before he invented written records. Principal stars were grouped into patterns which men identified with familiar animals or with the gods, goddesses, heroes, heroines and creatures of mythology. Since the appearance of the predominant constellations coincided with the natural phenomena, it was possible to trace the path of the moon and that of the sun through the sky. Those constellations were visible just before sunrise, or just after sunset, so primitive man naturally watched them as he rose with the dawn and 'went to bed' at sundown. The risings and settings of stars allowed him to derive the position of the sun among the stars and thus a calendrical year was ultimately obtained.

The height to which the sun rose above the horizon at midday was carefully observed by men and finally it was noticed that the sun was above the horizon for the longest period at midsummer. The shadows which were cast by trees were used by primitive civilizations to measure the altitudes of the sun. In such a way the seasons were discerned.

Notes:

cycle ['saikl]

phenomenon [fi'nɔ:minən], pl. phenomena

occurence[ə'kʌrəns]-случай, событие

hero ['hiərou]

heroine [‘herouin]

to intrigue [in'tri:g]

to coincide [koun'said] -совпадать

height [hait] - высота

altitude ['жltitju:d] - высота

to discern [di'sə:n] - различать, распознавать

crescent [kresnt] - полумесяц

phase [feiz]

precise [pri'saiz] - точный

calendar ['kжlində]

artificial [,a:ti'fiʃəl] - искусственный

to utilize ['ju:tilaiz] - использовать

to recognize ['rekəgnaiz] - узнавать

to identify [ai'dentifai]

mythology [mi'рɔlɔdzi]

predominant [pri'dɔminənt] - преобладающий

constelation [,kɔnstə'leiʃn] - созвездие

approximation [əpr,ɔksi 'meiʃən] - приближение

celestial [si'lestjəl]

1 b) Express agreement or disagreement with the following. Begin your answer with: 'Certainly you are right' or 'I'm afraid you are wrong'.

1. The Latin "calends" from which the word "calendar" is derived was

the first day of the ancient Roman week.

2. Early man required a calendar only for religious purposes.

3. The alternation of night and day and phases of the moon were the

most obvious and most precise of the recurring natural phenomena

which primitive man used for calendar purposes.

4. Man began to recognize stars long before he invented written

records.

5. Primitive people did not pay attention to various celestial

phenomena.

2. Consult the text and find:

a) a word close in meaning to: aim, route, event, exact, different, mainly,

evidently, to show, to puzzle;

b) a word opposite in meaning to: coward, late, unfamiliar, invisible,

disappear;

c) the English equivalents of the following: григорианский календарь;

явление природы; соблюдение религиозных праздников; смена дня и

ночи; мифологические существа; главные созвездия; различать

времена года; в отличие от современного человека; отождествлять с... .

3. Translate the sentences into English.

1. Появление календаря было вызвано (объясняется) потребностью человека вести отсчет времени года.

2. Календами в древнегреческом календаре назывался первый день каждого месяца.

3. Юлианский (Julian) и григорианский календари называют календарями старого и нового стиля.

4. Юлианский календарь был заменен григорианским в 1582г.

5. В нашей стране григорианский календарь впервые введен в феврале 1918г.

4. Answer the following questions.

1. What is the origin of the word "calendar"?

2. What calendar is used now throughout the world?

3. Why is it called the Gregorian calendar?

4. What did primitive man utilize to discern time divisions?

5. What celestial bodies could primitive man observe in the sky?

6. What helped obtain a calendar year?

7. What did people identify principal stars with?

8. In what way were the seasons discerned?

5. Read, translate and entitle the text. Render it by answering the following questions:

1. What is the text devoted to?

2. What facts does it provide the reader with?

3. Find the sentence in the text where the main idea is expressed.

4. Do you agree with the author's point of view? (Give your reason).

Up to now historians have assumed that calendars came into being with the advent of agriculture, for man was faced with a real need to understand something about the seasons. Recent scientific evidence seems to indicate that this assumption is incorrect.

Historians have long been puzzled by dots, lines and symbols that have been engraved on walls, bones, and the ivory tusks of mammoths. The nomads who made these markings lived by hunting and fishing during the last Ice Age which began about 35.000 B.C. and ended about 10.000 B.C.

By correlating markings made in various parts of the world, historians have been able to read this difficult code. They have found that it is connected with the passage of days and the phases of the moon.

It is in fact a primitive type of calendar. It has long been known that the hunting scenes, depicted on walls, were not simply a form of artistic expression. They had a definite meaning, for they were as near as early man could get to writing. It is possible that there is a definite relation between these paintings and the markings that sometimes accompany them. It seems that man was making a real effort to understand the seasons 20.000 years earlier than have been supposed.

6. Read and translate the text (you are given 3 minutes). Remember as many facts as you can to speak on the first historical writings.

Of course, the ruins of buildings, weapons, jewelry and other objects can tell us much about how people used to live in ancient times. But we learn most about the past from what people wrote. People learned to write a very long time ago.

In Armenia, for instance, one could find stone tablets with inscriptions that were carved on them more than two thousand five hundred years ago. Carved by the orders of the kings, who ruled them, these inscriptions described various military campaigns and conquests, the capture of prisoners and other booty as well as the building of canals and cities.

During excavations in Central Asia, wooden tablets and bits of leather with writing on them were discovered. Scholars are still unable to read many of them.

In Novgorod archaeologists found birch-bark scrolls. These scrolls proved to be letters, receipts, student notes, and the like.

Most of the ancient books that had come down to us were written on parchment. One such manuscript was discovered in the library of an old monastery. This splendid poem was written about eight hundred years ago and was called 'The Lay of the Warfare Waged by Igor'. In it, the ancient poet described a campaign that Russian people fought against the warlike nomads.

Scholars took great pains to collect and study ancient objects and manuscripts as well as folklore and legends.

Notes:

jewelry ['ʤ u:əlri] - драгоценности

tablet [tжblit] - табличка

carved ['ka:vd] - высеченный

capture ['kжptə] - захват

prisoner of war [‘prisənə] - пленник

booty [bu:ti] - трофей

leather [leрə] - кожа (выделанная)

birch-bark [bə:ʧ ba:k] - береста

scroll [skroul] - свиток

receipt [ri'si:t] – рецепт (особенно кулинарный), расписка

parchment ['pa:ʧment]

manuscript ['mжnjuskript]

folklore [fouk'lɔ:]

legend [leʤ end]

7. Answer the following questions:

1. What did the first inscriptions describe?

2. Where were these inscriptions found?

3. What forms of the first alphabet do you know?

4. Was it difficult to read the first alphabets?

5. What material did people use for ancient books?

8 a) Read, translate the text and be ready to make up a dialogue on the theme.

Libraries of Ancient Times

When was the first library established? Only a hundred years ago the two Egyptian libraries which were mentioned by the Greek historian Diodorus (1st century B.C.) were looked upon as the earliest examples of such institutions, if indeed, they were not fabulous. Now we have indisputable evidence of libraries at a much earlier date.

In 1850 the famous English archaeologist Layard, being then engaged in unearthing Assurbanipal's palace (VII c. B.C.), came across several chambers containing a great number of records - decrees of Assyrian kings, accounts of wars, works on astronomy - as well as dictionaries and text-books. Having deciphered the tablets, the philologist had good reason to believe that the library had been extensively used. It had a kind of catalogue and a systematic arrangement of shelves. Four decades later, while excavating an ancient Babylonian site, archaeologists exposed a series of rooms. And there, stored neatly upon shelves were some 25.000 clay tablets, part of an ancient temple library. The library existed in the third millenium B.C. and was adjunct to the temple school. Judging by its careful arrangement under separate subjects and on separate shelves, the students could enjoy the use of a good library of reference.

The greatest library of the ancient world grew up in Alexandria in Egypt in the 3rd century B.C. It consisted of two large collections. The larger and more famous one was housed in a school which was modelled after Aristotle's Academy in Athens. The smaller collection was placed in a temple of an Egyptian god. At the height, around 200 B.C., the collections contained several hundred thousand rolls. Being connected with a number of outstanding names in Greek literature, the Alexandrian library was the greatest centre of culture in the ancient world.

The ultimate fate of the library is almost uncertain as are the names of the librarians. Apparently at least part of the larger collection was burnt in the fighting between the Egyptians and Romans around 43 B.C. Having later been complemented by the

collections of other ancient libraries, the library in Alexandria came into world prominence again. But in 391 A.D. the library was burnt by the order of one of the Christian emperors.

Notes:

Diodorus [,daiə'dɔ:rəs]

Assurbanipal [,eisur 'ba:nipa:l]

Aristotle ['жristɔtl]

Layard [lɛəd]

fabulous ['fж bjuləs] - мифический

indisputable [,indis 'pju:təbl]

evidence ['evidəns] - доказательство

chamber ['ʧeimbə] - зд. комната

to decipher [di'saifə] - расшифровывать

series ['siəri:z]

adjunct ['жdzʌnkt] - зд. дополнение

separate ['seprit]

reference ['refrəns] - справка, ссылка

to model [mɔdl] - создавать по образцу

ultimate ['ʌltimit] - окончательно

to complement ['kɔmpliment] – дополнять

8 b) Explain the underlined grammar forms in the text.

8 c) Consult the text and find the English equivalents of the following:

рассматриваться; неоспоримое доказательство; наталкиваться; иметь достаточно оснований, чтобы считать; широко использоваться; древняя библиотека храма; в университете при храме была библиотека; судя по; справочная библиотека; размещаться, располагаться; собрание книг, рукописей; окончательная судьба; будучи дополненной; по-видимому; занимать видное положение; по приказу.

8 d) Make up a dialogue by answering the following questions. Work in pairs.

1. What library is considered to be the earliest example of this institution?

2. Where and by whom was it unearthed?

3. When did it exist?

4. What makes the historians think that the rooms excavated by Layard contained a library?

5. What century does that library belong to?

6. From what sources do we know about the two ancient Egyptian

libraries?

7. What was the largest and the most famous library in the 3rd century

B.C.?

8. When and why was the Alexandrian library damaged?

9. Read and translate the dialogue and be ready to explain to a non- historian student the main idea of it.

Inca Calendar May Be Hidden in Shrines

- There is an interesting article in the 'Herald Tribune'.

= What is its title?

- "Inca calendar may be hidden in shrines."

= Isn't it about the ancient civilizations?

- You are right. From a study of early Spanish chronicles and of the layout of Cuzco [kuzkə], capital of the Incas, a specialist in Andean archaeology has concluded that the shrines around that ancient city, the design of its central temple and even the "spring run" described by the chroniclers, were all closely linked to the Inca calendar.

= What is the name of this specialist?

- The researcher is Mr.Vescelius, who has taught at the City University of New York. From his analysis of the calendar he has also proposed radical revisions in the chronology of Andean history prior to the crushing of the Incas by the Spanish conquistadors [kɔn’kwistədɔ:z].

= Were the results of his work published anywhere?

- His thesis was recently presented to the Columbia University seminar on primitive and pre-Columbian art.

= What is the attitude of other scientists toward his hypothesis?

- Specialists said that, while the hypothesis was speculative, it brought

together many previously puzzling aspects of what is known of Inca

culture.

= But hadn't scientists enough evidence of the Mayas and the Incas?

- Unlike the Mayas, the Incas had no well-developed system of writing.

Knowledge of their history and of their calendar is incomplete, being

largely dependent on chronicles written by Spanish visitors. Among the

puzzling features of those accounts was the "spring run" for which, on

the vernal equinox [‘və:nl ‘i:kwinɔks], 400 runners assembled in the central square

of Cuzco in what is now Peru.

= Certainly there were some earlier sources than that of Spanish visitors, weren't

there?

- Mr. Vescelius suspects that the initial runners were assigned to 328 shrines whose distribution around the city and its suburbs was, in effect, a manifestation of the calendar. The shrine location, and the manner of their maintenance by the Cuzco families, some royal and plebeian, were described by the chroniclers. A large number of these shrines, according to the chronicles, lay along a series of 41 lines or sequences which, in general, radiated from Cuzco.

= What conclusion did the scientist come to?

- He believes that each shrine represented one day of the year. Each line represented a week. And each recurring triplet of lines was a month. It is known that the Inca year was divided into 12 months of three weeks each. If, for each week, there was a "sabbath" not represented by a shrine, those 36 days, plus one special festive day and the 328 days for which there were shrines, would add up to 365, representing a full year.

= I am very much interested in this subject. Could you give me this article for a couple of days.

- With pleasure. Here it is.