托福阅读真题Official 46 Passage 2（四）

托福阅读真题Official 46 Passage 2（四）

The Commercial Revolution in Medieval Europe

Beginning in the 1160s,the opening of new silver mines in northern Europe led to the minting and circulation of vast quantities of silver coins.The widespread use of cash greatly increased the volume of international trade.Business procedures changed radically.The individual traveling merchant who alone handled virtually all aspects of exchange evolved into an operation involving three separate types of merchants:the sedentary merchant who ran the“home office,”financing and organizing the firm’s entire export-import trade;the carriers who transported goods by land and sea;and the company agents resident in cities abroad who,on the advice of the home office,looked after sales and procurements.

Commercial correspondence,unnecessary when one businessperson oversaw everything and made direct bargains with buyers and sellers,multiplied.Regular courier service among commercial cities began.Commercial accounting became more complex when firms had to deal with shareholders,manufacturers,customers,branch offices,employees,and competing firms.Tolls on roads became high enough to finance what has been called a road revolution,involving new surfaces and bridges,new passes through the Alps,and new inns and hospices for travelers.The growth of mutual trust among merchants facilitated the growth of sales on credit and led to new developments in finance,such as the bill of exchange,a device that made the long,slow,and very dangerous shipment of coins unnecessary.

The ventures of the German Hanseatic League illustrate these advancements.The Hanseatic League was a mercantile association of European towns dating from 1159.The league grew by the end of the fourteenth century to include about 200 cities from Holland to Poland.Across regular,well-defined trade routes along the Baltic and North seas,the ships of league cities carried furs,wax,copper,fish,grain,timber,and wine.These goods were exchanged for finished products,mainly cloth and salt,from western cities.At cities such as Bruges and London,Hanseatic merchants secured special trading concessions,exempting them from all tolls and allowing them to trade at local fairs.Hanseatic merchants established foreign trading centers,the most famous of which was the London Steelyard,a walled community with warehouses,offices,a church,and residential quarters for company representatives.By the late thirteenth century,Hanseatic merchants had developed an important business technique,the business register.Merchants publicly recorded their debts and contracts and received a league guarantee for them.This device proved a decisive factor in the later development of credit and commerce in northern Europe.

These developments added up to what one modern scholar has called“a commercial revolution.”In the long run,the commercial revolution of the High Middle Ages(A.D.1000–1300)brought about radical change in European society.One remarkable aspect of this change was that the commercial classes constituted a small part of the total population—never more than 10 percent.They exercised an influence far in excess of their numbers.The commercial revolution created a great deal of new wealth,which meant a higher standard of living.The existence of wealth did not escape the attention of kings and other rulers.Wealth could be taxed,and through taxation,kings could create strong and centralized states.In the years to come,alliances with the middle classes were to enable kings to weaken aristocratic interests and build the states that came to be called modern.

The commercial revolution also provided the opportunity for thousands of agricultural workers to improve their social position.The slow but steady transformation of European society from almost completely rural and isolated to relatively more urban constituted the greatest effect of the commercial revolution that began in the eleventh century.Even so,merchants and business people did not run medieval communities,except in central and northern Italy and in the county of Flanders.Most towns remained small.The nobility and churchmen determined the predominant social attitudes,values,and patterns of thought and behavior.The commercial changes of the eleventh through fourteenth centuries did,however,lay the economic foundation for the development of urban life and culture.

Question 7 of 14

The word“decisive”in the passage is closest in meaning to

A.probable

B.determining

C.helpful

D.limiting

正确答案：B

题目详解

题型分类：词汇题

选项分析：

该单词所在的句子是：This device proved a decisive factor in the later development of credit and commerce in northern Europe，decisive作为形容词来修饰宾语factor，decisive是动词decide的形容词形式，意思是“决定性的，坚定的”。那么整句话的意思是“这一机制在北欧的信贷和商业发展中起了决定性作用。”

B选项：determing决定性的，是动词determine（决定）的形容词形式，和decisive意思相同，为正确答案。

A选项：probable可能的，可信的。

C选项：helpful有帮助的。

D选项：limiting限制的，局限的。

Question 8 of 14

Why does the author provide the information in paragraph 4 that the commercial classes never exceeded 10 percent of the population?

A.To argue that the wealth created by the commercial revolution benefited only a small number of people

B.To challenge the view that the commercial classes made up a majority of the population of Europe

C.To suggest a reason that the commercial revolution ended around A.D.1300

D.To emphasize the point that the commercial revolution was brought about by a small part of the population

正确答案：D

题目详解

题型分类：修辞目的题

题干分析：题干中的信息来自于文中的句子One remarkable aspect of this change was that the commercial classes constituted a small part of the total population—never more than 10 percent句子后半句破折号后的10 percent是对前半句化的进一步解释。因此本次考察的是句子中间的关系，因为主要看前半句话所表达的含义，“其中一个明显的变化是商人的数量只占人口数量的很小一部分——不超过10%”，那么，修饰目的即为商人的人口数量占比少，或很小。

选项分析：

D选项表述和原文所要强调修饰的目的完全一致，答案正确。

A选项当中所说的有商业革命commercial revolution所带来的财富只惠及一小部分人，并不是修辞所要表达的观点，因此错误。

B选项中的表述和原文相反，原文中并没有说商业人口在欧洲的人口占比很大，错误。

C选项表明了商业革命灭亡的时间原因，错误。

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