[originaltext] More people are trying to learn English than any other langua

游客2023-09-04  28

问题  
More people are trying to learn English than any other language in the world. Where did the English language come from? Why has it become so popular? To answer these questions we must travel back in time about 5,000 years to an area north of the Black Sea in southeastern Europe.
    Experts say the people in that area spoke a language called Proto-Indo-European. That language is no longer spoken. Researchers do not really know what it sounded like.
    (26) Yet,Proto-Indo-European is believed to be the ancestor of most European languages. These include the languages that became ancient Greek,ancient German and the ancient Latin.
    Latin disappeared as a spoken language. Yet it left behind three great languages that became modern Spanish, French and Italian. (27) Ancient German became Dutch, Danish, German, Norwegian, Swedish and one of the languages that developed into English.
    The English language is a result of the invasions of the island of Britain over many hundreds of years. The first invasions were by a people called Angles about 1,500 years ago. The Angles were a German tribe who crossed the English Channel. Later two more groups crossed to Britain. They were the Saxons and the Jutes.
    (28) These groups found a people called the Celts, who had lived in Britain for many thousands of years. The Celts and the invaders fought.
    After a while, most of the Celts were killed, or made slaves. Some escaped to live in the area that became Wales. Through the years,the Saxons,Angles and Jutes mixed their different languages. The result is what is called Anglo-Saxon or Old English.
26. What do we learn about Proto-Indo-European from the passage?
27. From which language does English develop?
28. What do we learn from the passage?

选项 A、It is proved to sound like the language spoken by Indians.
B、It still exists as a spoken language in the north of Europe.
C、It was once spoken by people living at the southeast of the Black Sea.
D、It is believed to be the ancestor of most European languages.

答案 D

解析 文中提到,5,000年以前,在欧洲东南部的黑海北部地区,住着说Proto—Indo—European语言的人。Proto-Indo-European是很多欧洲语言的祖先,包括ancient Greek,ancient German和ancient Latin。但是这种语言已不存在,研究者不知道它说起来是什么样的。故答案为D)。
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