問題詳情

請依下文回答第46題至第50題      During the course of a year, the path of the Sun among the stars—the ecliptic—passes through 12 ancientconstellations. Because all but one of these 12 constellations represent living things, human or animal, the Greekscalled them the “circle of Animals”—in ancient Greek, kyklos zodiakos, now shortened to zodiac. The one starpattern in the zodiac that doesn’t represent an animal is Libra, the Scales. However, the Greeks considered the starsof Libra to be both a Scales and the Claws of the Scorpion, which follows Libra in the zodiac, so it’s appropriate toinclude it in the circle as well.      The Greeks inherited the 12 constellations of the zodiac, as well as the concept of the zodiac as a singularobject, from the Babylonians. (Ancient Babylonia occupied south-central Mesopotamia on the floodplain betweenthe Tigris and Euphrates Rivers; today, it corresponds to southern Iraq.) The concept of the zodiac was closelyrelated to horoscope astrology—the system of predicting a person’s character and future from where the Sun andplanets were in the zodiac at the time of their birth—a practice which also came to Greece from Babylonia, thoughit was a very late development in Mesopotamia. In fact the earliest known horoscope from Babylonia dates only to 410 BC. But by that time Babylonia had been under the rule of Persian kings for over a century. The ancient Persianswere Sun-worshippers, whereas traditionally the Babylonians had used a lunar rather than a solar calendar. Thus,though it was indeed the Babylonians who conceived of the 12 ancient constellations in the path of the Sun as aunit, which the Greeks then called the zodiac, they did so only as late as the 5th century BC under the influence ofPersian Sun-worship.     Horoscope astrology as we think of it today developed even later: It didn’t attain its final form and greatpopularity until the 3rd century AD, when the social and political dislocations of the decaying Roman Empire madethe powerless multitudes vulnerable to any superstition that promised knowledge about the insecure future and someillusion of control over it.
【題組】46 What is the passage mainly about?
(A)Why the 12 constellations are called the zodiac
(B)How the concept of the zodiac develops historically
(C)Why the zodiac is related to horoscope astrology
(D)How horoscope astrology influences different peoples

參考答案

答案:B
難度:計算中-1
書單:沒有書單,新增

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【評論內容】The passage is mainl☆ ☆☆☆☆☆ ☆☆☆...

【用戶】墨夜熠樓

【年級】大四上

【評論內容】在一年的時間裡,太陽在恆星間的路徑——黃道——經過 12 個古老的星座。因為除了這 12 個星座中的一個之外,其他所有星座都代表生物,無論是人類還是動物,希臘人稱它們為“動物圈”——在古希臘語中,kyklos zodiakos,現在縮寫為 zodiac。黃道帶中唯一不代表動物的星型是天秤座,即天秤座。然而,希臘人認為天秤座的星星既是天秤座,又是天蠍座的爪子,在十二生肖中跟隨天秤座,因此將其包括在圓圈中也是合適的。     希臘人從巴比倫人那裡繼承了 12 個星座,以及黃道帶作為單一對象的概念。 (古巴比倫佔據了美索不達米亞中南部底格里斯河和幼發拉底河之間的氾濫平原;今天,它對應於伊拉克南部。)黃道帶的概念與占星術密切相關——占星...