More than twenty-one centuries ago,

These types of questions are really tricky for me as well. Its can be tough to understand the flow of the sentence.

So far I think either:
(1)
The han dynasty unified China
(a) by subduing warring tribes
(b) by forcing the vast territory to adopt a single code...

or(2)

The han dynasty unified China
(a) by subduing warring tribes
And forced the vast territory to adopt a single code...

I'm leaning toward example (1) which would be answer choice B.
I think for example (2) to be correct "by subduing warring tribes" would have to be in in commas.
But i'm still not 100% sure. Whats the OA?

Hey mailnavin1
Can you please elaborate your answer?

The answer is ................. B

Its simple parallelism Han dynasty is the subject and main verb is unified. "subduing" and "forcing" modifies the clause "Han dynasty unified China". If China would have been the subject then A is correct.

You can compare this SC to following SC - where the subject is "local times"
The growth of the railroads led to the abolition of local times, which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing from city to city, and to the establishment of regional times.

(A) which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing
(B) which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and which differed
(C) which were determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing
(D) determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differed
(E) determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing

Sorry if I changed the thought process by the words "tricky". But I want to be 100% sure on the explanation.

Nice Question nusmavrik... it was simple parallelism but your Subject the answer is tricky, it not simple parallelism ! forced me to give it a second thought..

Thanks once again for the Q..

I narrowed it to A and B but A does not make sense. Hence chose B.

Went for B ...glad that it turned out to be OA

above explanation was perfect ..............but I used logic instead of Grammar .....In A it was trying to explain that China was ruled , subdued and unified ......

But B tells how China was ruled by Hans .............felt that logically B is making sense .....

This is a very typical GMAT question .. in which they put in a modifier between and... thereby confusing between the parallel structure. One must closely look at the meaning intended and hence, A should be the right answer!

Hi there,
More than twenty-one centuries ago, the Han dynasty unified China, subduing warring tribes and forced the vast territory to adopt a single code of laws.

Another very good example of a sentence where meaning plays a crucial role. If we don’t understand the meaning well, most likely we will mark the incorrect answer choice. So let’s begin the meaning analysis.



The sentence says that twenty-one centuries ago, the Han dynasty unified China. So how did they do so? They did so by subduing warring tribes. Then the sentence says that the Han dynasty “forced” the vast territory to adopt a single code of laws. If the Han rulers forced everyone to adopt single code of laws, isn’t that a move towards unifying China? Yes, it is. So the Han dynasty unified China by:
a. subduing warring tribes and
b. forcing the vast territory to adopt a single code of laws.



ERROR ANALYSIS

With this understanding of meaning, it is easy to spot that verb “forced” should be turned into a verb-ing modifier “forcing” to make it parallel to “subduing”. In that case, both the modifiers will present how the Han dynasty unified China.

POE:

(A) subduing warring tribes and forced: Incorrect for the reason discussed above.

(B) subduing warring tribes and forcing: Correct. “forcing” is now parallel to “subduing”.

(C) subdued warring tribes, and forcing: Incorrect. This choice changes verb-ing modifier “subduing” to verb “subdued” which is now parallel to “unified”. “and” is the indicator of a parallel list in the sentence. However, the last entity followed by “and”, “forcing” is not parallel to the other two entities. Also, this is not the intended list.

(D) subdued warring tribes, and it forced: Incorrect. Presence of “it” is incorrect here. If there were no “it”, then all the entities would be parallel. However, this is not the intended list anyway.

(E) having subdued warring tribes, and they forced: Incorrect. Plural pronoun “they” does not agree in number with its singular antecedent “Han dynasty”.

At e-gmat we cover in details how to identify the correct parallel list and how to make the list parallel in the sentence in the concepts names “Parallelism – Identify and Correct” and “Parallelism – Helpful Tips”.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha

+1 for (B)
POE works, other other (B) nothing is suitably parallel.

in the following, oa is E.


The growth of the railroads led to the abolition of local times, //which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing// from city to city, and to the establishment of regional times.

(A) which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing
(B) which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and which differed
(C) which were determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing
(D) determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differed
(E) determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing

Bu I see A is also parallel and correct because

which was :
determined
and
differing.

inhere, "determined" is parallel to " differing" and A is correct

A can be INcorrect becuase the distance between " determined" and "differing" is far and we need to repeat "which was" before "differing" . If this was the case, A is wrong becuase of "style" problem not of parallel problem.

Pls, comment, confirm.

Hi there,

The growth of the railroads led to the abolition of local times, which was determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and differing from city to city, and to the establishment of regional times.

This sentence presents a couple of information about “local times”. They were
a. determined by when the sun reached the observer’s meridian and
b. differing from city to city, and to the establishment of regional times.

In the original sentence, the first information is presented, using “which” clause, but the second information does not start with which. Now, this is certainly a parallelism issue. In the parallel list, all the entities must have same construction as far as possible.

Now, presence of “was” makes “determined” a verb. However, in absence of “which was” before it, “differing” is still a verb-ing modifier. So a “which clause” cannot be parallel to a verb-ing modifier. We certainly have parallelism issue here.

Again, if we assume that “which was” is understood before “differing”, then we have the first information about the “local times” in simple present tense – “was determined” – and second information in past continuous tense – “was differing”. Why should this be the case? Both the information should be written in simple past tense because the sentence is giving general information about “local times”. Hence, we certainly have parallelism issue here.

We cannot say that this error is stylistic because “which was” is far away from “differing”. We saw the possible implications of "which was" in the sentence.

Also notice that “local times” is plural and “was” is singular verb. So we have subject-verb number agreement error as well.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha

This boils down to which is the main clause and which are the dependent? We can't have dependent and main clause parallel :

So which makes more sense :

He unified china

How?

By subduing warring tribes and forcing territory

Or he subded warring tribes and forced... by unifying China?

Clearly B

Explanation on how it unified is shown in portion. So we need two parallel verb+ing format words to fulfill the conditions and show the exact meaning.

Answer must be B

more than 21 centuries ago, the han dynasty unified china, subduing warring tribes and forced the vast territory to adopt a single code of laws.
REASON FOR ANSWER B

Hello RockstarNeha,

We hope this finds you well.

Having gone through the question and your query, we believe that we can help resolve your doubt.

Understanding the intended meaning of the sentence is key to solving this question; the intended meaning is that the Han dynasty unified China, and in doing so took two subordinate actions - subduing warring tribes and forcing the territory to adopt a single code of laws.

Option B conveys this meaning correctly through the "comma + present participle ("verb+ing" - "subduing" and "forcing" in this case)" construction. Further, as a result of using this construction Option B also maintains parallelism between "subduing..." and "forcing...", two elements linked by conjunction, and avoids parallelism between the dominant action "unified China" and the subordinate actions "subduing..." and "forcing...".

To understand the concept of "Comma + Present Participles for Cause-Effect Relationships" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~3 minutes):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team

(A) subduing warring tribes and forced
subduing and forcing aren't parallel therefore out

(B) subduing warring tribes and forcing
The meaning is perfect the subduing and forcing is parallel therefore let us hang on to it

(C) subdued warring tribes, and forcing
Similar reasoning as A

(D) subdued warring tribes, and it forced
it isn't having the right reference therefore out

(E) having subdued warring tribes, and they forced
having is unnecessary , in addition they isn't having the right reference therefore out

Therefore IMO B