The single-family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American peo

Lets look this way:

The single family house constructed by the Yana (...) was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

A) "banked" is parallel with "overlaid" as under
banked with dirt (to a height) of x feet
overlaid with slabs of bark

Hope that makes sense.

B) "as high as" is unnecessary and "that of.." is inapproperiate.
C) "them"?
D) "was" is not paralalled with "overlaid" and is in passive. "as high as" is unnecessary for no comparision.
E) Similar to D. "was" is not paralllel with "overlaid" and is in passive. "as high as" is unnecessary for no comparision. "that of"?

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended core meaning of this sentence is that the single-family house constructed by the Yana was conical, and its framework of poles was overlaid with slabs of bark and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

Concepts tested here: Meaning + Pronouns + Parallelism

• Elements of a sentence should only be parallel is they play the same role in the sentence.
• Any elements linked by a conjunction ("and in this sentence) must be parallel.

A: Correct. This answer choice avoids the pronoun error seen in Options B and E, as it employs no pronouns. Further, Option A correctly maintains parallelism between the adjective phrase "overlaid with slabs of bark" and "banked with dirt..."; thus, Option A correctly modifies "its framework of poles" with the phrases "overlaid with slabs of bark" and "banked with dirt...feet", conveying the intended meaning - that the single-family house's framework of poles was banked with dirt by some person.

B: This answer choice suffers from a pronoun error, as the pronoun "that" has no logical referent.

C: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the clause "its framework of poles...banked them with dirt"; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that the framework of the house banked the slabs with dirt; the intended meaning is that the framework of the house was, itself, banked with dirt by some person. Further, Option C fails to maintain parallelism between the adjective phrase "overlaid with slabs of bark" and the verb phrase "banked them with dirt..."; please remember, any elements linked by a conjunction ("and in this sentence) must be parallel.

D: This answer choice incorrectly maintains parallelism between "was conical in shape" and "was banked with dirt", incorrectly implying that the single-family house constructed by the Yana was banked with dirt; the intended meaning is that the house's framework of poles was banked with dirt; please remember, elements of a sentence should only be parallel is they play the same role in the sentence; here, "conical in shape" is an attribute of the house itself, and "banked with dirt" is an attribute of the house's framework.

E: This answer choice suffers from a pronoun error, as the pronoun "that" has no logical referent. Further, Option E incorrectly maintains parallelism between "was conical in shape" and "was banked with dirt", incorrectly implying that the single-family house constructed by the Yana was banked with dirt; the intended meaning is that the house's framework of poles was banked with dirt; please remember, elements of a sentence should only be parallel is they play the same role in the sentence; here, "conical in shape" is an attribute of the house itself, and "banked with dirt" is an attribute of the house's framework.

Hence, A is the best answer choice.

All the best!
Experts' Global Team

B "as high as that of" is confusing, awkward, and stylistically poor.

§ C "them" is unnecessary and has no clear referent.

§ D "was" is unnecessary, given the construction, and "as high as" is wordy and awkward.

§ E "was" is unnecessary and "as high as that of" is wordy, awkward, and stylistically poor.

ANSWER: A Clear, concise, and without errors.

In 'D' the word 'was' is refuting the parallel construction of the sentence.

Compare the following 2 sentences-

....its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark....and banked with dirt to a height of

OR
....its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark....and was banked with dirt as high as...


The first one looks better!

Other Explanation for A

Never do we say "the bridge was as high as 300ft", or "the building was as high as that of 100ft".

We definitely do say "the bridge was as high as the Sears tower", or "the building was as high as the tower".

Comparisons gives an idea about where one entity stands next to the other. All the rest choices here gives an idea where the entity stands next to its own height!

OA is A

Trick is to realize that banked with dirt applies to the poles and not the house

overlaid with slabs is parallel to banked with dirt.

I made the same mistake with this question

Hi E-GMAT,

My analysis ,

Sentence structure for this sentence would be , The single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

Bold face is a MAIN Sub and Main Verb. My question is "its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet." a noun plus noun modifier?

Thanks

Hi Nitinaka19,
Thank you for the query.

Let’s look at the structure of this sentence:

• The single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape,
o its framework of poles
• overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine,
• and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.


You have correctly identified that “its framework…..four feet” is a noun + noun modifier. In this modifier:
• Noun- its framework of poles
• Noun Modifier- overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

So, the two parallel verb-ed modifiers ‘overlaid’ and ‘banked’ modify the noun in this modifier .



Hope this helps!
Deepak

Hi E-GMAT,

I am able to eliminate option B,C and E. However, Option A and D have confused me. If we consider the parallelism then "overlaid" and "banked" are modifying noun "framework of poles".
The Option A says "banked" in which the doer of the action "banked" is "framework of poles" but the meaning says that doer of the action "banked" should be someone else. So, I believe that the right answer should be option D where "was banked" is stated. Is my thought process correct?

Thanks!

Hi anujag24,
Thank you for the query.

You are making an error in differentiating between the simple past tense verb and the verb-ed modifiers. In the original sentence, ‘overlaid’ and ‘banked’ are not the verbs for the subject ‘framework of poles’. They act as verb-ed modifiers in this sentence.

Let’s take an example to understand the verb-ed modifiers:
• The lamp placed on the table is a gift.

Now, does the lamp to the action of placing? No. The lamp cannot place itself. So, ‘placed’ is not a verb here. The verb for the subject ‘the lamp’ is ‘is’.
What is the function of the phrase ‘placed on the table’? It provides us additional information about the lamp.

So, we can write the above sentence as:
• The lamp (that is) placed on the table is a gift.

Now, the verb-ed form ‘placed’ is known as the verb-ed modifier. Please refer to the following link to know more about verb-ed modifiers:
ed-forms-verbs-or-modifiers-134691.html

Once you have gone through the article, try to apply the concept on the above question. If you face any problems, refer to my explanation below:
• The single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape,
• its framework of poles
o overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine,
o and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

Is ‘its framework of poles’ the doer of the verbs ‘overlaid’ and ‘banked’? No, it is not. A framework can’t perform the actions ‘overlaid’ and ‘banked’. So, these verb-ed forms are actually modifiers.
So, these two modifiers are providing additional information about the noun ‘framework of poles’ that this framework was overlaid with slabs and it was banked with dirt.


Now, if we consider OPTION D:
• The single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape,
• its framework of poles
o overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine,
o and was banked with dirt as high as three to four feet.

Since ‘overlaid’ is a modifier and ‘was banked’ is a verb, these two can’t be parallel to each other. Hence this option is incorrect.

Also, the expression ‘as… as’ is unnecessary in this option. ‘As…. as’ is used to show a comparison between two entities. There is no comparison in this sentence. It just tells us how high the dirt was.


Hope this helps!
Deepak

its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.
Above mentioned part of the sentence is an absolute phrase modifier or noun + noun modifier, which is perfectly used in the end of sentence.

Note: this part can be placed even in the front of the sentence.
Its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet, the single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape,

The single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

A) banked with dirt to a height of -- correct -- banked is -ed modifier to framework.
B) banked with dirt as high as that of -- as that of is not ok.
C) banked them with dirt to a height of -- only plural possible antecedent for them is people.

D) was banked with dirt as high as -- As per original sentence framework is banked with dirt, but in this sentence as verb was is introduced The single family house (subject) appears to be banked with dirt.

E) was banked with dirt as high as that of -- same as D.

what is wrong with D? I feel as high as three to four feet sounds correct. Please give the explanation for OA

Hi Yogita25,
firstly the non underlined portion itself is faulty..
The single-family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now
northern California, .....people is plural and cannot fit here .. it should be person and moreover, native american would not require person also
now why D is wrong..
It is wrong for want of parallelism and also change in meaning as shown below..
its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either
cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.....
overlaid and banked are parallel and describing about the poles..
Hope it helped

Hi

I have a small doubt. If overlaid and banked are to be parallel, then the comma should not be present before "and". Since two verbs of the same subject should not have comma at least in GMAT point of view.

Please correct me if I am wrong. It helps me to get more clarity. Also It would be grateful if you can clear out difference between "As high as" and "to the height of". I couldn't get the difference clearly from previous posts.

Thanks in advance

Hi,
the two doubts you have :-
1) use of comma before 'and'....
comma is used comparing/mentioning a list of three items or more, joining independent clauses, and when the meaning/ construction of sentence requires it..
here this will fall below the third category ' meaning'..
let me rewrite the sentence..
a) its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark and banked with dirt ... this would have been ok, but with introduction of 'either.. or..', there is a requirement of comma to separte out the modifying idiom 'either..' from the parallel structure 'and banked..'

so now it becomes..
b) its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt ...

2)as high as vs to a height of..
as high as is the correct idiom ..
as high as - to show that the work was done till some considerable height. mainly to stress on height
to a height of- this does not lay the required stress on height ... and would fit in if there is a subject or in passive voice..
a) he painted the pole to a height of 6m... may be just correct
b) the pole was painted to a height of 6m...

Hope it helped

The single family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

This question highlights two very important things to succeed in SC.
First is the identification of the "subject" and "object" of the sentence.
Second is the slash and burn technique to remove extra useless information to achieve the barest composition of the sentence.

Lets apply these two criterion here :-
The single family house constructed by the Yana ,a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

The new sentence becomes:- The single family house constructed by the Yana was banked with dirt to a height of 3 to 4 feet.
The subject of the sentence is "HOUSE" and the original sentence is already correct and perfect.
WE DO NOT NEED ANY MODIFICATION IN THE ORIGINAL SENTENCE, THUS A IS THE CORRECT ANSWER

The single-family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

A. banked with dirt to a height of (Correct)
B. banked with dirt as high as that of (Dirt is not as high as that of three to four feet. Rather, it is framework of poles)
C. banked them with dirt to a height of (Usage of them is incorrect because framework is singular)
D. was banked with dirt as high as (Need to be parallel with overlaid)
E. was banked with dirt as high as that of (Same as D)

Kudos please if you like my explanation!

GMATNinja : Why can't a house be banked? I thought that the house had been banked; therefore I ended up selecting "D".
The statement never explicitly states that the house CAN'T be banked.
In my opinion I don't feel that banking of house is awkward either. So why is "D" incorrect.

Please help me with this.
Regards

Hello gmatexam439,


I would be glad to help you resolve the doubt.

A thing that we must bear in mind is that the function of the original sentence is not only to provide one of the five answer choices. The original sentence presents the context. In absence of any other information, we must rely on the context set by the original sentence to understand the intended meaning. This intended meaning must be logical and conveyed in a correct grammatical structure.

Now, nine out ten times, the original sentence presents logical intended meaning. The grammar may be correct or incorrect. Hence, every time we get a logical meaning from the original sentence, we must retain that logic in the correct answer choice too.

On this basis, let's now evaluate the sentence at hand:

The single-family house constructed by the Yana, a Native American people who lived in what is now northern California, was conical in shape, its framework of poles overlaid with slabs of bark, either cedar or pine, and banked with dirt to a height of three to four feet.

Per the original sentence, the framework of poles was overlaid with slabs of bark and was banked with dirt to a certain height. This meaning is absolutely logical. There is no basis we can doubt this meaning. Hence, we will go by this meaning.

Choice D definitely is logical but does not convey the same meaning as does the original sentence. This change in the intended meaning does lead to distortion in meaning. Hence, despite logically correct, this choice is incorrect.


Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha