Sviatovin is a medieval Moringian text whose author and exact date of

(A) the life of Prince Sviatov is not the subject of any other medieval Moringian texts - Out of scope - Incorrect
(B) the author of Sviatovin intended it to provide as accurate a report about Prince Sviatov's exploits as possible - Giving accurate report of Sviatov would not help predict when the text was written - Incorrect
(C) the diagram accurately represents the composition of Sviatov's family at the time Sviatovin was written - Sviatov's fater died in 1167 and composition of family if assumed true would help pin point the year when the text was written - Correct
(D) Sviatovin is the earliest Moringian text whose composition can be dated to within a few years - Gives a vague idea - Incorrect
(E) Sviatovin was not written by Sviatov's father himself - Gives a generalised theory about the author of the text. - Irrelevant - Incorrect

(However events) in the diagram of Sviatov's family that accompanies the text his father, who died in 1167, is identified as still living.

Can someone mark the subjects and verbs and tell me the meaning...seems really odd structure

The structure is similar to this:

In the event of a fire, the fire alarm, which is located in the main hall, will go off.
In the diagram of Sviatov's family that accompanies the text, his father, who died in 1167, is identified as still living

Subject - the fire alarm/his father

I got confused with the wording "accurately represents the family composition" and rejected C.
IMO, family composition is the members of the family, that means if the diagram says that Prince Sviatov's father had 3 brothers but actually there were 5!! In this condition the diagram is wrong i.e. is is not the accurate representation of the composition of the family. Need more clarification for the OA!!

In arriving at the conclusion (Sviatovin was written between 1165 and 1167), we have assumed that the picture is accurate. The picture shows his father alive so we say that his father must have been alive when Sviatovin was written. We have assumed that the picture was showing the truth. In case we are told that the picture is not accurate, then can we arrive at the conclusion that Sviatovin must have been written between 1165 and 1167. No. Then all we can say is that it was written after 1165 - but when exactly, we wouldn't know.
So we have assumed the accuracy of the picture - that the painter wouldn't have lied by painting the father alive even though he wasn't. It doesn't matter whether the painter included everyone because it is hard to say who is part of the family and who isn't - the exact composition of a family is very subjective - nuclear family or joint family or extended etc. Accurate depiction only means that whoever is shown alive at that time was actually alive.

" Somehow i'm still thinking about the answer choice "B". If author is intended to provide a accurate report then conclusion holds OK. If we negate it, then it means that text as well as drawing is not accurate so can not conclude predict the time of text.

Pleas help!

The argument gives us clearly "the events in the life of Prince Sviatov that the text describes occurred in 1165"

So the events that the text describes happened in 1165 so the text couldn't have been written before 1165. Whether the exploits described are perfectly accurate, doesn't matter. We know that the exploits described did take place and that they took place in 1165.
If the exploits described are not exact, still the picture could be accurate.

An assumption is necessary for the conclusion. Is it necessary that there should be NO OTHER text on Price Sviatov? Even if there is, isn't it possible that Sviatovin was actually written between 1165and 1167? Even if the text plagiarised other texts, it could still have been written between 1165 and 1167, right? Then (A) cannot be the assumption. If we negate (A), the conclusion can still hold.

Sviatovin is a medieval Moringian text whose author and exact date of composition are unknown. However, the events in the life of Prince Sviatov that the text describes occurred in 1165, and in the diagram of Sviatov's family that accompanies the text his father, who died in 1167, is identified as still living. Thus Sviatovin must have been written between 1165 and 1167, assuming that _____________ .

(A) the life of Prince Sviatov is not the subject of any other medieval Moringian texts

(B) the author of Sviatovin intended it to provide as accurate a report about Prince Sviatov's exploits as possible

(C) the diagram accurately represents the composition of Sviatov's family at the time Sviatovin was written

(D) Sviatovin is the earliest Moringian text whose composition can be dated to within a few years

(E) Sviatovin was not written by Sviatov's father himself

Others beside B and C, are vague or out of scope.

We're left with two choices- B and C.

In Critical reasoning, my main rule, one that I would live and die by, is to stick to the keywords in the stimulus. If anything appears within the answer choice that seems a bit farther from the keyword in the stimulus e.g. (for this question, keyword we're looking for is 'events' in the stimulus, but translated to 'exploits' in answer choice 'B'. That JUMP from 'event' to 'exploit' is too big to digest and should be a cause for concern straight away - unless there is NO BETTER choice at all - which I doubt would be the case. Live by this rule, and you'l start seeing patterns everywhere. 'keywords' is the key!!

All the best.

OG2017, CR583, P522

Medieval Text
 
Step 1: Identify the Question

The fact that the question stem appears before the argument indicates broadly that this is a fill-in-the-blank argument. These arguments can fall into any of the regular categories of arguments. Examine the end of the argument to determine which type this one is.

The language assuming that at the end of the argument indicates that this is a Find the Assumption question.

Step 2: Deconstruct the Argument

S is an old text. Nobody knows who wrote it or exactly when it was written. It does describe events that occurred in 1165. It also describes the father as still alive, and this father died in 1167. Therefore, the author concludes, the text must have been written between these two dates, 1165 and 1167—assuming that what is true?

Step 3: Pause and State the Goal

On Assumption questions, the correct answer will contain information that the author must believe to be true in order to draw his or her conclusion. What must this author believe to be true in order to claim that the text was written between 1165 and 1167?

Step 4: Work from Wrong to Right

(A) Whether any other texts were written about Prince S does not impact when this particular text may have been written.
(B) The accuracy of the exploits in the text does not indicate when this text was written.
(C) CORRECT. The author does assume that the diagram indicating that the father was still alive is accurate. If this diagram was not accurate, then the father may have been dead, indicating that the text may have been written after 1167.
(D) Whether there are other texts that can be accurately dated does not indicate when this text may have been written.
(E) The author does not need to assume anything about who wrote the text in order to draw the given conclusion.

Please someone help me with this Question. I am stillnot convinced with C. According to me B is a better assumption. I did not get how is C the ans!...GMATPrepNow Brent please guide. GMATNinja

Hi startjumprun ,

Notice that the conclusion is saying the text was written between 1165 and 1167.

This is based on the premises that It depicts information about 1165 events and it shows that the father was alive at that time.

Now, the information it is showing may be incorrect, right? So, what I mean is let's say the person it is showing as a father is not actually his father. He could be someone else who dies many many years later and thus, it weakens the conclusion that this text was written between 1165 and 1167.

So, Assuming that it represents family structure accurately prevents our conclusion from getting broken down. This is what option C is doing.

Let me talk about option B. It is saying author provided accurate report about his exploits. Even if it is accurate. These exploits have no relation to when the book was written because the main reason we said it was before 1167 was that his father died that year. But exploits won't tell us when the father died. Hence, this option is 100% incorrect.

We need to find out something that proves the relation between the death of the father and the time when the text was written. That would be our assumption.

GMATNinja gmat1393 GMATNinjaTwo nightblade354 iamsiddharthkapoor
GMATNinjaTwo

Hi Experts -- i thought negating A broke the argument

Negated A : the life of Prince Sviatov IS the subject of other medieval Moringian texts

If the life of Prince is the subject of other books, then there is a very realistic possibility that these others books talk about events about Prince Svaitovin's life, perhaps even earlier than 1965. (example : other books may talk about events in Price Sviatov's life in 1960 for example)

If there are events that happened earlier than 1965 in other books talking about Sviaton -- the entire argument breaks does it not ?

We’re only talking about Sviatovin in this argument. Any other text is irrelevant. Read the premise-conclusion relationship and it is exclusively about the items in the book. It is inconsequential whether other texts were written about him.

Posted from my mobile device

Hi -- thank you for responding

I am struggling to understand why other books don't count

I understand that we are talking about Sviatovin only but I think other books do count for the following reason

The arguement is essentially saying because of x and y , Sviatovin was written between 1965 - 1967

If there are other events

Posted from my mobile device

However, the events in the life of Prince Sviatov that the text describes occurred in 1165, and in the diagram of Sviatov's family that accompanies the text his father, who died in 1167, is identified as still living.

We are only talking about material within the book. The book was written between X and Y, but a photo outside of this date is within the book. This is the issue at hand. We do not care about other texts because our entire focus is on the book and the photo within it.

I'll agree with nightblade354 here!


Yes, IF the other texts contain evidence that the info in Sviatovin is inaccurate, that would definitely be an issue.

But the life of Prince Sviatov could be the subject of 100 other medieval Moringian texts--as long as the info/dates in those other books is consistent with the info/dates in Sviatovin, we don't have a problem.

We don't have to assume that the life of Prince Sviatov is NOT the subject of any other medieval Moringian texts. Sure, we have to assume that there are no other texts that DISCREDIT or DISPROVE the info/dates in Sviatovin. But that's not what (A) says.

I hope this helps!