Mechmeera wrote:
There are two actions here
1. great debate among Greek historians whether the city of Troy ever existed or it was a figment of fiction for some time
2. noted archaeologist Schliemann discovered in Turkey a site that many believe to be the ancient city of Troy,
a discovery that validated its historical importance along with its literary eminence hitherto
Great debate happened before and until the discovery.
so past perfect tense is needed here.Given sentence uses simple past tense and therefore is an incorrect choice.
A, and C contain the same error.Options also contain whether X or Y, where X and Y are parallel.
Whether the city of Troy ever existed or was a figment of fiction,
or
Whether the city of Troy ever existed or it was a figment of fiction
C. was great debate among Greek historians whether the city of Troy ever existed or it was a figment of fiction, until the noted archaeologist Schliemann discovered in Turkey a site that many believe to be the ancient city of Troy, a discovery that had validated
past perfect tense is used wrongly to depict that discovery is the earlier one of the two past events. E. had been great debate among Greek historians whether the city of Troy ever existed or it was a figment of fiction, until the noted archaeologist Schliemann discovered in Turkey a site that many believe to be the ancient city of Troy, a discovery that validates
present tense verb validates gives a wrong meaning as the action took place in the past.left with B and D.B. had been great debate among Greek historians whether the city of Troy ever existed or was a figment of fiction, until the noted archaeologist Schliemann discovered in Turkey a site that many believe to be the ancient city of Troy, a discovery that validated .
D. had been great debate among Greek historians whether the city of Troy had ever existed or had been a figment of fiction, until the noted archaeologist Schliemann discovered in Turkey a site that many believe to be the ancient city of Troy, a discovery that has validated
I chose B over D.
Can someone explain how can we use
- present perfect tense has validated for discovery and
- past perfect tense for whether x or y idiom.
Even though initially even I picked option B over D
But if checking the sequence of events
D makes more sense
Event1: great debate
Event 2:whether the city of Troy ever existed
Event 3: it was a figment of fiction
Event 4:until the noted archaeologist Schliemann discovered in Turkey a site
IMO event 4 happened after Event 1,2,3 so usage of had is justified
further effects of this discovery are still present so has is used.
Experts please pitch in , If there is some flaw in my reasoning