Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or

Question

Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, it remained common until the end of the century, when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation. 
 
A. Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, it remained common until the end of the century, when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.
 
B. Although it remained common until the end of the century, when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation, coin clipping is a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion and was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662.
 
C. Remaining common until the end of the century before all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation, coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662.
 
D. A practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, coin clipping, even though remaining common until the end of the century before all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation, but was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662.
 
E. Although coin clipping is a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, it was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, and remained common until the end of the century before all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.

Source - ready4gmat App

aanjumz92 · Answer

IMO option A is correct as is. Correct form of "although X...Y" . It's also correctly formatted in it's structure. Although X...was made more difficult...it remained common. Take out all the modifiers and you have a perfect sentence.

B is wrong: coin clipping is a practice....would. Change in tense is not required. 
C is wrong: I feel this option alters the intended meaning of the original sentence
D is wrong: Incorrect placement of "verb-ing" and "but was"
E is wrong: Ambiguous "it". Incorrect movement from present tense "is" to conditional "would be"

Abhishek009 · Answer

IMHO (A) as well -

Although coin clipping,  a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion,  was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, it remained common until the end of the century,  when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.

RamSep · Answer

Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, it remained common until the end of the century, when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.

First impression:   Long as hell! Let's go through it, trying to skip modifiers and to make the whole sentence easy to understand. This is what one (even me, myself) should do when faces to such a creepy sentence: get rid of modifiers and look to the heart of the sentence.

Meaning:    Although coin clipping  , a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion,   was made more difficult  in England  by the introduction of     coin milling machines in 1662 ,  it remained common until the end of the century  , when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.

Now it's better (at least we can understand the meaning). And I can see no problem in the heart of the sentence:
- Although is followed by a clause
- Verb tenses are alright (One may claim that we have two events in the past and we would better to use past perfect for the first event; Well the structure as is (using two simple past) is clear enough to understand the meaning. buy the way I would agree with a past perfect either)
- SV agreements are perfect
- Pronoun "it" at the beginning of the second clause perfectly refers to the subject of the first clause without any ambiguity

So, this parts are OK. Now we can look for any error in two big modifiers: 
- " a practice   in which ... " perfectly modifies the subject "coin clipping" using a  noun + noun modifier . Moreover, there is no other error in this modifier (tense, agreements and idioms are all OK)
- "when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation" neatly modifies "the end of the century" and also there is no other errors.

Well done. Let's jump into answer choices.

A. Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, it remained common until the end of the century, when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.   No error found, Keep it.  
 
B. Although it remained common until the end of the century, when all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation, coin clipping  is  a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold  would  be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion and  was  made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662.   Tenses don't make sens at all. Eliminate.  
 
C. Remaining common until the end of the century before all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation, coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662.   Although this choice is grammatically correct, the intended meaning is slightly different from the original sentence: there isn't a comparison/contrast between "coin clipping remaining common" and "coin clipping becoming difficult". Eliminate.   
 
D. A practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, coin clipping,  even though  remaining common until the end of the century before all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation,  but  was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662.   Using "eventhough" and "but" together is redundant. Also after ",but" a subject is needed. So, Eliminate.  
 
E. Although coin clipping is a practice in which small amounts of silver or gold would be chipped from a coin to be sold as bullion, it was made more difficult in England by the introduction of coin milling machines in 1662, and remained common until the end of the century before all the old unmilled coins were removed from circulation.   Again, as in choice C, in this choice intended comparison/contrast is missed. Eliminate.

So, the winner is A.

aragonn · Answer

Official Explanation: 
This sentence is long, but we can take it step by step. When we read through it the first time, it sounds good; if we want to go back over it before moving on to our answer choices, a good way to do that would be to look at the first clause beginning with "although," then the second independent clause (“it remained..."). They both look fine.
Glancing over our other answer choices, (B), (C), and (D) are harder to understand because the main subject of the sentence (coin clipping) doesn't appear at the beginning.
To choose between (A) and (E), we need to look a little more closely at the meaning of the sentence. In (A), the word "although” introduces a contrast between the difficulty of coin clipping and the fact that it continued, which makes sense. Choice (E) changes the wording of the sentence around so that it sounds like the contrast implied by “although” is between the definition of coin clipping and the fact that it became more difficult, which doesn't make sense.
The correct answer is Choice (A).

Shobhit7 · Answer

A: Correct
B: Wrong contrast: 'Remained Common' contrasted with 'Practice'.
C: Modifier error - Meaning Change: Centuries before all coins removed from circulation. 
D: Main Clause is a Fragment: Verb missing for subject 'Coin Flipping'.
E: Wrong contrast: 'A Practice' contrasted with 'made more difficult'.

Raj30 · Answer

option c changes meaning as follows...
Required meaning: difficult still common
Reflected meaning: common but made difficult
Am I right, please help?

Nimabinia · Answer

I used the meaning approach, sort of a quicker way to deal with long questions like this. 
Although clause 1, clause 2. 
Clause 1 and 2 must show the surprise, opposing to each other. 
B, D and E all have this problem. Basically, all three options start with description of coin clipping is and are followed by coin clipping remains common. These two ideas are not related, and the use of although won't be appropriate. 
The main problem of C is the time reference. The end of the century was before 1662, chronologically, it is not sensible.

Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or

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Although coin clipping, a practice in which small amounts of silver or

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