Hundreds of clay tablets marked in cuneiform have been found in excava

Hundreds of clay tablets marked in cuneiform
have been found in excavations of the Sumerian city
of Uruk (in present-day Iraq). Though the tablets date
from roughly 3000 B.C., the writing on them uses
(5) relatively few pictographs; instead, numerous abstract
symbols are used. The sign for “sheep,” for example,
is not an image of a sheep, but rather a circled cross,
while the sign for “metal” is a crescent with five lines.
Because of its early date, this seemingly sudden
(10) appearance of such abstract writing has long puzzled
researchers. At the same time, among prepottery clay
artifacts found at archaeological sites along the Jordan
and nearby rivers are thousands of small. hand-
modeled tokens of fired clay, some dating to before
(15) 4000 B.C. Often ignored by archacologists— some
concluded without evidence that they were amulets
of game pieces—the tokens are identified by Denise
Schmandt-Besscrat in her book Before Writing (1992)
as overlooked predecessors to the written word.

(20) The earliest of the tokens were simple in form—
small cones, spheres, and pyramids—and they were
often inscribed. In 1966, a hollow tablet containing
several of these tokens was discovered, and more than
100 additional tablets, which are now recognized as
(25) sealed envelopes of clay, have since been found. Later
envelopes are also inscribed with impressions of
tokens in the outer clay, signaling exactly what each
envelope contained. Noting that these inscriptions are
clearly traceable to later, known inscriptions of farm
(30) products, Schmandt-Besserat theorizes that the
envelopes contained official records of villagers"
contributions to temple-based grain and livestock
pools. After 4000 B.C., hundreds of new token forms
developed, as a rise in industry boosted the token
(35) system. Many forms are figurative, such as bowls or
jars with handles, suggesting that villagers’ crafts
were becoming more diversified and sophisticated.

The token system, essentially a system of three-
dimensional nouns, was replaced in about 3100 BC.
(40) by a system of marks on clay tablets. A few centuries
later, this latter system was to display the first use of
numerals, where simple marks coded the concepts of
one, two, and so forth. The eventual evolution of this
system into mature writing, Schmandt-Besscrat
(45) suggests, can be seen in the following example:
At first il took two ovoid tokens to record two jars of
oil. A litte later, it took two markings on a clay tablet
to achieve this -one mark, using the outline of the old
token, to record the customary unit measure for oil,
(50) the jarful, and a second mark to convey the numeral:
two oil jars. Eventually, it took three signs on the
tablet, one for the numera! 2, one for the standard
jarful, and a new symbol that denoted oil itself. With
three such signs, an abstract and flexible written form
(55) had arrived.

1. Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?

(A) Based on her analysis of inscription-bearing clay envelopes containing tokens dating to roughly 4000 B.C.. Schmandt-Besserat concludes that this system of tokens eventually evolved into an abstract written language.
(B) The discovery of clay tablets bearing inscriptions representing the tokens they contain confirms the belief of Schmandt-Besserat that these tokens served to designate the products given by villagers to their temples.
(C) Inscription-bearing clay envelopes containing tokens discovered in modem Iraq have provided Schmandt-Besserat with the evidence required to resolve the puzzlement of archaeologists over the sudden appearance of sophisticated crafts.
(D) The inscriptions found on clay envelopes containing small clay tokens have enabled Schmandt-Besserat to formulate a more detailed picture of the way in which a simple system of three-dimensional nouns evolved into modem languages.
(E) The discovery of inscription-bearing clay envelopes containing small tokens confirms Schmandt-Besscrat's hypothesis that a language becomes increasingly abstract as the arts and crafts of the people who use the language become more abstract.

2. With which one of the following statements about the society in which the clay tokens were used would Schmandt-Besserat be most likely to agree?

(A) Society members' trade and other economic activities were managed by a strong centralized governmental authority.
(B) Religious rituals were probably less important to the society's members than agriculture and trade were.
(C) Society members regarded whatever was produced by any individual as the common property of all.
(D) The society eventually came to regard the clay tokens as redundant.
(E) Without a readily available supply of raw clay, the society could not have developed a system of representation that used tokens.

3. The passage states that the writing on clay tablets found in Uruk

(A) was not deciphered by archaeologists until 1992
(B) used relatively few pictographic symbols
(C) eventually evolved into a more abstract and flexible linguistic system
(D) transcribed a language that was commonly spoken along the Jordan and nearby rivers
(E) transcribed a language that was much older than archaeologists would have expected

4. According to the passage, the token system

(A) was eventually abandoned because it was not capable of representing quantity and other abstractions
(B) came to designate a broad range of objects as the crafts of the people who used it became more diverse and sophisticated
(C) could be understood only because some tokens were inscribed with symbols known to represent agricultural products
(D) was originally thought by most archaeologists to have had a primarily religious function
(E) became physically unwieldy and cumbersome as its users' agricultural products became more diverse

5. By characterizing certain cuneiform inscriptions on the clay tablets found in Uruk as "abstract" (line 10) the author most likely means that

(A) the meaning of the inscriptions is obscure and hard for linguists to decipher
(B) the inscriptions are meant to represent intangible concepts
(C) the inscriptions do not resemble what they designate
(D) the inscriptions refer to general categories rather than specific things
(E) the terms represented by the inscriptions were more ceremonial in nature than most daily speech was

6. It can be inferred from the discussion of clay tokens in the second paragraph that

(A) there were many tokens that designated more than one type of item
(B) nonagricultural goods and products came to be preferred as contributions to temple-based pools
(C) some later tokens were less abstract than some earlier ones
(D) the storage and transportation of liquids were among the most important tasks performed by the token system's users
(E) the token system was as abstract and flexible as later written languages

7. With which one of the following statements regarding the sign for "sheep" (line 6) would the author of the passage be most likely to agree?

(A) It could have been replaced without loss of significance by any other sign that was not already being used for something else.
(B) The sign gets its meaning in a radically different way from the way in which the cuneiform sign for "metal" gets its meaning.
(C) The way in which it represents its meaning resulted from the fact that sheep are an agricultural commodity rather than a product of human industry.
(D) The way in which it represents its meaning was not the subject of scientific scrutiny prior to that given it by Schmandt-Besserat.
(E) The abstract nature of the sign reveals a great deal about the political life of the people who used the language expressed by cuneiform writing.

8. Which one of the following, if true, would most call into question Sclunandt-Besserat's theory mentioned in lines 28-33?

(A) The more than 100 clay envelopes discovered at archaeological sites along the Jordan come in many different dimensions. thicknesses, and styles of composition.
(B) It was customary for villagers who performed services for another person to receive in return a record of a promise of agricultural products or crafted objects as compensation.
(C) The tablets marked in cuneiform dating after 3000 B.C. do not seem to function as records of villagers' contributions to a temple-based pool of goods.
(D) There is no archaeological evidence suggesting that the tokens in use from about 4000 B.C. to 3100 B.C. were necessarily meant to be placed in clay envelopes.
(E) Villagers were required not only to contribute goods to central pools but also to contribute labor, which was regularly accounted for.