Bunuel wrote:
Excavation of the house of a third-century Camarnian official revealed that he had served four magistrates—public officials who administer the law—over his thirty-year public career, in four provincial capital cities. However, given the Camarnian administrative system of that era, it is unclear whether he served them simultaneously, as a traveling administrator living for part of the year in each provincial capital, or else did so sequentially, leaving one magistrate after several years to join another.
Which of the following would, if found in the excavation, most likely help reveal the pattern of the official's administrative service?
(A) Maps and documents describing each of the four provincial capitals
(B) A cache of the official's documents related to work from early in his career
(C) A set of cups of a type made only in the city of the first magistrate whom the official is known to have served
(D) Several pieces of furniture in the styles of two of the provincial capital cities
(E) Heavy clothing appropriate only for the coldest of the four cities
CR53341.01
OG2020 NEW QUESTION
Argument Construction
Situation
Evidence from an excavation makes clear that a particular third-century Camarnian official served four magistrates in four provincial capitals over his thirty-year career, but it is unclear whether he served the magistrates simultaneously or sequentially.
Reasoning
What evidence, if it were also found in the excavation, would be most helpful in determining whether the official served the magistrates simultaneously or sequentially? It would be helpful to find documents from throughout the magistrate's career indicating at what times he worked for each magistrate, or even documents from just one period, as long as there were a large number, because this would likely show whether he was working for just one magistrate or for all four.
(A) We already know that the official worked in each of the four capitals. The fact that maps and documents describing the capitals were at his house tells us nothing about whether he worked for magistrates in these capitals simultaneously or not.
(B) Correct. Presumably the work-related documents would show whom he was working for at the time, and for how long—and would provide evidence as to whether he was working for multiple magistrates or for just one.
(C) Merely finding a set of cups made only in one of the cities tells us little. Even if we knew when he acquired the set, he need not have been working for the magistrate of that city at the time he acquired it; perhaps he had simply traveled to that city.
(D) One frequently moves furniture when moving from one city to another, so the fact that the official had pieces of furniture that may have come from different cities does not give us any indication of whether the official worked for all four magistrates simultaneously or not.
(E) The fact that heavy clothing appropriate only for the coldest of the four cities was found in the excavation of the official's house does not imply that other clothing, appropriate for one or more of the other cities, was not found. Consistent with the finding of the heavy clothing, the official may have worked exclusively in the city for which that clothing was appropriate, or worked intermittently in this city.
deepverma wrote:
Hi Karishma,
https://gmatclub.com/forum/excavation-o ... 94368.htmlFor the above question ,Please address my queries:
1)Why E is wrong ; I found it as taking strongest stand for the pattern that Camarnian official stayed only 1 place and mostly managed 4 simulaneously
2) For B : I had doubts , as B talks only about early carrer so how can we r sure that it will give information of 30 years career pattern
3) How to handle questions when all choices looks incorrect or partially correct? Any Technique ?
Thanks a ton!
Brian has already explained the solution in detail above so I will focus on just option (E) (which seems to be throwing you off)
(E) is certainly wrong - Say he works at all 4 places for some part of the year - 3 months each. One would expect him to have heavy clothing suitable to city A (say, coldest).
Say he worked in the four cities one after the other. When he lived in city A, he would have bought the heavy clothing. On his move to another city after years, he could have easily carried the clothes not knowing what the future held for him. Or he could have moved to city A at the end and bought the clothes at that time.
So finding clothes apt for only one city tells us nothing about his service pattern.
If we find clothes apt for all 4 cities, that tells us nothing either. He could have acquired them all in one year or in sequence in one stint after another.
(B) does have the problem of "early" but it is the best option we have. Say, if we know how things were in the first 5 years of his career (whether he was serving multiple magistrates or only one), we can guess what the pattern was for him. Note that the assumption of the question is that there was a pattern and it was not a mix of patterns. The question asks what would help us find the pattern that his career followed (so we know that his career followed one of the two patterns - simultaneous service or one after another). If he first served only one magistrate early on and mid way in his career switched to multiple, then the question makes no sense. The question makes sense only if his career followed only one pattern. So even documents of just early times should reveal the pattern.
Option (B) is correct.
close
26 Apr 2019, 04:25
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wrong 
Analysis.xlsx [9.4 KiB] 
, but someone who works with magistrates may need some place to keep documents/books).
