The earliest surviving Greek inscriptions written in an alphabet date

Question

The earliest surviving Greek inscriptions written in an alphabet date from the eighth century B.C. Some of these inscriptions are written from right to left, others from left to right. The alphabet they employ clearly derives from Phoenician writing, but by the eighth century B.C., Phoenician was consistently written from right to left and had been for about two centuries. Therefore, the Greeks must have adopted alphabetic writing no later than the tenth century B.C.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

A. Greek inscriptions from the eighth century B.C. that are written from right to left were not translations of Phoenician inscriptions.

B. In Greece, the adoption of an alphabetic writing system supplanted a writing system in which Greek was written from right to left.

C. When the Greeks adopted alphabetic writing, they also adopted the Phoenician practices of the time with respect to the direction in which texts were written.

D. After adopting alphabetic writing, the Greeks had no exposure to Phoenician inscriptions for at least two centuries.

E. Apart from Greek, all languages whose alphabets derived from Phoenician writing were consistently written from right to left.

ModelMist · Answer

This is my take on the answer

A. They did not mention translation in the passage
B. It did not supplant right to left writing since the passage assumes that Greek adopted the phoenician alphabet, which is right to left writing.
C. The passage makes a connection that Greek had both Right to left and Left to right. Greek also has similar alphabets with phoenician which makes sense that they adopted the same writing style. Since Phoenician was written from right to left for 2 centuries before the inscriptions were found, then it makes sense that initially Greek also adopted the writing style, which is why there are right to left in greek.
D. There is no mention of no exposure in the passage
E. This would help but not an assumption that the argument depends on

MartyMurray · Answer

The key to getting this one correct is seeing the the argument jumps from fairly solid evidence involving deriving an alphabet to speculation about writing direction and a final conclusion about the time the alphabet was adopted. So, the author has assumed that the Greeks adopted the writing direction from the Phoenicians as well.

guddo · Answer

The earliest surviving Greek inscriptions written in an alphabet date from the eighth century B.C. Some of these inscriptions are written from right to left, others from left to right. The alphabet they employ clearly derives from Phoenician writing, but by the eighth century B.C., Phoenician was consistently written from right to left and had been for about two centuries. Therefore, the Greeks must have adopted alphabetic writing no later than the tenth century B.C.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

The argument says Greek writing in the eighth century B.C. went in both directions, while Phoenician writing by then had long been only right to left. So the argument concludes that the Greeks must have adopted alphabetic writing earlier, before Phoenician became fixed in one direction.  The missing assumption  is that when the Greeks adopted the alphabet, they also adopted the Phoenician writing-direction practice of that time.

A. Greek inscriptions from the eighth century B.C. that are written from right to left were not translations of Phoenician inscriptions.

This is not required. The argument is about when Greeks adopted alphabetic writing, not whether some Greek inscriptions translated Phoenician texts.

B. In Greece, the adoption of an alphabetic writing system supplanted a writing system in which Greek was written from right to left.

This is irrelevant. The argument does not depend on what writing system, if any, Greek had before alphabetic writing.

C. When the Greeks adopted alphabetic writing, they also adopted the Phoenician practices of the time with respect to the direction in which texts were written.

This is correct. If the Greeks adopted the Phoenician direction practices of the time, then the mixed Greek directions suggest adoption before Phoenician became consistently right to left. Without this assumption, the Greek direction patterns would not help date the adoption.

D. After adopting alphabetic writing, the Greeks had no exposure to Phoenician inscriptions for at least two centuries.

This is not required. Later exposure to Phoenician inscriptions does not undermine the key point about what happened when the Greeks first adopted the alphabet.

E. Apart from Greek, all languages whose alphabets derived from Phoenician writing were consistently written from right to left.

This is too broad. The argument does not need evidence about all other Phoenician-derived alphabets.

Answer: (C)

The earliest surviving Greek inscriptions written in an alphabet date

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The earliest surviving Greek inscriptions written in an alphabet date

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