2010年中國人民大學考博英語真題6

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Passage Five

A line in a song asks, “Does anyone really know what time it is?” This question could easily apply to calendars! Did you know that our ideas about time are affected by religion? Different faiths use different types of calendars to measure time. Odd structures, such as Stonehenge in England, may have been used to measure time long ago. These ancient rocks stand in a circle like large, gray Legos. Some people think that the rocks relate to the position of the sun. No one knows how people moved them into this information, but it was probably a lot of work. If it was a calendar, it sure was a big one! The Aztecs also had a rock calendar that was related to the sun. They had a Sun Stone that showed their sun god in the center.

The calendar you are probably most familiar is also based on the sun. The powerful Roman Emperor, Julius Caesar, first adopted the solar calendar in 46 B. C. The cycle of the year in a solar calendar is measured from one equinox to the next. A solar calendar has to be adjusted every so often to keep in time with the sun. In 1582, Pope Gregory XH first authorized taking a few days out of every year for the purpose of adjusting the calendar. People didn’t like this one bit because they thought they were losing time! It took centuries for Europeans to get used to this concept.

Eventually, a system was worked out to add a single day to the calendar every four years. So it was synchronized with the seasons. The extra day made every fourth year 366 days long. These special years are called leap years, and we called the extra day to the month of February. If you know someone whose birthday is February 29, you know that he or she was bom in a leap year. This calendar is called the Gregorian calendar, and it is used in the United States and other Christian countries. Muslims use a different kind of calendar. Their lunar calendar is based on the cycles of the moon, and it is completely different than a solar one. According to the Muslim holy book, the Koran, Allah said, “Truly, twelve months is the number of the months with God, according to the God’s Book, ever since He created heaven and Earth. ” A new Muslim month does not start until two reliable witnesses

have seen the new moon. Muslim families often take walks in the evening to find the first yellow slice of the new moon to start Ramadan, their month-long fast.

41. According to the author of the article, has influenced our way of measuring the time.

A. the universe B. the Pope C. religion D. nature

42. We know from the article that calendar is based on the cycle of the moon.

A. Gregorian B. solar C. Christian D. lunar

43. From the article we can infer that Ramadan is a Muslim festival, which lasts for .

A. one month B. one week C. four days D. twenty five days

44. The verb “synchronize”（Line 2，Paragraph 4） probably means .

A. to cause to occur four days later B. to cause to happen four days earlier

C. to happen beforehand or afterwards D. to cause to happen at the same time

45. The calendar that most people are familiar with was first adopted by .

A. the Christian B. the Pope C. Julius Caesar D. the Muslims

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