Read the following passage.
A. In 1960 the Norwegian explorer Helge Ingstad and his daughter Benedicte came to L'Anse aux Meadows, at the tip of Newfoundland's Great Northern Peninsula, while searching the coast for places where the Norse had landed. A local man, George Decker, led them to a set of grassy bumps and ridges that might once have been walls. From 1961 to 1968 Helge's wife, the archaeologist Anne Stine Ingstad, directed digs with a team from Norway, Iceland, Sweden and the United States. More than any other find, a great deal of iron slag and many iron boat rivets led the team to identify the site as Norse.
B. The ruins dated from the 11th century, when the Norse put up eight buildings on a narrow terrace beside a bog and a small brook. Their walls and roofs were sod laid over a wooden frame, in the style used in Iceland and Greenland around the year 1000, and three of them were large halls. A hut built into the bank of the brook held a small furnace where iron from bog ore was smelted. Researchers calculate that the camp would have taken 60 men two months to build, when the entire Greenland colony had only about 400 people.
C. The Norse were neither the first nor the last people to use the spot. Five Indigenous groups camped there before them and one after, probably because of the rich harvest from the sea, although none seems to have been present during the Norse stay. The Norse buildings could sleep between 70 and 90 people. Most were men, but a spindle whorl and a whetstone for needles point to some women as well. Three butternuts found in the bog show that the Norse had explored the Gulf of St. Lawrence, since these trees grow no farther north than eastern New Brunswick.
D. L'Anse aux Meadows became a national historic site in 1968 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978. A Parks Canada visitor centre with exhibits of the artifacts was built in the 1980s, and three sod dwellings have been rebuilt at some distance from the original remains. The site receives about 30,000 visitors a year. A recent study of growth rings in three pieces of wood cut by the Norse showed that the trees were felled in 1021. Even so, whether this is the base the sagas call Straumfjord is still debated, and how far south the Norse went from it remains unknown.
E. Not given in any of the above paragraphs.
Decide which paragraph, A to D, has the information given in each statement below. Select E if the information is not given in any of the paragraphs.
AI explanationShows the answer. Tap to open.
Correct Answer: D
Why this is correct: Look at paragraph D: a study of growth rings in wood cut by the Norse showed the trees were felled in 1021. A single year like 1021 is far more exact than a century, so this matches the statement.
Passage Reference: A recent study of growth rings in three pieces of wood cut by the Norse showed that the trees were felled in 1021.
Tips: Two paragraphs give dates for the Norse. Look for the one that names a single year rather than a century.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: The years 1960 to 1968 in paragraph A belong to the Ingstads' visit and digs. These date the modern search, not the Norse stay.
- B: Paragraph B places the buildings in the 11th century and in a style used around the year 1000. That is a broad period, not one exact year.
- C: The third paragraph explains who lived at the spot and where the Norse travelled. But it gives no date for their time there.
- E: Notice that paragraph D names the year 1021 and the tree-ring study that produced it, in its second-to-last sentence.
Correct Answer: E
Passage Reference: From 1961 to 1968 Helge's wife, the archaeologist Anne Stine Ingstad, directed digs with a team from Norway, Iceland, Sweden and the United States.
Why this is correct: In paragraph A, the writer says Anne Stine Ingstad directed the digs from 1961 to 1968. Her team came from four countries, including Norway. It never says who paid for the work, so the source of the money is not given.
Tips: A team's nationality is not the same as its funding. Check whether any paragraph names who paid.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Paragraph A names Helge Ingstad as Norwegian and lists Norway among the team's homes. Yet it is silent about any money or government support.
- B: How the Norse built their camp a thousand years ago is the story of paragraph B. The modern excavation and its costs do not appear.
- C: The third paragraph covers the Indigenous groups and the Norse who used the site, with nothing about who paid for later research.
- D: Notice that paragraph D mentions Parks Canada and a recent wood study. But it does not say who funded the digs of the 1960s.
Correct Answer: A
Passage Reference: More than any other find, a great deal of iron slag and many iron boat rivets led the team to identify the site as Norse.
Why this is correct: Look at how paragraph A ends. More than any other find, iron slag and iron boat rivets led the team to identify the site as Norse. Slag is waste from working metal, and rivets fasten boats together. So these finds told the team who had built it.
Tips: Iron appears in three paragraphs. Ask which one treats it as proof of who the builders were.
Why the other options are wrong:
- B: Paragraph B mentions iron smelted in a small furnace. But it explains how the camp worked, not how archaeologists identified its builders.
- C: Paragraph C says most of the Norse were men and lists a few small tools. This describes the group rather than proving who it was.
- D: The fourth paragraph describes a study of wood that fixed a date, not the finds that first showed the builders were Norse.
- E: Paragraph A's closing sentence names the slag and boat rivets as the find that convinced the team.
Correct Answer: E
Passage Reference: Five Indigenous groups camped there before them and one after, probably because of the rich harvest from the sea, although none seems to have been present during the Norse stay.
Why this is correct: Notice that paragraph C says no Indigenous group seems to have been present during the Norse stay. It does not give any reason for their absence, and fear of the newcomers is never mentioned.
Tips: Here, paragraph C reports an absence. A reason for it would need a word like because, and there is none.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Paragraph A is about the 1960 search and the digs that followed. Indigenous groups are not part of it.
- B: Paragraph B stays with the eight Norse buildings and the furnace, not any other people nearby.
- C: The third paragraph notes that no Indigenous group seems to have been there during the Norse years, but it never explains why.
- D: Notice that paragraph D covers the site today and open questions about the Norse, with nothing about Indigenous people.
Correct Answer: E
Passage Reference: Their walls and roofs were sod laid over a wooden frame, in the style used in Iceland and Greenland around the year 1000, and three of them were large halls.
Why this is correct: Look at paragraph B: three of the eight buildings were large halls, built in the style used in Iceland and Greenland. It compares their style, not their size, so the comparison in the statement is not given.
Tips: Same style is not the same size. Look for a real size comparison before you pick a paragraph.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: In paragraph A, the writer describes grassy bumps and ridges found in 1960, with no measurements of any building.
- B: Paragraph B mentions large halls and houses in Greenland, but it only compares the building style, never the size.
- C: The third paragraph says how many people the buildings could sleep, which is not a comparison with houses elsewhere.
- D: Notice that paragraph D mentions rebuilt dwellings for visitors, not the size of the original halls against other Norse homes.
Correct Answer: B
Passage Reference: Researchers calculate that the camp would have taken 60 men two months to build, when the entire Greenland colony had only about 400 people.
Why this is correct: In paragraph B, the writer says the camp would have taken 60 men two months to build. At that time the whole Greenland colony had only about 400 people. Sixty workers is a big share of 400.
Tips: Two paragraphs count Norse people. Choose the one that sets the builders against Greenland's total.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Paragraph A counts the modern team by country, not the Norse workers who built the camp.
- C: Look at paragraph C: it gives how many people the buildings could sleep, between 70 and 90. But it does not compare them with Greenland.
- D: The fourth paragraph counts visitors today, about 30,000 a year, which has nothing to do with Norse builders.
- E: Notice that paragraph B sets the 60 builders against Greenland's population of about 400 in its closing sentence.
Correct Answer: C
Passage Reference: Most were men, but a spindle whorl and a whetstone for needles point to some women as well.
Why this is correct: Most people at the camp were men, paragraph C tells us. But a spindle whorl and a whetstone for needles point to some women too. These small tools show that the group included women.
Tips: Find the small household tools. Then check what they tell you about the people in the camp.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: In paragraph A, the writer mentions two women, Benedicte and Anne Stine Ingstad. But they came in the 1960s, not with the Norse.
- B: Paragraph B lists buildings and a furnace, not the small objects that tell us who lived in them.
- D: The fourth paragraph mentions exhibits of the artifacts, but it does not say what any of them reveal about the Norse group.
- E: Paragraph C's fourth sentence names the spindle whorl and the whetstone and says they point to some women.
Correct Answer: D
Passage Reference: A Parks Canada visitor centre with exhibits of the artifacts was built in the 1980s, and three sod dwellings have been rebuilt at some distance from the original remains.
Why this is correct: Notice that paragraph D says three sod dwellings have been rebuilt at some distance from the original remains. Rebuilt dwellings are copies, and at some distance means they stand apart from the real traces.
Tips: Sod houses appear in two paragraphs. One is about the Norse building them, the other about recent copies.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: In paragraph A, the writer describes the grassy bumps and ridges the Ingstads first saw, before anything was rebuilt.
- B: Paragraph B tells how the Norse first built their sod houses, not about modern copies.
- C: Look at paragraph C: it says how many people the Norse buildings could sleep, not where any copies now stand.
- E: The fourth paragraph reports the rebuilt dwellings and their distance from the remains, just after the visitor centre.
Correct Answer: C
Passage Reference: Five Indigenous groups camped there before them and one after, probably because of the rich harvest from the sea, although none seems to have been present during the Norse stay.
Why this is correct: Notice that paragraph C says five Indigenous groups camped there before the Norse, probably because of the rich harvest from the sea. A rich harvest from the sea is what the ocean offered them.
Tips: Look for a likely reason given for the people who came before the Norse, not for the Norse themselves.
Why the other options are wrong:
- A: Look at paragraph A: it explains why Ingstad came in 1960, to search for Norse landing places, not why earlier people came.
- B: Here, paragraph B describes the Norse buildings and their furnace. But it gives no reason why anyone came to the spot.
- D: Paragraph D asks how far south the Norse sailed, which concerns them, not the people who came earlier.
- E: The rich harvest from the sea, and the groups it probably drew, appear in the second sentence of Paragraph C.
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