美国学生人类历史 第71期:小结(2)

 　　Not only did these hardy¹ people manage to exist through the long cold spells which killed many ferocious² animals, but when the earth became warm and comfortable once more,prehistoric man had learned a number of things which gave him such great advantages over his less intelligent neighbors that the danger of extinction³ (a very serious one during the first half million years of man's residence upon this planet) became a very remote one.

　　这些强壮的人们不但度过了这次使很多凶猛的动物死亡的长时间寒冷时期，而且在当地球再次变得暖和适合居住的时候，史前人类也学到了很多知识。这些知识使得他们比他们的低智商的邻居拥有了更多的优势，从而灭绝的危机（在人类开始在地球上生存的前五十万年里都是一个很严重的危机）离他们更加遥远。

　　I told you how these earliest ancestors of ours were slowly plodding⁴ along when suddenly (and for reasons that are not well understood) the people who lived in the valley of the Nile rushed ahead and almost over night, created the first centre of civilisation⁵.

　　我告诉你如何当我们这些早期的祖先正在缓慢地沉重地前行的时候突然居住在尼罗河山谷的人们冲在了前面，在一夜之间创造了第一个文明的中心。

　　Then I showed you Mesopotamia, "the land between the rivers," which was the second great school of the human race. And I made you a map of the little island bridges of the Aegean Sea, which carried the knowledge and the science of the old east to the young west, where lived the Greeks.

　　然后我向你展示了米索不达米亚，"河流之间的土地"，这里是人类的第二个起源地。然后我让你看了一副地中海上小的桥梁岛屿的地图。这些岛屿桥梁将古老东方的科学知识传递到了地处西方的希腊。

　　Next I told you of an Indo-European tribe⁶, called the Hellenes, who thousands of years before had left the heart of Asia and who had in the eleventh century before our era pushed their way into the rocky peninsula of Greece and who, since then, have been known to us as the Greeks.

　　接下来我给你们讲述了一个被称为古希腊的印欧部落。他们在几千年前就离开了亚洲的中心地带，在公元前十一世纪跻身到了多岩石的希腊半岛，自从那时他们就变成了人们所熟知的希腊人。

　　And I told you the story of the little Greek cities that were really states, where the civilisation of old Egypt and Asia was transfigured (that is a big word, but you can "figure out" what it means) into something quite new, something that was much nobler and finer than anything that had gone before.

　　然后我给你讲述了小的希腊城堡的故事，在这里古希腊和亚洲的文明被美化(这是一个很复杂的词，但是你能够查出来它的意思)成新的，比以前逝去的文明更加神圣的事物。

1 hardy   

adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的

参考例句：

• The kind of plant is a hardy annual.这种植物是耐寒的一年生植物。
• He is a hardy person.他是一个能吃苦耐劳的人。

2 ferocious   

adj.凶猛的，残暴的，极度的，十分强烈的

参考例句：

• The ferocious winds seemed about to tear the ship to pieces.狂风仿佛要把船撕成碎片似的。
• The ferocious panther is chasing a rabbit.那只凶猛的豹子正追赶一只兔子。

3 extinction   

n.熄灭，消亡，消灭，灭绝，绝种

参考例句：

• The plant is now in danger of extinction.这种植物现在有绝种的危险。
• The island's way of life is doomed to extinction.这个岛上的生活方式注定要消失。

4 plodding   

a.proceeding in a slow or dull way

参考例句：

• They're still plodding along with their investigation. 他们仍然在不厌其烦地进行调查。
• He is plodding on with negotiations. 他正缓慢艰难地进行着谈判。

5 civilisation   

n.文明，文化，开化，教化

参考例句：

• Energy and ideas are the twin bases of our civilisation.能源和思想是我们文明的两大基石。
• This opera is one of the cultural totems of Western civilisation.这部歌剧是西方文明的文化标志物之一。

6 tribe   

n.部落，种族，一伙人

参考例句：

• This is a subject tribe.这是个受他人统治的部落。
• Many of the tribe's customs and rituals are as old as the hills.这部落的许多风俗、仪式都极其古老。