新概念第三册 Lesson 38 The first calendar

　　Lesson 38 The first calendar

　　最早的日历

　　Listen to the tape then answer the question below.

　　听录音，然后回答以下问题。

　　What is the importance of the dots, lines, and symbols engraved on some, bones and ivory?

　　Future historians will be in a unique position when they come to record the history of our own times. They will hardly know which facts to select from the great mass of evidence that steadily accumulates. What is more, they will not have to rely solely on the written word. Films, videos, CDs and CD-ROMS are just some of the bewildering amount of information they will have. They will be able, as it were, to see and hear us in action. But the historian attempting to reconstruct the distant past is always faced with a difficult task. He has to deduce what he can from the few scanty clues available. Even seemingly insignificant remains can shed interesting light on the history of early man.

　　Up to now, historians have assumed that calendars came into being with the advent of agriculture, for then man was faced with a real need to understand something about the seasons. Recent scientific evidence seems to indicate that this assumption is incorrect.

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