高中一年级英语阅读理解练习及答案

1

Before the print was brought to England in 1476, everything was written by hand. The few people who knew how to write were trained in schools set up by the church. Those who made a living by writing for other people were called scribes(抄写员)。

The work of scribes was not easy. Much of it had to be done fast in order to meet the needs of the King. the church and traders. Most of the writing was in Latin(拉丁) ,but some of it was in the English of the day. And no one was quite sure how some English words should be spelled.

One problem was that several letters were written with short vertical strok（竖笔）that all looked like each other. Among them were the letters , i, u, v, m and n, Thus .five straight lines in a row might stand for uni nui uvi or mii.

As a result .reading was sometimes difficult, especially when the writing was done in a hurry.

The scribes solved(解决)the problem in part, by changing the letter u to o when it came before m. n or v. This is how sum and cum came lo be written as some and come. At some point, too, the scribes seemed to have decided that no English word should be ended by u or v. Thus, in time an e was added to such words as live, have, due and true. It was added, but not pronounced.

36. Which of the following is true according to the passage?

A. Everything has been written by hand in English since 1476.

B. More than 500 years ago no people made a living by writing for other people.

C. The church set up schools to train scribes before 1476.

D. Scribes in England worked only for kings and traders.

37. Which of the following is false?

A. Often the scribes had to work with great speed.

B. The spelling of some English words was changed.

D. Some scribes of the day were quite sure about the spelling of many English words.

38. Sometimes people couldn’t read easily_____________.

A. because there were too many u’s and v’s in sonic English words

B. because most of the writing was in Latin

C. when the writing was in English

D. When tile writing was done hurriedly

39. The scribes changed u before m to o because

A. the change helped them write faster

B. the change made reading easier

C. um and om had the same pronunciation

D. om was the right order

40. It is believed that some scribes thought

A. it important to add an e to every English word

B. the letter e at the end of any word shouldn't be pronounced

C. it natural to change the spelling of sonic Latin words

D. an English word should be ended neither by n nor by v

I

Man's First real inventions, and one of the most important inventions in history, was the wheel. All transportation and machine in the world depend on it.