Archeology is always full of mystery and appeal ... 

   本周RE學(xué)習(xí)了考古里的神秘現(xiàn)象，沒(méi)有想到同學(xué)們是那么興奮，下了課還繼續(xù)挖掘資料和紀(jì)錄片來(lái)分享。其實(shí)我很高興，感謝這門(mén)課， 讓英語(yǔ)學(xué)習(xí)突破了英語(yǔ)本身， 成為一個(gè)工具去打開(kāi)世界的大門(mén)。比起單純教英語(yǔ)，我更在意正面引導(dǎo)學(xué)生一個(gè)正確的世界觀和價(jià)值觀。世界是神秘的， 歷史確實(shí)充滿(mǎn)了未知的神秘， 但是這不應(yīng)該成為一個(gè)負(fù)面的恐懼， 而應(yīng)該是充滿(mǎn)興奮和驚喜的猜測(cè)過(guò)程。

  RE2 UNIT 3 兩篇課文的基本結(jié)構(gòu)都相似， 提出猜想和推斷過(guò)程， 有反駁也有承認(rèn)的部分。這種類(lèi)似推理破案的神秘，引起了極大的興趣。當(dāng)然， 好的材料如果有好的老師， 好的氛圍來(lái)引導(dǎo)，才能體現(xiàn)出價(jià)值。聽(tīng)課和學(xué)習(xí)的時(shí)候那種積極，真的是我從來(lái)沒(méi)有見(jiàn)過(guò)，從課后交給我的課本，我就可以看出他們的仔細(xì)， 真的是連老師一個(gè)字也沒(méi)錯(cuò)過(guò)。 

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  筆記本更是認(rèn)真和整齊

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   課后一起精聽(tīng)聽(tīng)寫(xiě)， 跟讀， 分享紀(jì)錄片... 爭(zhēng)先恐后地給我反饋， 我真心感動(dòng)。   

    那今天蜜雪老師也來(lái)貢獻(xiàn)一篇科學(xué)美國(guó)人60秒的考古文章吧，再給大家朗讀錄音。

     以下文章選自2020年4月科學(xué)美國(guó)人雜志考古專(zhuān)欄，特意挑選出來(lái)的。

     同時(shí)給大家朗讀這篇文章，我今天語(yǔ)速較快因?yàn)槟７滦侣劰?jié)目。

古代尿液的考古之窗--蜜雪老師來(lái)自蜜雪英語(yǔ)00:0002:54

   This is Scientific American's 60-second Science, I'm Bob Hirshon.

 A 10,000-year-old archaeological site in central Turkey is helping scientists unlock the region's pee-historic past. That's right: the salty residue of ancient urine can reveal how and when humans went from hunter-gatherers to herder-farmers who kept and raised animals in their settlements.

   土耳其中部地區(qū)一處有10000年歷史的考古遺址，正在幫助科學(xué)家解開(kāi)該地區(qū)的小便歷史。沒(méi)錯(cuò)：古代尿液中的鹽分殘留能揭示出人類(lèi)如何以及何時(shí)從狩獵采集者轉(zhuǎn)變?yōu)樵诙ň拥亓糇『惋曫B(yǎng)動(dòng)物的放牧種植者。

   "And so we thought, okay, what's a process that an animal would go through if it was being kept at the site, whether it's corralled between buildings or kept in other specific areas?"

  Archaeologist Jordan Abell from Columbia's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. He's been studying the settlement of A??kl? H?yük, located on a 16-meter-high mound near Turkey's Melendiz River.

   "We thought, okay, well, these animals would be urinating all the time that they were on the mound."

  “所以我們想，好吧，如果動(dòng)物被保留在這個(gè)地點(diǎn)，無(wú)論是被圈在建筑物之間還是被放到其他特定地方，它們會(huì)經(jīng)歷什么過(guò)程？”

  哥倫比亞大學(xué)拉蒙特-多爾蒂地球觀測(cè)站的考古學(xué)家喬丹·艾貝爾說(shuō)到。他一直在研究位于土耳其孟雷迪茲河附近16米高土堆上的 A??kl? H?yük定居點(diǎn)。

  “我們想，嗯，這些動(dòng)物在土堆上生活時(shí)一直都會(huì)小便?！?/span>

 In the dry climate of central Turkey, the sodium, chloride and nitrates from all that animal excretion would be trapped in the layers of earth onto which they were originally peed. Excavating those salts, layer by layer, should provide a timeline of animal populations at the site.

  "And so we calculated, using a simple mass-balance approach, an estimate of the number of organisms that it would take to produce these large quantities of salt."

Abell and his colleagues found that from 10,000 years ago to about 9,700 years ago, the site jumped from having just a few large organisms' worth of whiz to more than 1,800.

  在土耳其中部干燥的氣候中，所有動(dòng)物排泄物中的鈉、氯和硝酸鹽都會(huì)留在它們?cè)瓉?lái)小便地點(diǎn)之上的土層上。一層一層地挖掘這些鹽，應(yīng)該可以提供該地點(diǎn)的動(dòng)物種群時(shí)間表。

  “因此，利用簡(jiǎn)單的質(zhì)量平衡方法，我們推算出產(chǎn)生這些大量鹽所需的生物體數(shù)量?！?/span>

  艾貝爾和同事發(fā)現(xiàn)，從10,000年前到大約9700年前，這個(gè)地點(diǎn)的大型生物數(shù)量從僅有幾只躍升至了1800多只。

  Of course, people pee too, so the researchers had to figure out which salts were from humans and which were from their animals. Luckily, the location of the salts provided clues—for example, high concentrations in narrow alleyways too small for animals.

  "The general thought is that they might have been standing on their roofs and just peeing into these alleyways."

Something that goats and sheep do rarely, if ever. By subtracting contributions from humans, the researchers calculated that there had to be between 800 and 1,300 sheep and goats to account for the remaining pee. The study appears in the journal Science Advances.

  當(dāng)然，人類(lèi)也會(huì)小便，因此研究人員必須弄清楚哪些鹽來(lái)自人類(lèi)，哪些鹽來(lái)自動(dòng)物。幸運(yùn)的是，這些鹽的位置提供了線(xiàn)索——比如，在對(duì)動(dòng)物來(lái)說(shuō)過(guò)于狹窄的小巷，鹽濃度很高。

“普遍想法是，他們可能一直站在頂上，向著這些小巷小便?！?/span>

  如果山羊和綿羊這樣做過(guò)的話(huà)，那也是極少的情況。通過(guò)減去人類(lèi)小便的情況，研究人員計(jì)算出必須有800到1300只綿羊和山羊才能產(chǎn)生剩余尿液。這項(xiàng)研究發(fā)表在《科學(xué)進(jìn)展》期刊上。

  If true, it means that animal domestication didn't originate solely in the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia, as many of us learned in history class.

"Our technique has been able to support that idea, that somewhere outside the Fertile Crescent, in this case in central Turkey, was developing this process at near the same time as has been shown elsewhere within the Fertile Crescent."

  An important discovery, since the advent of herding and farming was a turning point for human civilization, leading to cities and modern society.

  Abell points out that many archaeological sites have little in the way of physical evidence like bones and artifacts, but presumably all of them have pee. So his advice for other archaeologists who want to track animal and human populations? Look out for number one.

  Thanks for listening for Scientific American — 60-Second Science. I'm Bob Hirshon.

如果屬實(shí)，那就意味著動(dòng)物馴養(yǎng)并非像我們大多數(shù)人從歷史課上學(xué)到的那樣，僅僅起源于美索不達(dá)米亞的新月沃土。

“我們的技術(shù)已經(jīng)能夠支持這一觀點(diǎn)，即在新月沃土之外的其他地方，比如這項(xiàng)研究中的土耳其中部地區(qū)，幾乎在同一時(shí)間發(fā)展著新月沃土內(nèi)出現(xiàn)的這一過(guò)程?！?/span>

   這是一項(xiàng)重要發(fā)現(xiàn)，因?yàn)樾竽翗I(yè)和農(nóng)業(yè)的出現(xiàn)是人類(lèi)文明的轉(zhuǎn)折點(diǎn)，繼而催生了城市和現(xiàn)代社會(huì)。

  艾貝爾指出，許多考古遺址幾乎沒(méi)有骨骼和器物等實(shí)物證據(jù)，但大概所有遺址上都有尿液存在。那他對(duì)其他想追蹤動(dòng)物和人類(lèi)種群的考古學(xué)家有何建議？留意尿液。

   謝謝大家收聽(tīng)科學(xué)美國(guó)人——60秒科學(xué)。我是鮑勃·赫爾尚。