IELTS TUTOR cung cấp A river reveals its Roman past - Đề luyện tập IELTS READING (IELTS Reading Practice Test) - Làm bài online format computer-based, kèm đáp án, dịch & giải thích từ vựng - cấu trúc ngữ pháp khó & GIẢI ĐÁP ÁN VỚI LOCATION

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READING PASSAGE 1

A river reveals its Roman past

2,000 years ago the town of Arles, in what is now south-western France, was a busy gateway to the area of the Roman Empire known as Gaul. Goods from all over the Mediterranean were transferred there to barges – long, shallow riverboats – then pulled up the Rhone river to supply the northern half of the great empire. Today, Arles is a small, quiet place, and the Rhone is polluted and mostly ignored.

In 1986, a friend persuaded Luc Long, a keen diver, to dive for the first time in his home river. Long reluctantly agreed. The two men entered the river on a chilly November morning, when the water was around 8°C, thick, cloudy and foul-smelling. They could see no more than a metre ahead through the murky water. At a depth of about six metres, Long saw a sunken truck. To his surprise, he discovered an ancient Roman jar known as an amphora on the driver's seat. These containers were used throughout the Roman Empire to transport olive oil, fish sauce, and other products. When empty, they would simply be discarded. Within a short time the divers had located dozens more amphorae, and he has been mapping this Roman rubbish dump ever since.

For the first 20 years or so, no one paid much attention to what Long was doing. In 2004, one of his colleagues came across a 34-metre-long Roman barge. Long doubted that there would ever be enough money available to raise it. In 2007, Long handed over the study of this barge to a young archaeologist, Sabrina Marlier, and concentrated on a survey of the rest of the dump, around 50 metres upstream. This was where he started finding pieces of the Roman town of Arles, including statues. Word began to leak out. The French customs police warned Long that antiquities thieves might be watching his operation. So when a rare marble bust of the Roman emperor Caesar was found, Long hid it in a friend's garage.

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Before the diving season was over, divers had discovered a rare marble bust of the Roman emperor Caesar. News of the find spread around the world. The exhibition's success was astonishing,' said Claude Sintes, director of Arles' local antiquities museum, where the exhibition was held. 'When a modest town like ours got 400,000 visitors, the politicians understood that the economic return was strong.' By the autumn of 2010, the Caesar exhibition was nearing its end, and those same politicians were looking for more culture to invest in, because the European Union had designated the region around Arles a 2013 European Capital of Culture. Suddenly nine million euros became available to build a new wing on the museum and put a Roman barge into it. There was just one problem. The project would need to be completed by 2013. That meant the barge needed to be extracted during the one diving season in 2011. This was because although the wood of the boat had suffered no microbial decay, water had filled its cells, leaving the whole structure soft and spongy. If that water were to evaporate, the boat would collapse. The solution was to leave the boat in water, gradually infusing it with a polymer before extracting the water. The process would take nearly two years.

So there was only one diving season to extract the boat from the Rhone. 'We all thought the deadline was impossible,' said Benoit Poinard, who led the diving team. Normally, Poinard explained, the Rhone is safe for diving only from late June to October; otherwise the current is too strong. Three or four months would not be enough to excavate Arles-Rhone 3. Then 2011 arrived. It hardly snowed in the Alps that winter and that spring it barely rained. The Rhone's current was so gentle that the team got in the water by early May. The team worked straight into November, losing only a single week to bad weather and completed the job. 'Two hours after we finished,' Poinard said, 'the Rhone became undiveable for the whole winter.'

When Arles-Rhone 3 sank, it was carrying 33 tons of stone for building work. It had come from a quarry just north of Arles, and was probably heading towards a construction site further down the river. The boat was pointed upstream, though, rather than downstream, indicating it had been moored at the quay when it sank. A flash flood had probably swamped it. As soon as the flood subsided, the barge would have been covered in a coating of fine clay no more than 20 cm thick. This was where the archaeologists discovered the personal effects that the crew had left on the boat, including cooking utensils and plates. When the restorers were taking the boat apart, they found a silver coin dated to 30 BCE – the year before the battle of Actium – under the floorboards. They guessed someone had left it there to bring good luck. And it did – 2,000 years later. Arles-Rhone 3 was able to take its place in the new wing of the museum, on schedule, just over two years after re-emerging from the cloudy depths of the Rhone.

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Questions 1–6

Do the following statements agree with the information given in the text?

Choose
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this.

1. In 1986 Luc Long had been looking for an opportunity to dive in the Rhone for some time.
   FALSE

2. Long and his friend were the first divers to find Roman remains in the Rhone.
   NOT GIVEN

3. Long's work in the Rhone attracted immediate interest.
   FALSE

4. It was thought that the Neptune statue would be of interest to thieves.
   TRUE

5. Benoit Poinard doubted that the barge could be raised in one diving season.
   TRUE

6. The restorers were surprised to discover a silver coin in the barge.
   NOT GIVEN

Questions 7–13

Complete the notes. Write ONE WORD ONLY from the text for each answer.

Questions 7–13

Complete the notes below.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

The Roman barge *Arles-Rhone 3*

The discovery and condition of the barge:

• The barge was 34 metres long and was found by one of Long’s (7) _______________ in 2004.

• The wood had not decayed, but water had filled its cells, making the structure soft and (8) _______________.

Extraction from the Rhone:

• Normally, the Rhone is safe for diving only from late June to (9) _______________.

• In 2011, because it hardly snowed in the Alps, the river’s (10) _______________ was very gentle.

• The diving team lost only one (11) _______________ to bad weather.

What was found on or near the barge:

• The barge was carrying 33 tons of (12) _______________ for building work.

• Under the floorboards, restorers found a silver (13) _______________ dated to 30 BCE.

Questions 1–6

1. FALSE
2. NOT GIVEN
3. FALSE
4. TRUE
5. TRUE
6. NOT GIVEN

Questions 7–13

7. colleagues
8. spongy
9. October
10. current
11. week
12. stone
13. coin
 

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