Question

Where did the British people come from? This is an extraordinarily interesting question, since they are a mixture of many different races, and all these races invaded（入侵） Britain at various times from Europe．Nobody knows very much about Britain before the Romans came during the first century BC, but there had been at least three invasions（入侵） before that．The first of these was by the Iberians．The other two were by Celtic tribes（部落）：first the Gaels, whose descendants（后裔）are the modern Scots and Irish, some of whom still speak the Gaelic language; and secondly the Britons, who gave their names to the whole island of Britain．These were the people whom the Romans conquered（征服）．But the Roman Empire was overthrown by the Germanic tribes, which once overran（横行于）the whole of Western Europe．

There were three great Germanic tribes which invaded Britain: the Angles, the Saxons and Jutes; and together they form the basis of the modern English race． The Britons, as a race, disappeared except in Wales and Cornwall．Many Welsh people still speak their “ British” language, which is called Welsh．The Angles were so numerous that the country was called Angle-land, i．e England, and the Anglo-Saxon language was old English, in other words, modern English has descended（传下来）directly from it．

So far then, we have noted the Iberians, two kinds of Celts; the Romans and the Germanic peoples, which we shall call collectively the Saxons: but they by no means ended． A few hundred years later a further invasion took place from the North-East, that of the Danes． Finally, and more important, there came the great Norman invasion．In the year 1066, Duke William of Normandy claimed the English throne（王位） and he defeated and killed the Saxon King Harold at the Battle of Hastings．He went on to conquer the whole country and was crowned（加冕） William I of England．Our present Queen is one of his descendants．There has never been another invasion of Britain in the 900 years since William the Conqueror, so that all the various elements（人的一群） have had time to settle down and form one people．   

1．The British people are descendants of __________ ．

    A．the Romans                                           B．the Germanic peoples

    C．the Normans                                          D．many different races

2．Modern English is mainly derived from          ．

A．the Garlic language                                 B．the “British” language

C．the Germanic language                              D．the Anglo-Saxon language

3．Which of the following statements in not true?

A．The Britons form a large part of the modern English race．

B．Some languages of former invaders still exist in Britain now．

C．The last and greatest invasion Britain suffered from was the Norman invasion．

D．It can be inferred that the name of England is derived（获得） from the name of one of the Germanic tribes．

4．This passage deals mainly with          ．

   A．the past suffering of Britain

B．the history of Britain

C．the origin（起源，来历） of the British people

D．the development of the English language

Answer 1

DDAC