Evidencesuggests that an importantstimulusbehind the rise of early civilizations was thedevelopmentof settledagriculture, which unleashed aseriesof changes in theorganizationof human communities thatculminated inthe rise of largeancientempires.

Theexacttime and place that crops were firstcultivatedsuccessfully is uncertain. Many prehistorians believe that farming may have emerged in dependently in several different areas of the world when small communities, driven by increasingpopulationand adeclineinavailablefood resources, began to plant seeds in the ground in an effort toguaranteetheirsurvival. The first farmers, who may have lived as long as 10,000 years ago, undoubtedly used simple techniques and still reliedprimarilyon other forms of food production, such as hunting, foraging, or pastoralism. The realbreakthroughtook place when farmers began tocultivatecropsalongthe floodplains of river systems. Theadvantagewas that crops grown in such areas were not as dependent onrainfallandthereforeproduced a morereliableharvest. Anadditionalbenefitwas that thesedimentcarried by the river waters deposited nutrients in the soil, thus enabling the farmer tocultivatea singleplotof ground for many years without moving to a new location. Thus, the first trulysedentary(that is, nonmigratory) societies were born. As time went on, such communitiesgraduallylearned how to direct the flow of water toenhancetheproductivecapacityof the land, while theintroductionof the ironploweventuallyled to thecultivationof heavy soils notpreviouslysusceptibletoagriculture.

Thespreadof this rivervalleyagriculturein various parts of Asia and Africa was the decisivefactorin the rise of the first civilizations. The increase in food production in these regions led to asignificantgrowth inpopulation, while efforts to control the flow of water to maximize theirrigationofcultivatedareas and to protect thelocalinhabitants fromhostileforces outside thecommunityprovoked the first steps towardcooperativeactivities on a largescale. The need to oversee the entireprocessbrought about theemergenceof an elite that waseventuallytransformed into agovernment.

The firstclearsteps in the rise of the first civilizations took place in the fourth and thirdmillenniaB.C. inMesopotamia, northern Africa, India, and China. How the first governments tookshapein these areas is not certain, but anthropologists studying theevolutionof human communities in various parts of the world have discovered that onecommonstagein theprocessis theemergenceof what are called “big men”withina single village or a collection of villages. By means of theirmilitaryprowess,dominantpersonalities, orpoliticaltalents, these peoplegraduallyemergeas the leaders of thatcommunity. In time, the “big men” becomeformalsymbols ofauthorityand pass on thatauthorityto otherswithintheir own family. As the communities continue to grow in size andmaterialwealth, the “big men”assumehereditarystatus, and their allies and family members are transformed into ahereditarymonarchy.

Theappearanceof thesesedentarysocieties had amajorimpacton the social organizations,religiousbeliefs, and way of life of the peoples livingwithintheir boundaries. With the increase inpopulationand thedevelopmentofcentralizedauthoritycame theemergenceof the cities. While some of theseurbancenters were identified with aparticulareconomicfunction, such asproximityto gold or iron deposits or astrategiclocation on amajortraderoute, others servedprimarilyas administrative centers or the site of temples for theofficialcultor otherritualobservances. Withinthese cities, new forms oflivelihoodappeared to satisfy the growing need for social services and consumer goods. Some people became artisans or merchants, while others became warriors, scholars, or priests. In some cases, thephysicaldivisionwithinthe first cities reflected thestricthierarchicalcharacterof the society as a whole, with a royal palace surrounded by an imposing wall andseparatefrom theremainderof theurbanpopulation. In other instances, such as the Indus RiverValley, the cities lacked a royalprecinctand the ostentatious palaces thatmarkedtheir contemporaries elsewhere.

Questions:
question_stem: The phrase “culminated in” in the passage is closest in meaning to
choices: tag: A
text: reached a high point with

tag: B
text: logically followed from

tag: C
text: partly contributed to

tag: D
text: marked
answer_key: A
explanation: 【题目翻译】短语“culminated in”与下列哪一个意思最相近？
A：reached a high point with，到达高点
B：logically followed from，有逻辑地
C：partly contributed to，部分作用
D：marked，标记

【判定题型】：题目要求选出与高亮单词意思最接近的选项，故判断本题为词汇题。

【关键词定位】：根据关键词“culminated in”,定位到原句“Evidence suggests that an important stimulus behind the rise of early civilizations was the development of settled agriculture, which unleashed a series of changes in the organization of human communities that culminated in the rise of large ancient empires.”。

【词汇解析】：词汇“culminated in”的意思是“到达顶点/高潮”,带入到原句中，原句的意思是“证据显示，早期文明兴起的一个重要刺激因素就是定居农业的发展，它导致了人类群落的组织结构出现一系列变更，在古代大型帝国的兴起时达到了顶峰。”

【选项分析】
A：reached a high point with，到达高点，同义替换，正确
B：logically followed from，有逻辑地，不符，错误
C：partly contributed to，部分作用，不符，错误
D：marked，标记，不符，错误