The vikings wayfaring (đi chu du) way

In the last century, Vikings have been perceived (nhìn

nhận) in numerous different ways – vilified (bị lăng mạ) Questions 1-5
as conquerors (những kẻ xâm lược) and romanticised (bị
lãng mạn, viễn vông hóa) as adventurers. How Vikings Complete the notes below.
have been employed in (dành thời gian vào)
nation-building (xây dựng đất nước) is a topic of some Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS OR A
interest (vấn đề được một số người quan tâm) NUMBER for each answer

In English, Vikings are also known as Norse or Norsemen.

Write your answers in boxes 1-5 on your answer
Their language greatly influenced English, with the sheet
nouns, ‘Hell’, ‘husband’, ‘law’, and ‘window’, and the
verbs, ‘blunder (mò mẫm)’, ‘snub (làm mất mặt)’, ‘take’, Word ‘Viking’ is (1)__obscure__
Origins:
and ‘want’, all coming from Old Norse. However, the Vikings came from Scandinavia
origins of the word ‘Viking’, itself, are obscure (1) (mơ hồ,
không rõ ràng, khó hiểu): it may mean ‘a Scandinavian
Dates of In Britain: AD (2)__793__ - 1066
pirate (tên cướp biển)’, or it may refer to ‘an inlet (con the Viking
lạch)’, or a place called Vik, in modern-day Norway, from Age Length varies elsewhere
where the pirates came. These various names – Vikings,
Norse, or Norsemen, and doubts about the very word In doubt – but most of Europe
‘Viking’ suggest historical confusion. Territorial
extent: Possibly raided as far away as
Loosely speaking (Nói một cách dễ hiểu), the Viking Age (3)__Northwest Africa__
endured from the late eighth to the mid-eleventh
centuries. Vikings sailed to England in AD 793 to storm End of the Vikings had assimilated into (4)__local
(đột chiếm) coastal monasteries (2) (các tu viện), and Viking populations__, & adopted a new
subsequently (tiếp sau đó), large swathes (vùng lãnh Age: (5)__monotheistic religious__ system
thổ) of England fell under Viking rule – indeed (quả thực)
several Viking kings sat on the English throne. It is
Questions 6-13
generally agreed that (Mọi người đều cho rằng) the
Battle of Hastings, in 1066, when the Norman French Look at the following statements and the list of
invaded, marks the end of the English Viking Age, but the times and places below.
Irish Viking age ended earlier, while Viking colonies
(thuộc địa) in Iceland and Greenland did not dissolve Match each statement with the correct place or
(biến mất, giải thể) until around AD 1500. time: A-H.

How much territory (lãnh thổ) Vikings controlled is also Write the correct letter, A-H, in boxes 6-13 on
in dispute (đang gây tranh cãi) – Scandinavia and
your answer sheet.
Western Europe certainly, but their reach east and south
is uncertain. They plundered (cướp đoạt) and settled (6)__F__ A geographer documents Viking culture as it
down the Volga and Dnieper rivers, and traded with happens.
modern-day Istanbul, but the archaeological record has
yet to (chưa) verify that Vikings raided (đột kích) as far (7)__D__ A philosopher classifies cultures
away as Northwest Africa (3), as some writers claim. hierarchically

The issue of control and extent is complex because many (8)__E__ Historians assert that Viking history is based
more on legends than facts.
Vikings did not return to Scandinavia after raiding (đột
kích, đánh phá) but assimilated into (bị đồng hóa vào)
(9)__A__ Young people learn about Viking cultural and
local populations (4), often becoming Christian. To some economic activities.
degree, the Viking Age is defined by (được xác định bởi)
(10)__G__ People see themselves as unrelated to
religion. Initially (Ban đầu), Vikings were polytheists Vikings.
(người theo thuyết đa thần), believing in many gods, but
by the end of the age, they had permanently accepted a (11)__B__ An historian claims Viking colonists to
modern-day Canada came from his land.
new monotheistic religious system (hệ thống tôn giáo
độc thần) – Christianity. (5) (12)__C__ Viking conquests are exaggerated to bolster
the country’s ego after a territorial loss.
This transition from so-called (cái gọi là) pagan
plunderers (những kẻ cướp bóc ngoại giáo) to civilised (13)__H__ DNA tests show locals are closely related to
Swedes.
Christians (những Cơ Đốc nhân) is significant (có ý
nghĩa quan trọng) and is the view promulgated (được List of times & places
truyền bá) throughout much of recent history. In the UK,
A In the UK today
in the 1970s for example, schoolchildren were taught
that until the Vikings accepted Christianity they were B In 19th-century Norway
nasty heathens (người ngoại đạo thối nát) who
C In 19th-century Sweden
rampaged (hoành hành) throughout Britain. By contrast
(ngược lại), today’s children can visit museums where D In 19th-century England
Vikings are celebrated (được tôn vinh) as merchants, E In Denmark today
pastoralists, and artists (thương nhân, người chăn nuôi
gia súc, và nghệ sĩ) with a unique worldview as well as F In 9th-century Persia
conquerors. (9) G In mid-20th century Soviet Union

What are some other interpretations (cách hiểu, cách H In Russia today
giải thích) of Vikings? In the nineteenth century, historians
in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden constructed (đã xây Question 14
dựng) their own Viking ages for nationalistic reasons (lý
Choose the correct letter A-E.
do dân tộc). At that time, all three countries were in crisis.
Denmark had been beaten in war and ceded territory Write the correct letter in box 14 on your answer
(nhượng lại lãnh thổ) to what is now Germany. Norway sheet.
had become independent from Sweden in 1905 but was
(14) Which might be a suitable title for passage?
economically vulnerable, so Norwegians sought to (cố
gắng) create a separate identity (bản sắc riêng) for A. A brief history of Vikings
themselves in the past as well as the present. The B. Recent Viking discoveries
Norwegian historian, Gustav Storm, was adamant (kiên C. A modern fascination with Vikings
quyết) it was his forebears (tổ tiên) and not the Swedes’ D. Interpretations of Viking history
or Danes’ who had colonised (xâm chiếm thuộc địa) E. Viking history and nationalism
Iceland, Greenland, and Vinland, in what is now Canada
(11). Sweden, meanwhile, had relinquished (nhường,
giao) Norway to the Norwegians and Finland to the
Russians; thus (vì vậy), in the late nineteenth century,
Sweden was keen to (rất muốn) boost its image with rich
archaeological finds to show the glory of its Viking past
(12).

In addition to augmenting nationalism (tăng cường chủ

nghĩa dân tộc), nineteenth-century thinkers (các nhà tư
tưởng) were influenced by an Englishman, Herbert
Spencer, who described peoples and cultures in
evolutionary terms (các thuật ngữ tiến hóa) similar to
those of Charles Darwin. Spencer coined the phrase (tạo
ra cụm từ) ‘survival of the fittest (kẻ mạnh nhất)’, which
includes the notion (quan niệm) that, over time, there is
not only technological but also moral progress. (7)
Therefore, Viking heathens’ adoption (sự chấp nhận) of
Christianity was considered an advantageous move
(động thái có lợi). These days, historians do not compare
cultures in the same way, especially since, in this case, the
archaeological record (hồ sơ khảo cổ) seems to show
that heathen Vikings and Christian Europeans were
equally brutal (hung ác, tàn bạo như nhau).

Views of Vikings change according to not only to forces

(lực tác động) affecting historians at the time of their
research (vào thời điểm nghiên cứu) but also according
to the materials they read. Since much knowledge of
Vikings comes from literature composed up to 300 years
after the events they chronicle (ghi chép lại), some
Danish historians cal1 these sources ‘mere legends
(truyền thuyết đơn thuần) (8)’.

Vikings did have a written language carved on large

stones, but as few of these survive today (rất ít số này
tồn tại đến ngày nay), the most reliable contemporary
(đương thời) sources on Vikings come from writers from
other cultures, like the ninth-century Persian geographer,
Ibn Khordadbeh (6).

In the last four decades, there have been wildly (cực kỳ)
varying interpretations (cách giải thích khác nhau) of
the Viking influence in Russia. Most non-Russian scholars
(học giả) believe the Vikings created a kingdom in
western Russia and modern-day Ukraine led by (được
lãnh đạo bởi) a man called Rurik. After AD 862, Rurik’s
descendants (hậu duệ) continued to rule. There is
considerable (đáng kể) evidence of this colonisation (sự
xâm chiếm thuộc địa): in Sweden, carved stones, still
standing, describe the conquerors’ journeys; both Russian
and Ukrainian have loan words (từ mượn) from Old
Norse; and, Scandinavian first names, like Igor and Olga,
are still popular. However, during the Soviet period, there
was an emphasis on (sự chú trọng, nhấn mạnh vào) the
Slavic origins of most Russians. (Appearing in the
historical record around the sixth century AD, the Slavs
are thought to have originated in Eastern Europe.) This
Slavic identity was promoted to contrast with (tương
phản với) that of the neighbouring Viking Swedes, who
were enemies during the Cold War. (10)

These days, many Russians consider themselves hybrids

(con lai). Indeed recent genetic studies support a
Norse-colonisation theory: western Russian DNA is
consistent with (tương thích, phù hợp với) that of the
inhabitants (người dân) of a region north of Stockholm in
Sweden. (13)

The tools available to modern historians are many and

varied, and their findings may seem less open to debate
(ít gây tranh cãi hơn). There are linguistics, numismatics,
dendrochronology, archaeozoology, palaeobotany, ice
crystallography, climate and DNA analysis to add to the
translation of runes and the raising of mighty (hùng
mạnh) warships (tàu chiến). Despite these, historians
remain children of their times.

Finches (chim họ sẻ) on islands

A

Today, the quest (sự tìm kiếm, truy lùng) continues. On

Daphne Major-one of the most desolate of the Galápagos
Islands, an uninhabited (bỏ hoang) volcanic cone (nón
núi lửa) where cacti (cây xương rồng) and shrubs (cây
bụi) seldom grow higher than a researcher’s knee-Peter
and Rosemary Grant have spent more than three decades
watching Darwin’s finch respond to the challenges of
storms, drought and competition for food. Biologists at
Princeton University, the Grants know and recognize
many of the individual birds on the island and can trace
(tìm ra nguồn gốc) the birds’ lineages hack through time.
They have witnessed Darwin’s principle in action again
and again, over many generations of finches.

The Grants’ most dramatic insights have come from

watching the evolving bill of the medium ground finch.
The plumage of this sparrow-sized bird ranges from dull
brown to jet black. At first glance, it may not seem
particularly striking, but among scientists who study
evolutionary biology, the medium ground finch is a
superstar. Its bill is a middling example in the array of
shapes and sizes found among Galápagos finches: heftier
than that of the small ground finch, which specializes in
eating small, soft seeds, but petite compared to that of
the large ground finch, an expert at cracking and
devouring big, hard seeds.

When the Grants began their study in the 1970s, only

two species of finch lived on Daphne Major, the medium
ground finch and the cactus finch. The island is so small
that the researchers were able to count and catalogue
every bird. When a severe drought hit in 1977, the birds
soon devoured the last of the small, easily eaten seeds.
Smaller members of the medium ground finch population,
lacking the bill strength to crack large seeds, died out.

Bill and body size are inherited traits, and the next
generation had a high proportion of big-billed individuals.
The Grants had documented natural selection at
work-the same process that, over many millennia,
directed the evolution of the Galápagos’ 14 unique finch
species, all descended from a common ancestor that
reached the islands a few million years ago.

Eight years later, heavy rains brought by an El Nino

transformed the normally meager vegetation on Daphne
Major. Vines and other plants that in most years struggle
for survival suddenly flourished, choking out the plants
that provide large seeds to the finches. Small seeds came
to dominate the food supply, and big birds with big bills
died out at a higher rate than smaller ones. ‘Natural
selection is observable,’ Rosemary Grant says. ‘It happens
when the environment changes. When local conditions
reverse themselves, so does the direction of adaptation.

Recently, the Grants witnessed another form of natural

selection acting on the medium ground finch: competition
from bigger, stronger cousins. In 1982, a third finch, the
large ground finch, came to live on Daphne Major. The
stout bills of these birds resemble the business end of a
crescent wrench. Their arrival was the first such
colonization recorded on the Galápagos in nearly a
century of scientific observation. ‘We realized,’ Peter
Grant says, ‘we had a very unusual and potentially
important event to follow.’ For 20 years, the large ground
finch coexisted with the medium ground finch, which
shared the supply of large seeds with its bigger-billed
relative. Then, in 2002 and 2003, another drought struck.
None of the birds nested that year, and many died out.
Medium ground finches with large bills, crowded out of
feeding areas by the more powerful large ground finches,
were hit particularly hard.

When wetter weather returned in 2004, and the finches

nested again, the new generation of the medium ground
finch was dominated by smaller birds with smaller bills,
able to survive on smaller seeds. This situation, says
Peter Grant, marked the first time that biologists have
been able to follow the complete process of an
evolutionary change due to competition between species
and the strongest response to natural selection that he
had seen in 33 years of tracking Galápagos finches.

On the inhabited island of Santa Cruz, just south of

Daphne Major, Andrew Hendry of McGill University and
Jeffrey Podos of the University of Massachusetts at
Amherst have discovered a new, man-made twist in finch
evolution. Their study focused on birds living near the
Academy Bay research station, on the fringe of the town
of Puerto Ayora. The human population of the area has
been growing fast-from 900 people in 1974 to 9,582 in
2001. Today Puerto Ayora is full of hotels and mai tai
bars,’ Hendry says. ‘People have taken this extremely arid
place and tried to turn it into a Caribbean resort.’
I

Academy Bay records dating back to the early 1960s

show that medium ground finches captured there had
either small or large bills. Very few of the birds had
mid-size bills. The finches appeared to be in the early
stages of a new adaptive radiation: If the trend continued,
the medium ground finch on Santa Cruz could split into
two distinct subspecies, specializing in different types of
seeds. But in the late 1960s and early 70s, medium
ground finches with medium-sized bills began to thrive at
Academy Bay along with small and large-billed birds.
The booming human population had introduced new food
sources, including exotic plants and bird feeding stations
stocked with rice. Billsize, once critical to the finches’
survival, no longer made any difference. ‘Now an
intermediate bill can do fine,’ Hendry says.

At a control site distant from Puerto Ayora, and relatively

untouched by humans, the medium ground finch
population remains split between large- and small-billed
birds. On undisturbed parts of Santa Cruz, there is no
ecological niche for a middling medium ground finch, and
the birds continue to diversify. In town, though there are
still many finches, once-distinct populations are merging.

The finches of Santa Cruz demonstrate a subtle process

in which human meddling can stop evolution in its tracks,
ending the formation of new species. In a time when
global biodiversity continues its downhill slide, Darwin’s
finches have yet another unexpected lesson to teach. ‘If
we hope to regain some of the diversity that’s already
been lost/ Hendry says, ‘we need to protect not just
existing creatures, but also the processes that drive the
origin of new species.