Finding fossil man

down from one generation of storytellers to another. These legends are useful because they can tell us something about migrations of people who lived long ago, but none could write down what they did. Anthropologists wondered where the remote ancestors of the Polynesian peoples now living in the Pacific Islands came from. The sagas of these people explain that some of them came from Indonesia about 2,000 years ago.

But the first people who were like ourselves lived so long ago that even their sagas, if they had any, are forgotten. So archaeologists have neither history nor legends to help them to find out where the first'modern men' came from.

Fortunately, however, ancient men made tools of stone, especially flint, because this is easier to shape than other kinds. They may also have used wood and skins, but these have rotted away. Stone does not decay, and so the tools of long ago have remained when even the bones of the men who made them have disappeared without trace.

New words and expressions

recount /ri'kaunt/ v.叙述     / ' rei'kaunt/ 再数一次

record / ' rek[d/ /ri' kC:d/ 第一个音节带重音，名前动后

叙述：recount :  emotionless  重复

describe

depict： a little emotional

narrate： temporal&spacial 根据时间或空间顺序描述。

portray：描述

saga /'sa:g[/ n.英雄故事  描述的内容mostly real 北欧海盗活动的故事

legend /'ledV[nd/ n.传说，传奇  unreal e.g robin hood

anthropologist/ 'AnWr['pCl[dVist/ n.人类学家

  anthrop：人

  philosophere :philo＋sopher|爱＋智慧＝哲学家

  philanthropist : 慈善家（对人有爱心的人）

  anthropology :人类学

  带-gy结尾的都是学科：biology 生物学   geography 地理学  ecology 生态学

remote/ ri'm[ut/ n.遥远

ancestor / 'Ansest[/ n.祖先

   an- 在前面

   forefather,forebear ，predecessor祖先

rot/ rCt/ v.烂掉

   leave me rot.＝leave me along

   rot to death.

   soon ripe,soon rotten.

   decay 国家民族逐渐衰亡 decompose 逐渐衰竭 deteriorate关系逐渐恶化

trace /treis/ n.痕迹，踪迹

   trace the problem

   i follow your trace＝i follow where you go

polynesia 波利尼西亚

    poly-多

    polyandric: a wife with more than one husband

    polygeny : a husband with more than one wife

flint /flint/ n.燧石  flinting hearted

fossil /  ' fCsl/ n. 化石    cobble 鹅卵石

read of 读到

谈到：speak of ,talk of ,know of,hear of

 near east：近东 mediterranean, south europe,north afric

far east

 非限定性从句，表原因

oral(spoken) language is earlier than written language.

precede :什么在什么之前，不用比较，直接跟名词

counterpart: two things or two people have the same position

oral(spoken) language is earlier than written counterpart.

preserve: 保留，保存（腌制）

 如果句中有only，那后面的表语结构就要用to do sth,而不是doing sth.

 storyteller: 讲故事的人

fortuneteller, palmreader: 算命先生

 migration ：移民  １）migrant  ２）immigrant

v. migrate:迁移，迁徙

migratory bird:候鸟

 none: no body

 people＋s 民族

 if they had any: 即便是有

his relatives,if he had  any,never went to visit him when he was hospitalized.

 find out千方百计，费尽周折＝explore

 modern men :the men who were like ourselves

 however－anywhere you want ,加逗号

but,yet－不加标点，only at the beginning of the sentence

therefore－自由

so－自由

 tool:小工具

instrument:实验器械

equipment:设备

 shape:成型；教育，改造

may also have:表推测

 peel:果皮

leather:皮革

hide:兽皮 cowhide:牛皮

 without (any) trace:无影无踪