2015哈尔滨工业大学考博英语真题阅读理解精练.pdfVIP

中国考博辅导首选学校 2015哈尔滨工业大学考博英语真题阅读理解精练 Between the eighth and eleventh centuries A. D., the Byzantine Empire staged an almost unparalleled economic and cultural revival, a recovery that is all the more striking because it followed a long period of severe internal decline. By the early eighth century, the empirehad lostroughly two-thirds of the territory ithad possessed inthe year 600, and itsremaining areawas being raided by Arabs and Bulgarians, who at times threatened to take Constantinople and extinguished the empire altogether. The wealth of the state and its subjectswasgreatlydiminished,andartisticandliteraryproduction had virtually ceased. By the early eleventh century, however, the empire had regained almost half of its lost possessions, its new frontiers were secure, and its influence extended far beyond its borders. The economy had recovered, the treasury was full, and art and scholarship had advanced. To consider the Byzantine military, cultural, and economic advances as differentiated aspects of a single phenomenon is reasonable. After all, these three forms of progress have gone together inanumberof statesand civilizations.RomeunderAugustus and fifth-century Athens provide the most obvious examples in antiquity. Moreover, an examination of the apparent sequential connectionsamongmilitary, economic,and culturalformsofprogress might help explain the dynamics of historical change. The common explanation of theseapparent connections inthe case 中国考博辅导首选学校 ofByzantiumwouldrun likethis:whentheempirehadturnedbackenemy raids on its own territory and had begun to raid and conquer enemy territory, Byzantine resources naturally expanded and more money became available to patronize art and literature. Therefore, Byzantine military achievements led to economic advances, which in turn led to cultural revival. No doubt this hypothetic