His voice phone is ringing. Hiro picks it up.
"Pod," Y.T. says, "I was beginning to think you'd never come out of there."
"Where are you?" Hiro says.
"In Reality or the Metaverse?"
"The Metaverse."
"In the Metaverse, I'm on a plusbound monorail train. Just passed by Port 35."
"Already? It must be an express."
"Good thinking. That Clint you cut the arms off of is two cars ahead of me. I don't think he knows I'm following him."
"Where are you in Reality?"
"Public terminal across the street from a Reverend Wayne's," she says.
"Oh, yeah? How interesting."
"Just made a delivery there."
"What kind of delivery?"
He gets the whole story out of her, or what he thinks is the whole story -- there's no real way to tell.
"You're sure that the babbling2 that the people did in the park was the same as the babbling that the woman did at the Reverend Wayne's?"
"Sure," she says. "I know a bunch of people who go there. Or their parents go there and drag them along, you know."
"To the Reverend Wayne's Pearly Gates?"
"Yeah. And they all do that speaking in tongues. So I've heard it before."
"I'll talk to you later, pod," Hiro says. "I've got some serious research to do."
"Later."
The Babel/Infopocalypse card is resting in the middle of his desk. Hiro picks it up. The Librarian comes in.
Hiro is about to ask the Librarian whether he knows that Lagos is dead. But it's a pointless question. The Librarian knows it, but he doesn't. If he wanted to check the Library, he could find out in a few moments. But he wouldn't really retain the information. He doesn't have an independent memory. The Library is his memory, and he only uses small parts of it at once.
"What can you tell me about speaking in tongues?" Hiro says.
"The technical term is 'glossolalia,'" the Librarian says.
"Technical term? Why bother to have a technical term for a religious ritual?"
The Librarian raises his eyebrows4. "Oh, there's a great deal of technical literature on the subject. It is a neurological phenomenon that is merely exploited in religious rituals."
"It's a Christian5 thing, right?"
"Pentecostal Christians6 think so, but they are deluding7 themselves. Pagan Greeks did it -- Plato called it theornania. The Oriental cults9 of the Roman Empire did it. Hudson Bay Eskimos, Chukchi shamans, Lapps, Yakuts, Semang pygmies, the North Borneo cults, the Trhi-speaking priests of Ghana. The Zulu Amandiki cult8 and the Chinese religious sect10 of Shang-ti-hui. Spirit mediums of Tonga and the Brazilian Umbanda cult. The Tungus tribesmen of Siberia say that when the shaman goes into his trance and raves11 incoherent syllables12, he learns the entire language of Nature."
"The language of Nature."
"Yes, sir. The Sukuma people of Africa say that the language is kinatuns, the tongue of the ancestors of all magicians, who are thought to have descended13 from one particular tribe."
"What causes it?"
"If mystical explanations are ruled out, then it seems that glossolalia comes from structures buried deep within the brain, common to all people."
"What does it look like? How do these people act?"
"C. W. Shumway observed the Los Angeles revival14 of 1906 and noted15 six basic symptoms: complete loss of rational control; dominance of emotion that leads to hysteria; absence of thought or will; automatic functioning of the speech organs; amnesia16; and occasional sporadic17 physical manifestations18 such as jerking or twitching19. Eusebius observed similar phenomena20 around the year 300, saying that the false prophet begins by a deliberate suppression of conscious thought, and ends in a delirium21 over which he has no control."
"What's the Christian justification22 for this? Is there anything in the Bible that backs this up?"
"Pentecost."
"You mentioned that word earlier -- what is it?"
"From the Greek pentekostos, meaning fiftieth. It refers to the fiftieth day after the Crucifixion."
"Juanita just told me that Christianity was hijacked23 by viral influences when it was only fifty days old. She must have been talking about this. What is it?"
"'And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance24. Now there were dwelling25 in Jerusalem Jews, devout26 men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. And they were amazed and wondered, saying, "Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians, we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty27 works of God." And all were amazed and perplexed28, saying to one another, "What does this mean?"' Acts 2:4-12."
"Damned if I know," Hiro says. "Sounds like Babel in reverse."
"Yes, sir. Many Pentecostal Christians believe that the gift of tongues was given to them so that they could spread their religion to other peoples without having to actually learn their language. The word for that is 'xenoglossy'."
"That's what Rife29 was claiming in that piece of videotape, on top of the Enterprise. He said he could understand what those Bangladeshis were saying."
"Yes, sir."
"Does that really work?"
"In the sixteenth century, Saint Louis Bertrand allegedly used the gift of tongues to convert somewhere between thirty thousand and three hundred thousand South American Indians to Christianity," the Librarian says.
"Wow. Spread through that population even faster than smallpox30."
"What did the Jews think of this Pentecost thing?" Hiro says. "They were still running the country, right?"
"The Romans were running the country," the Librarian says, "but there were a number of Jewish religious authorities. At this time, there were three groups of Jews: the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes."
"I remember the Pharisees from Jesus Christ, Superstar. They were the ones with the deep voices who were always hassling Christ."
"They were hassling him," the Librarian says, "because they were religiously very strict. They adhered to a strong legalistic version of the religion; to them, the Law was everything. Clearly, Jesus was a threat to them because he was proposing, in effect, to do away with the Law."
"He wanted a contract renegotiation with God."
"This sounds like an analogy, which I am not very good at -- but even if it is taken literally31, it is true."
"Who were the other two groups?"
"The Sadducees were materialists."
"Meaning what? They drove BMWs?"
"No. Materialists in the philosophical32 sense. All philosophies are either monist or dualist. Monists believe that the material world is the only world -- hence, materialists. Dualists believe in a binary33 universe, that there is a spiritual world in addition to the material world."
"Well, as a computer geek, I have to believe in the binary universe."
The Librarian raises his eyebrows. "How does that follow?"
"Sorry. It's a joke. A bad pun. See, computers use binary code to represent information. So I was joking that I have to believe in the binary universe, that I have to be a dualist."
"How droll," the Librarian says, not sounding very amused. "Your joke may not be without genuine merit, however."
"How's that? I was just kidding, really."
"Computers rely on the one and the zero to represent all things. This distinction between something and nothing -- this pivotal separation between being and nonbeing -- is quite fundamental and underlies34 many Creation myths."
Hiro feels his face getting slightly warm, feels himself getting annoyed. He suspects that the Librarian may be pulling his leg, playing him for a fool. But he knows that the Librarian, however convincingly rendered he may be, is just a piece of software and cannot actually do such things.
"Even the word 'science' comes from an Indo-European root meaning 'to cut' or 'to separate.' The same root led to the word 'shit,' which of course means to separate living flesh from nonliving waste. The same root gave us 'scythe35' and 'scissors' and 'schism,' which have obvious connections to the concept of separation."
"How about 'sword'?"
"From a root with several meanings. One of those meanings is 'to cut or pierce.' One of them is 'post' or 'rod.' And the other is, simply, 'to speak.'"
"Let's stay on track," Hiro says.
"Fine. I can return to this potential conversation fork at a later time, if you desire."
"I don't want to get all forked up at this point. Tell me about the third group -- the Essenes."
"They lived communally36 and believed that physical and spiritual cleanliness were intimately connected. They were constantly bathing themselves, lying naked under the sun, purging37 themselves with enemas, and going to extreme lengths to make sure that their food was pure and uncontaminated. They even had their own version of the Gospels in which Jesus healed possessed38 people, not with miracles, but by driving parasites39, such as tapeworm, out of their body. These parasites are considered to be synonymous with demons41."
"They sound kind of like hippies."
"The connection has been made before, but it is faulty in many ways. The Essenes were strictly42 religious and would never have taken drugs."
"So to them there was no difference between infection with a parasite40, like tapeworm, and demonic possession."
"Correct."
"Interesting. I wonder what they would have thought about computer viruses?"
"Speculation43 is not in my programming."
"Speaking of which -- Lagos was babbling to me about viruses and infection and something called a nam-shub. What does that mean?"
"Nam-shub is a word from Sumerian."
"Sumerian?"
"Yes, sir. Used in Mesopotamia until roughly 2000 B.C. The oldest of all written languages."
"Oh. So all the other languages are descended from it?" For a moment, the Librarian's eyes glance upward, as if he's thinking about something. This is a visual cue to inform Hiro that he's making a momentary44 raid on the Library.
"Actually, no," the Librarian says. "No languages whatsoever45 are descended from Sumerian. It is an agglutinative tongue, meaning that it is a collection of morphemes or syllables that are grouped into words -- very unusual."
"You are saying," Hiro says, remembering Da5id in the hospital, "that if I could hear someone speaking Sumerian, it would sound like a long stream of short syllables strung together."
"Yes, sir."
"Would it sound anything like glossolalia?"
"Judgment46 call. Ask someone real," the Librarian says.
"Does it sound like any modern tongue?"
"There is no provable genetic47 relationship between Sumerian and any tongue that came afterward48."
"That's odd. My Mesopotamian history is rusty," Hiro says. "What happened to the Sumerians? Genocide?"
"No, sir. They were conquered, but there's no evidence of genocide per se."
"Everyone gets conquered sooner or later," Hiro says. "But their languages don't die out. Why did Sumerian disappear?"
"Since I am just a piece of code, I would be on very thin ice to speculate," the Librarian says.
"Okay. Does anyone understand Sumerian?"
"Yes, at any given time, it appears that there are roughly ten people in the world who can read it."
"Where do they work?"
"One in Israel. One at the British Museum. One in Iraq. One at the University of Chicago. One at the University of Pennsylvania. And five at Rife Bible College in Houston, Texas."
"Nice distribution. And have any of these people figured out what the word 'nam-shub' means in Sumerian?"
"Yes. A nam-shub is a speech with magical force. The closest English equivalent would be 'incantation,' but this has a number of incorrect connotations."
"Did the Sumerians believe in magic?"
The Librarian shakes his head minutely. "This is the kind of seemingly precise question that is in fact very profound, and that pieces of software, such as myself, are notoriously clumsy at. Allow me to quote from Kramer, Samuel Noah, and Maier, John R. Myths of Enki, the Crafty49 God. New York, Oxford50: Oxford University Press, 1989: 'Religion, magic, and medicine are so completely intertwined in Mesopotamia that separating them is frustrating51 and perhaps futile52 work. [Sumerian incantations] demonstrate an intimate connection between the religious, the magical, and the esthetic53 so complete that any attempt to pull one away from the other will distort the whole.' There is more material in here that might help explain the subject."
"In where?"
"In the next room," the Librarian says, gesturing at the wall. He walks over and slides the rice-paper partition out of the way.
A speech with magical force. Nowadays, people don't believe in these kinds of things. Except in the Metaverse, that is, where magic is possible. The Metaverse is a fictional54 structure made out of code. And code is just a form of speech -- the form that computers understand. The Metaverse in its entirety could be considered a single vast nam-shub, enacting55 itself on L. Bob Rife's fiber-optic network.
The voice phone rings. "Just a second," Hiro says.
"Take your time," the Librarian says, not adding the obvious reminder56 that he can wait for a million years if need be.
"Me again," Y.T. says. "I'm still on the train. Stumps57 got off at Express Port 127."
"Hmm. That's the antipode of Downtown. I mean, it's as far away from Downtown as you can get."
"It is?"
"Yeah. One-two-seven is two to the seventh power minus one -- "
"Spare me, I take your word for it. It's definitely out in the middle of fucking nowhere," she says.
"You didn't get off and follow him?"
"Are you kidding? All the way out there? It's ten thousand miles from the nearest building, Hiro."
She has a point. The Metaverse was built with plenty of room to expand. Almost all of the development is within two or three Express Ports -- five hundred kilometers or so -- of Downtown. Port 127 is twenty thousand miles away.
"What is there?"
"A black cube exactly twenty miles on a side."
"Totally black?"
"Yeah."
"How can you measure a black cube that big?"
"I'm riding along looking at the stars, okay? Suddenly, I can't see them anymore on the right side of the train. I start counting local ports. I count sixteen of them. We get to Express Port 127, and Stumpy climbs off and goes toward the black thing. I count sixteen more local ports and then the stars come out. Then I take thirty-two kilometers and multiply it by point six and I get twenty miles -- you asshole."
"That's good," Hiro says. "That's good intel."
"Who do you think owns a black cube twenty miles across?"
"Just going on pure, irrational58 bias59, I'm guessing L. Bob Rife. Supposedly, he has a big hunk of real estate out in the middle of nowhere where he keeps all the guts60 of the Metaverse. Some of us used to smash into it occasionally when we were out racing61 motorcycles."
"Well, gotta go, pod."
Hiro hangs up and walks into the new room. The Librarian follows.
It is about fifty feet on a side. The center of the space is occupied by three large artifacts, or rather three-dimensional renderings63 of artifacts. In the center is a thick slab64 of baked clay, hanging in space, about the size of a coffee table, and about a foot thick. Hiro suspects that it is a magnified rendering62 of a smaller object. The broad surfaces of the slab are entirely65 covered with angular writing that Hiro recognizes as cuneiform. Around the edges are rounded, parallel depressions that appear to have been made by fingers as they shaped the slab.
To the right of the slab is a wooden pole with branches on top, sort of a stylized tree. To the left of the slab is an eight-foot-high obelisk66, also covered with cuneiform, with a bas-relief figure chiseled67 into the top. The room is filled with a three-dimensional constellation68 of hypercards, hanging weightlessly in the air. It looks like a highspeed photograph of a blizzard69 in progress. In some places, the hypercards are placed in precise geometric patterns, like atoms in a crystal. In other places, whole stacks of them are clumped70 together. Drifts of them have accumulated in the corners, as though Lagos tossed them away when he was finished. Hiro finds that his avatar can walk right through the hypercards without disturbing the arrangement. It is, in fact, the three-dimensional counterpart of a messy desktop71, all the trash still remaining wherever Lagos left it. The cloud of hypercards extends to every corner of the 50-by-50-foot space, and from floor level all the way up to about eight feet, which is about as high as Lagos's avatar could reach.
"How many hypercards in here?"
"Ten thousand, four hundred and sixty-three," the Librarian says.
"I don't really have time to go through them," Hiro says. "Can you give me some idea of what Lagos was working on here?"
"Well, I can read back the names of all the cards if you'd like. Lagos grouped them into four broad categories: Biblical studies, Sumerian studies, neurolinguistic studies, and intel gathered on L. Bob Rife."
"Without going into that kind of detail -- what did Lagos have on his mind? What was he getting at?"
"What do I look like, a psychologist?" the Librarian says. "I can't answer those kinds of questions."
"Let me try it again. How does this stuff connect, if at all, to the subject of viruses?"
"The connections are elaborate. Summarizing them would require both creativity and discretion72. As a mechanical entity73, I have neither."
"How old is this stuff?" Hiro says, gesturing to the three artifacts.
"The clay envelope is Sumerian. It is from the third millennium74 B.C. It was dug up from the city of Eridu in southern Iraq. The black stele75 or obelisk is the Code of Hammurabi, which dates from about 1750 B.C. The treelike structure is a Yahwistic cult totem from Palestine. It's called an asherah. It's from about 900 B.C."
"Did you call that slab an envelope?"
"Yes. It has a smaller clay slab wrapped up inside of it. This was how the Sumerians made tamper-proof documents."
"All these things are in a museum somewhere, I take it?"
"The asherah and the Code of Hammurabi are in museums. The clay envelope is in the personal collection of L. Bob Rife."
"L. Bob Rife is obviously interested in this stuff."
"Rife Bible College, which he founded, has the richest archaeology76 department in the world. They have been conducting a dig in Eridu, which was the cult center of a Sumerian god named Enki."
"How are these things related to each other?"
The Librarian raises his eyebrow3. "I'm sorry?"
"Well, let's try process of elimination77. Do you know why Lagos found Sumerian writings interesting as opposed to, say, Greek or Egyptian?"
"Egypt was a civilization of stone. They made their art and architecture of stone, so it lasts forever. But you can't write on stone. So they invented papyrus78 and wrote on that. But papyrus is perishable79. So even though their art and architecture have survived, their written records -- their data -- have largely disappeared."
"What about all those hieroglyphic80 inscriptions81?"
"Bumper83 stickers, Lagos called them. Corrupt84 political speech. They had an unfortunate tendency to write inscriptions praising their own military victories before the battles had actually taken place?'
"And Sumer is different?"
"Sumer was a civilization of clay. They made their buildings of it and wrote on it, too. Their statues were of gypsum, which dissolves in water. So the buildings and statues have since fallen apart under the elements. But the clay tablets were either baked or else buried in jars. So all the data of the Sumerians have survived. Egypt left a legacy85 of art and architecture; Sumer's legacy is its megabytes."
"How many megabytes?"
"As many as archaeologists bother to dig up. The Sumerians wrote on everything. When they built a building, they would write in cuneiform on every brick. When the buildings fell down, these bricks would remain, scattered86 across the desert. In the Koran, the angels who are sent to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah say, We are sent forth87 to a wicked nation, so that we may bring down on them a shower of clay -- stones marked by your Lord for the destruction of the sinful.' Lagos found this interesting -- this promiscuous88 dispersal of information, written on a medium that lasts forever. He spoke89 of pollen90 blowing in the wind -- I gather that this was some kind of analogy."
"It was. Tell me -- has the inscription82 on this clay envelope been translated?"
"Yes. It is a warning. It says, 'This envelope contains the nam-shub of Enki'"
"I know what a nam-shub is. What is the nam-shub of Enki?" The Librarian stares off into the distance and clears his throat dramatically.
"Once upon a time, there was no snake, there was no scorpion91, There was no hyena92, there was no lion, There was no wild dog, no wolf, There was no fear, no terror, Man had no rival. In those days, the land Shubur-Hamazi, Harmony-tongued Sumer, the great land of the me of princeship, Un, the land having all that is appropriate, The land Martu, resting in security, The whole universe, the people well cared for, To Enlil in one tongue gave speech. Then the lord defiant93, the prince defiant, the king defiant, Enki, the lord of abundance, whose commands are trustworthy, The lord of wisdom, who scans the land, The leader of the gods, The lord of Eridu, endowed with wisdom, Changed the speech in their mouths, put contention94 into it, Into the speech of man that had been one.
That is Kramer's translation."
"That's a story," Hiro says. "I thought a nam-shub was an incantation."
"The nam-shub of Enki is both a story and an incantation," the Librarian says. "A self-fulfilling fiction. Lagos believed that in its original form, which this translation only hints at, it actually did what it describes."
"You mean, changed the speech in men's mouths."
"Yes," the Librarian says.
"This is a Babel story, isn't it?" Hiro says. "Everyone was speaking the same language, and then Enki changed their speech so that they could no longer understand each other. This must be the basis for the Tower of Babel stuff in the Bible."
"This room contains a number of cards tracing that connection," the Librarian says.
"You mentioned before that at one point, everyone spoke Sumerian. Then, nobody did. It just vanished, like the dinosaurs95. And there's no genocide to explain how that happened. Which is consistent with the Tower of Babel story, and the nam-shub of Enki. Did Lagos think that Babel really happened?"
"He was sure of it. He was quite concerned about the vast number of human languages. He felt there were simply too many of them."
"How many?"
"Tens of thousands. In many parts of the world, you will find people of the same ethnic96 group, living a few miles apart in similar valleys under similar conditions, speaking languages that have absolutely nothing in common with each other. This sort of thing is not an oddity -- it is ubiquitous. Many linguists97 have tried to understand Babel, the question of why human language tends to fragment, rather than converging98 on a common tongue?" "Has anyone come up with an answer yet?"
"The question is difficult and profound," the Librarian says. "Lagos had a theory."
"Yes?"
"He believed that Babel was an actual historical event. That it happened in a particular time and place, coinciding with the disappearance99 of the Sumerian language. That prior to Babel Infopocalypse, languages tended to converge100. And that afterward, languages have always had an innate101 tendency to diverge102 and become mutually incomprehensible -- that this tendency is, as he put it, coiled like a serpent around the human brainstem."
"The only thing that could explain that is -- " Hiro stops, not wanting to say it.
"Yes?" the Librarian says.
"If there was some phenomenon that moved through the population, altering their minds in such a way that they couldn't process the Sumerian language anymore. Kind of in the same way that a virus moves from one computer to another, damaging each computer in the same way. Coiling around the brainstem."
"Lagos devoted103 much time and effort to this idea," the Librarian says. "He felt that the nam-shub of Enki was a neurolinguistic virus."
"And that this Enki character was a real personage?"
"Possibly."
"And that Enki invented this virus and spread it throughout Sumer, using tablets like this one?"
"A tablet has been discovered containing a letter to Enki, in which the writer complains about it."
"A letter to a god?"
"Yes. It is from Sin-samuh, the Scribe. He begins by praising Enki and emphasizing his devotion to him. Then he complains:
'Like a young ... (line broken) I am paralyzed at the wrist. Like a wagon104 on the road when its yoke105 has split, I stand immobile on the road. I lay on a bed called "01 and 0 No!" I let out a wail106. My graceful107 figure is stretched neck to ground, I am paralyzed of foot. My ... has been carried off into the earth. My frame has changed. At night I cannot sleep, my strength has been struck down, my life is ebbing108 away. The bright day is made a dark day for me. I have slipped into my own grave. I, a writer who knows many things, am made a fool. My hand has stopped writing There is no talk in my mouth.'
"After more description of his woes109, the scribe ends with,
'My god, it is you I fear. I have written you a letter. Take pity on me. The heart of my god: have it given back to me.'"
收听单词发音 |
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aluminum
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babbling
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eyebrow
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eyebrows
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Christian
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Christians
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deluding
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cult
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cults
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sect
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raves
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syllables
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descended
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revival
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noted
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amnesia
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sporadic
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manifestations
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twitching
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phenomena
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delirium
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justification
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hijacked
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utterance
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dwelling
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devout
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mighty
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perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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rife
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| adj.(指坏事情)充斥的，流行的，普遍的 | |
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smallpox
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| n.天花 | |
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literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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philosophical
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| adj.哲学家的，哲学上的，达观的 | |
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binary
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| adj.二，双；二进制的；n.双(体)；联星 | |
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34
underlies
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| v.位于或存在于（某物）之下( underlie的第三人称单数 )；构成…的基础（或起因），引起 | |
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35
scythe
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| n. 长柄的大镰刀，战车镰； v. 以大镰刀割 | |
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communally
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| adv.共同地 | |
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37
purging
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| 清洗； 清除； 净化； 洗炉 | |
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38
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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39
parasites
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| 寄生物( parasite的名词复数 )； 靠他人为生的人； 诸虫 | |
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parasite
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| n.寄生虫；寄生菌；食客 | |
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41
demons
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| n.恶人( demon的名词复数 )；恶魔；精力过人的人；邪念 | |
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42
strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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43
speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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44
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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45
whatsoever
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| adv.（用于否定句中以加强语气）任何；pron.无论什么 | |
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46
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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47
genetic
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| adj.遗传的，遗传学的 | |
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48
afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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49
crafty
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| adj.狡猾的，诡诈的 | |
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50
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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51
frustrating
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| adj.产生挫折的，使人沮丧的，令人泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的现在分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧 | |
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52
futile
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| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
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53
esthetic
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| adj.美学的，审美的；悦目的，雅致的 | |
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54
fictional
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| adj.小说的，虚构的 | |
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55
enacting
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| 制定（法律），通过（法案）( enact的现在分词 ) | |
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56
reminder
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| n.提醒物，纪念品；暗示，提示 | |
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57
stumps
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| （被砍下的树的）树桩( stump的名词复数 )； 残肢； （板球三柱门的）柱； 残余部分 | |
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irrational
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| adj.无理性的，失去理性的 | |
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bias
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| n.偏见，偏心，偏袒；vt.使有偏见 | |
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guts
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| v.狼吞虎咽，贪婪地吃，飞碟游戏（比赛双方每组5人，相距15码，互相掷接飞碟）；毁坏（建筑物等）的内部( gut的第三人称单数 )；取出…的内脏n.勇气( gut的名词复数 )；内脏；消化道的下段；肠 | |
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racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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rendering
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| n.表现，描写 | |
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renderings
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| n.（戏剧或乐曲的）演奏( rendering的名词复数 )；扮演；表演；翻译作品 | |
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slab
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| n.平板，厚的切片；v.切成厚板，以平板盖上 | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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obelisk
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| n.方尖塔 | |
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chiseled
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| adj.凿刻的，轮廓分明的v.凿，雕，镌( chisel的过去式 ) | |
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constellation
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| n.星座n.灿烂的一群 | |
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blizzard
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| n.暴风雪 | |
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clumped
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| adj.[医]成群的v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的过去式和过去分词 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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71
desktop
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| n.桌面管理系统程序；台式 | |
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discretion
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| n.谨慎；随意处理 | |
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entity
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| n.实体，独立存在体，实际存在物 | |
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millennium
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| n.一千年，千禧年；太平盛世 | |
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stele
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| n.石碑，石柱 | |
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76
archaeology
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| n.考古学 | |
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77
elimination
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| n.排除，消除，消灭 | |
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78
papyrus
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| n.古以纸草制成之纸 | |
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perishable
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| adj.（尤指食物）易腐的，易坏的 | |
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80
hieroglyphic
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| n.象形文字 | |
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81
inscriptions
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| （作者）题词( inscription的名词复数 )； 献词； 碑文； 证劵持有人的登记 | |
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82
inscription
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| n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文 | |
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bumper
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| n.(汽车上的)保险杠；adj.特大的，丰盛的 | |
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corrupt
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| v.贿赂，收买；adj.腐败的，贪污的 | |
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legacy
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| n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西 | |
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scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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87
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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88
promiscuous
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| adj.杂乱的，随便的 | |
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89
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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90
pollen
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| n.[植]花粉 | |
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91
scorpion
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| n.蝎子，心黑的人，蝎子鞭 | |
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92
hyena
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| n.土狼，鬣狗 | |
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93
defiant
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| adj.无礼的，挑战的 | |
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94
contention
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| n.争论，争辩，论战；论点，主张 | |
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95
dinosaurs
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| n.恐龙( dinosaur的名词复数 )；守旧落伍的人，过时落后的东西 | |
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ethnic
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| adj.人种的，种族的，异教徒的 | |
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linguists
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| n.通晓数国语言的人( linguist的名词复数 )；语言学家 | |
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converging
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| adj.收敛[缩]的，会聚的，趋同的v.（线条、运动的物体等）会于一点( converge的现在分词 )；（趋于）相似或相同；人或车辆汇集；聚集 | |
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99
disappearance
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| n.消失，消散，失踪 | |
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100
converge
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| vi.会合；聚集，集中；(思想、观点等)趋近 | |
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101
innate
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| adj.天生的，固有的，天赋的 | |
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102
diverge
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| v.分叉，分歧，离题，使...岔开，使转向 | |
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103
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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104
wagon
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| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
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105
yoke
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| n.轭；支配；v.给...上轭，连接，使成配偶 | |
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106
wail
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| vt./vi.大声哀号，恸哭；呼啸，尖啸 | |
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107
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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108
ebbing
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| （指潮水）退( ebb的现在分词 )； 落； 减少； 衰落 | |
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109
woes
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| 困境( woe的名词复数 )； 悲伤； 我好苦哇； 某人就要倒霉 | |
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