METHODS OF TEACHING

Curriculum Links of Language Studies with Other Subjects

Развитие межпредметных связей: изучение английского языка и мировой художественной культуры в 10–11-х классах

This materials aim to develop students’ knowledge of English and Art, offering a broader educational approach to teaching the language.

Theme 1

CULTURE AND ART (INTRODUCTION)

Culture (from Latin cultus – to care, refine) – 1) the customary beliefs, social forms of a racial, religious, or social groups; 2) the socially transmitted pattern of human behaviour that includes thought, speech, action, institutions, and artifacts; 3) intellectual and artistic enlightenment as distinguished from vocational and technical skills; 4) enlightenment and excellence of taste acquired by intellectual and aesthetic training.

Artefact/Artifact – a simple object, a tool or an ornament produced by human workmanship, a product of civilization. E.g. an artifact of the jet age.

Civilization – 1) the culture characteristic of a particular time or place; 2) a relatively high level of cultural and technological development.

Art – 1) all the processes and products of human skill, imagination, and invention; 2) the opposite of nature. The term may encompass literature, music, drama, painting, and sculpture.
Popularly, the term is most commonly used to refer to the visual arts. Recent technology has made new art forms possible, such as photography and cinema, and today electronic media have led to entirely new ways of creating and presenting visual images.

Fine arts are concerned primarily with beauty rather than utility and encompass painting, sculpture, graphics, photography, and music.

Decorative applied arts are concerned with utility, e.g. ornamented tableware, jewellery, clothes.

• Architecture – the art of designing structures. The term covers the design of the visual appearance of structures, their internal arrangements of space, selection of building materials, design of electrical and plumbing systems, selection of decorations and furnishings.

• Painting – application of colour, pigment, or paint to a flat surface or panel. The chief methods (techniques) of painting are:

• Tempera – emulsion painting, with a gelatinous (e.g. egg yolk) rather than oil base; known in Ancient Egypt.

• Fresco – watercolour painting on plaster walls, e.g. in the palace of Knossos, Crete.

• Ink painting was a method developed in China from calligraphy in the Sung period and highly popular in Japan from the 15th century.

• Oil – ground pigments in linseed, walnut, or other oil, spread from North to South Europe in the 15th century.

• Watercolour – pigments combined with gum Arabic and glycerol, which are diluted with water; the method was developed in the 15th–17th centuries from wash drawings.

• Acrylic – synthetic pigments developed after World War II; the colours are very hard and brilliant.

• Pastel – a drawing in pastel, i.e. in crayons made of a paste of powdered pigment mixed with gum.

Graphic arts – the fine and applied arts of representation, decoration, and writing or printing on flat surfaces. It is characterised by using mostly black and white colours.

Sculpture – the artistic shaping in relief or in the round of materials such as wood, stone, metal, and, more recently, plastic and other synthetics. Developments of the 20th century include the mobile, in which suspended components move spontaneously with the currents of air, and mechanised sculpture.

Literature – words set apart in some way from ordinary everyday communication. Literature serves as a means for exploration the human situations and expression of emotion. The English poet and critic Coleridge defined prose as words in their best order, and poetry as the best words in the best order. In practice poetry tends to be metrically formal (making it easier to memorise), whereas prose corresponds more closely to the patterns of ordinary speech.

Drama – distinct from literature in that it is a performing art open to infinite interpretation, the product not merely of the playwright but also of the collaboration of director, designer, actors, and technical staff.

Music is an art of combined sounds arranged according to fixed patterns and for aesthetic purpose.

Cinema – 20th century form of art and entertainment consisting of “moving pictures” in either black and white or colour, projected onto a screen. Cinema borrows from other arts, such as music, drama, and literature, but is entirely dependent on the technology of action photography, projection, sound reproduction and film processing and printing.

I. Questions:

1. What arts are mainly concerned with beauty? What arts are more focused on utility?

2. What art deals with selection of furnishings?

3. What is one of the 20th century developments in sculpture? What is it characterised by?

4. What is the difference between prose and poetry?

5. What arts does cinema borrow from?

II. Restore the omitted parts of the sentences.

1. Culture is the socially ______.

2. Culture is ______ by intellectual and aesthetic training.

3. ______ is a simple object ______.

4. Civilisation is the culture ______.

5. ______ human skill, imagination, and invention ______.

III. Find out and write the words derived from the following verbs: to act, to invent, to arrange, to furnish, to develop.
Use them in the word expressions mentioned in the text.

MODEL: to act – action
the technology of action photography (техника съемки на кинопленку)

IV. Match the words from the left and right columns into set expressions. Write out the expressions from the text. Find their Russian equivalent.

MODEL: 1. Plumbing system – водопроводная система.

V. Complete the following web-chart:

ART

VI. Useful vocabulary:

MAJOR PERIODS AND MOVEMENTS IN ART HISTORY

Theme 2

ANCIENT ART

Ancient Art – art of prehistoric cultures and the ancient civilisations, e.g. around the Mediterranean that predate the classical world of Greece and Rome (Sumerian and Aegean art).
Artifacts range from simple relics of the Paleolithic period, such as pebbles carved with symbolic figures, to the sophisticated art forms of Ancient Egypt and Assyria.

Paleolithic Art

The earliest surviving artifacts are mainly from Europe, dating back to 30,000–10,000 BC. This was the period of hunter-gathering cultures. Items that survive are small sculptures, such as the Willendorf Venus carved from a small stone and simply painted. Cave paintings in different places depict animals – bison, bulls, horses, and deer – and a few human figures. It is probable that the caves were decorated as part of magical rituals, perhaps to ensure successful hunts. The underground network of caves at Lascaux, south-west France, have some artworks with well-defined features and strong colouring, e.g. the Galloping Horse.

Neolithic Art

The Neolithic Era (4000–2400 BC) is generally understood as that time period during which people began to settle into small agricultural communities and eventually formed cities. Various artistic expressions developed as people required permanent dwellings (architecture), furniture and utensils (woodcraft and pottery), a fixed location for gods (temple buildings and religious objects) and secure places for the bodies of the deceased (tombs and urns).
Some artifacts of the Neolithic Era are everyday objects. They reveal that fishing and hunting were the main occupations of that time. Neolithic people decorated clay vessels, created stone, horn and wooden figurines of people and animals.
Human figurines are often understood as fertility and/or worship figures, although their exact purpose remains unknown. Most of the statuettes were found in burial locations.
Characteristic of late Neolithic Mesopotamian art are the large eyes of human figurines, the arms folded across the abdomen, and the staring, supplicant appearance.
The Bronze Age overlaps the Neolithic Era in time and is generally marked by an increased use of metals to replace stone tools and an increase in human settlements, often with locations with large megalithic structures, such as Carnac in France and Stonehenge in Britain.

Egyptian Art

The history of ancient Egypt falls into three periods: the Old, the Middle, and the New Kingdoms, covering about 3,000 years between them. Sculpture and painting of these periods use strict conventions and symbols based on religious beliefs. The best known artifacts of the time are: the monumental sculpture of the Sphinx; the treasures of grave goods; the temples of Karnak and Luxor and the maze of tombs in the Valley of the Kings; and the golden coffins of Tutankhamen’s mummified body.
Ancient Egyptian architectural development parallels the chronology of the historical periods: Old Kingdom, 2680–2258 BC, Middle Kingdom, 2134–1786 BC, New Kingdom, 1570–1085 BC.
Old Kingdom remains are almost entirely sepulchral, chiefly the tombs of monarchs and nobles. The Mastaba is the oldest remaining form of sepulcher; it is a rectangular, flat-roofed structure with sloping walls containing chambers built over the mummy pit. The pyramid of a sovereign was begun as soon as he ascended the throne. Groups of pyramids remain; those at Giza, which include the Great Pyramid of Cheops, are among the best known.
Middle Kingdom tombs were tunnelled out of the rock cliffs on the west bank of the Nile; among them the remarkable group (c.1991–1786 BC) at Beni Hasan.
New Kingdom temples in the environs of Thebes, such as those of Medinet Habu and the Ramesseum, derived their form from the funerary chapels of previous ages. This period was a time of great temple construction, those temples extant conforming to a distinct type. The doorway in the massive facade is flanked by great sloping towers, or pylons, in front of which obelisks and colossal statues were often placed. The more important temples were approached between rows of sculptured rams and sphinxes. A high enclosing wall screened the building from the common people, who had no share in the temple rituals practiced solely by the king, the officials, and the priesthood. Beyond the open colonnaded courtyard was the great hypostyle hall with immense columns arranged in a central nave and side aisles. The shorter columns of the latter permitted a clerestory for the admission of light. Behind the hypostyle hall were small sanctuaries, where only the king and priests might enter, and behind these were small service chambers.
The Great Temple of Amon at Karnak is a product of many successive additions; the central columns of its hypostyle hall are the largest known. In the temples that resulted from many additions, unity of design was often sacrificed to sheer size. New Kingdom temples were also excavated from rock. The temples of Abu-Simbel begun by Seti I (1302–1290 BC), have four colossal figures, sculptured from solid rock, of Ramses II, who completed the temples.

Sumerian Art

More than 4,000 years ago the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers began to teem with life – producing first the Sumerian, then the Babylonian, Assyrian, and Persian Empires. Excavations have unearthed evidence of great skill and artistry.
From Sumeria we have examples of fine works in marble, diorite, hammered gold, and lapis lazuli. Of the many portraits produced in this area, some of the best are those of Gudea, ruler of Lagash.
Some of the portraits are in marble, others, such as the one in the Louvre in Paris, are cut in gray-black diorite. Dating from about 2400 BC, they have the smooth perfection and idealized features of the classical period in Sumerian art.
Sumerian art and architecture was ornate and complex. Clay was the Sumerians’ most abundant material. Stone, wood, and metal had to be imported.
Art was primarily used for religious purposes.

Sumerian techniques and motifs were widely available because of the invention of cuneiform writing before 3000 BC. This system of writing developed before the last centuries of the 4th millennium BC, in the lower Tigris and Euphrates valley, most likely by the Sumerians. The characters consist of arrangements of wedge-like strokes, generally on clay tablets.
Among other Sumerian art forms were the clay cylinder seals used to mark documents or property. They were highly sophisticated.
The Sumerian temple was a small brick house that the god was supposed to visit periodically. It was ornamented so as to recall the reed houses built by the earliest Sumerians in the valley. This house, however, was set on a brick platform, which became larger and taller as time progressed until the platform at Ur (built around 2100 BC) was 45 by 60 meters and 23 meters high. These Mesopotamian temple platforms are called ziggurats, a word derived from the Assyrian ziqquratu, meaning “high.” They were symbols in themselves; the ziggurat at Ur was planted with trees to make it represent a mountain. There the god visited Earth, and the priests climbed to its top to worship. The ziggurat was one of the world’s first great architectural structures.

Ziggurat

Babylonian Art

In the 18th cent. BC, Babylonia under Hammurabi rose to power and dominated Mesopotamia. A diorite head, wide-eyed, bearded, found at Susa (1792–50 BC; Louvre), is generally taken to be a portrait of Hammurabi. The surface is carved to show the marks of aging on a sensitive face. The great basalt stele found in Susa upon which Hammurabi’s immortal code of law is inscribed bears a relief at the top showing the king himself before the sun god who commands him to set down the law for his people (c.1750 BC; Louvre). Hammurabi is also represented kneeling in prayer in a sculpture in the round that is coloured green and on which the hands and face have been gilded.
A sculpture from Mari of a fertility goddess, holding a vase from which water flows down her skirt, further attests to the genius of Babylonian sculptors. Several examples of terra-cotta plaques of this period in the Louvre depict scenes of Babylonian daily life, including agricultural pursuits and crafts such as carpentry. Babylonia was also a glassmaking centre, but far less glass than sculpture has survived its destructive climate.
After Hammurabi’s death Mesopotamia was torn for centuries by foreign invasions. For a time the Assyrian warrior people held sway and established some cultural coherence (see Assyrian art). One of their kings, Sennacherib, razed the city of Babylon. Babylonia was not to be reborn until Nebuchadnezzar divided the Assyrian lands with the Medes in 612 BC. Under his rule the Babylonians developed to perfection one of their most striking arts: the great polychrome-glazed brick walls modelled in relief, the foremost example of which is the Ishtar gates of Babylon. These, produced for Nebuchadnezzar, contain 575 reliefs of lions, dragons, and bulls of superb workmanship.
The king’s palace, with its courtyard and hanging (balconied) gardens (constructed more than a century before Nebuchadnezzar came to power), the Ishtar gates, and the royal processional road made Babylon a city of unrivalled magnificence in its time. Its artisans were able to draw upon materials and styles from an area bounded only by Egypt and India. The new splendour was short-lived; less than a century later Babylonia fell prey to more invasions, and the Persians, Greeks, and Romans ruled in succession. The great Mesopotamian civilisations eventually crumbled. They were forgotten until archaeologists of the 19th century began to bring to light something of their history and appearance.

Assyrian Art

An Assyrian artistic style distinct from that of Babylonian art began to emerge in 1500 BC and lasted until the fall of Nineveh in 612 BC. The characteristic Assyrian art form was the polychrome carved stone relief that decorated imperial monuments. The precisely delineated reliefs concern royal affairs, chiefly hunting and war making. Predominance is given to animal forms, particularly horses and lions, which are magnificently represented in great detail. Human figures are comparatively rigid and static but are also minutely detailed, as in triumphal scenes of sieges, battles, and individual combat.
Among the best known of Assyrian reliefs are the lion-hunt alabaster carvings showing Assurnasirpal II (9th cent. BC) and Assurbanipal (7th cent. BC), both of which are in the British Museum. Guardian animals, usually lions and winged beasts with bearded human heads, were sculpted partially in the round for fortified royal gateways, an architectural form common throughout Asia Minor. At Nimrod carved ivories and bronze bowls were found that are decorated in the Assyrian style but were produced by Phoenician and Aramaean artisans. Exquisite examples of Assyrian relief carving may be seen at the British and Metropolitan (NYCity) museums.

Persian Art

The long prehistoric period in Iran, is known to us mostly from excavation work carried out in a few key sites, which has led to a chronology of distinct periods, each one characterised by the development of certain types of pottery, artefacts and architecture. Pottery is one of the oldest Persian art forms, and examples have been unearthed from burial mounds (Tappeh), dating back from the 5th millennium BC.
The “Animal style” which uses decorative animal motifs is very strong in the Persian culture first appearing in pottery, reappearing much later in the Luristan bronzes and again in Scythian art.

Darius I’s palace in Persepolis was magnificently decorated in 518–516 BC with low relief friezes cut in stone.

During the Achaemenian and Sassanian periods, metal-work continued its ornamental development. Some of the most beautiful examples of metal-ware are gilded silver cups and dishes decorated with royal hunting scenes from the Sassanian Dynasty.

Aegean Art

The art of the Aegean refers to those civilisations that flourished between c.3000 BC and c.1150 BC in the area known as the Aegean Sea. Bounded by modern Greece on the west and north, by Turkey to the east and the island of Crete to the south, the ancient cultures of the Aegean were the precursors to the classical Greek civilisation.
Several cultures developed on the islands and mainland surrounding the Aegean Sea. For instance, in Crete art forms were developed about 1800–1400 BC by wall paintings at the palace of Knossos, ceramics, and naturalistic bull’s heads in bronze and stone. On the Greek mainland, Mycenean culture reached its peak around 1400 to 1200 BC. Surviving examples of this culture include the ruins of the palace at Mycenae, gold masks, and metalwork.
The Aegean Bronze Age coincides with the period of the Aegean civilisations, and ends with their collapse and the arrival of invading Iron Age cultures.
Unlike the Egyptian civilisation very few written accounts exist that can give us an accurate picture of the times. Much of our understanding of the cultures in the Aegean throughout this period comes from excavated palaces, houses and artifacts. This knowledge, linked with what we know of other civilisations before, during and after, has given historians the opportunity to piece together an idea of their lifestyles, beliefs, history and culture.
The Neolithic people of the Aegean were initially living as small farming communities spread thinly along coastal mainland areas and on the many islands. As they slowly formed into larger settlements the groups began to develop customs and beliefs which, with increasing trade and knowledge, gave rise to larger civilisations centred on the Cyclades and Crete.
The Cycladian civilisation, which was centred on the many islands north of Crete, began to develop on the island group included Kos, Delos, Milos, Siros and Thira.
Marble carvings from the 3rd millennium of heads and figures are very Neolithic in their simplicity and are presumed to be ritual objects since nearly all have been found in stone-lined burial chambers called cists. Most of these sculptures are just a few centimetres long with a few reaching 1.5 metres.
The most complete examples of Cycladic painting have come from the island of Thira and include scenes depicting festivals, animals, sports and warfare, all with some apparent religious significance. The striking art of this early Aegean Bronze Age culture produced a wide range of objects including polished pottery (often decorated with incised geometric and spiral designs), metalwork and wall paintings.

The first cultural flowering on Greek lands began in Minoan Crete around 3000 BC. The Minoan civilisation was one of the most unique and influential of its age, and at its height was a major seafaring power with wealth, lavish buildings, political stability and a high level of artistic and architectural creativity.
The first Cretans were Neolithic farmers, but with the introduction of metals in c.3000 BC the island was slowly transformed, and its people grouped into a number of major centres of populations, controlled by separate rulers living in large palaces.
Archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans who called the people Minoans after the legendary King Minos, was the first to discover the ancient civilisation after he began excavating the palace at Knossos in 1900.
The palace at Knossos covered about 2.5 hectares (6 acres) and had a surrounding city which could have supported a population of over 50,000 people. It was built around an uncovered courtyard with rooms coming off the sides for living and official purposes. It was unique for having many passages with no clearly direct route to rooms; this design aspect probably gave rise to the legendary labyrinth of the Minotaur in Greek mythology.

There was a throne room, many storage rooms, sunken pools and baths with running water, toilets which flushed into sewers as well as terraces, covered porches and light walls to reflect sunlight into dark rooms.
Built of stone, rubble and sun-dried brick, with stucco walls painted with brightly coloured frescoes, the emphasis was on interior comfort, light, space and convenience. Water was brought in from many kilometres away along close fitting tapered terracotta pipes, while drains and drainpipes also carried away rain and wastewater. Well designed for hot climates, allowance was made for cool winds to circulate with the strategic placement of folding doors to direct breezes. A feature of Minoan architecture are the downward tapering painted wooden pillars with their flattened, bulging blue capitals which held up large flat roofs and were frequently used in the construction of colonnades.
Minoan painting is highly individualistic. Colourful, lively and at times almost impressionistic, the Minoan artists achieved great skill through their imaginative use of form and space. Compared to both Egyptian and Mesopotamian painting there is greater spontaneity, more animated human representation and an increased sense of realism and design.
Minoan painting lacked the constraints imposed on other civilisations by a dominant ruling priesthood, and as such the wall paintings give us some insight into the courtly life, games, rituals, plants and animals prominent in their lives.
Unfortunately much of the fresco work discovered is very fragmentary. The main features of their style however demonstrate a strong use of reds, blues, greens and yellows, bold outlines filled with flat washes and a convention of painting women white, men red and the dead blue. In fact so skilled in the true fresco style were the Minoans that no other civilisation attained the same degree of control until the Romans 2000 years later.
Early painting consists of simple decorative abstract patterns in spirals and meanders, while later work sees a greater use of natural forms such as flowers and animals.
The Minoans were highly skilled in the art of pottery, an artifact that not only had numerous uses within their own civilisation, but one that was a sought after commodity by other cultures. As in painting there is a strong understanding of form and decoration in their work where floral and marine motifs evolve into stylised, attractive and often complex imaginative designs. Two styles of pottery painting stand out; the “marine style” which uses naturalistic subjects such as fish and the octopus, and the “palace style” where the pictorial qualities become more ordered and symmetrical with the use of geometric patterns.
As the Aegean Bronze Age began later on mainland Greece than it did on Crete, large settlements took longer to develop into effective centres of civilisation; the culture at this time was called “Early Helladic”. Around 2000 BC after invasion from the north, there followed a period which saw new architectural forms, burial customs and artifacts evolve. This culture has been called Mycenaean after the excavated ancient city of Mycenae on the Peleponnesus in southern Greece. Again in about 1600 BC they were conquered, this time by the warlike Achaians who probably provided the Mycenaeans with powerful leadership. Finally in 1150 BC the culture collapsed through a likely combination of earthquake and Doric invasion.
The Mycenaeans were a warrior culture and eventually became the major Aegean power around 1400 BC after the decline of Minoan civilisation. They colonised widely and traded with both central Europe and across the Mediterranean. They are sometimes called the “first Greeks”.
The Mycenaeans and Minoans had plenty of contact with each other and as such Mycenaean artistic and architectural styles were very much influenced by the Cretan civilisation. Two notable features of Mycenaean architecture are the Megaron and the Tholos tombs. Megarons are isolated rectangular rooms usually surrounded by corridors and are the forerunner of classical Greek temples.Tholos tombs are dug into hillsides and have circular floors and a domed ceiling constructed with close fitting stones. They were designed for royalty.
The fortress palace of Mycenae and the one at Tiryns were probably built not long after Knossos and display a combination of Minoan and mainland Greek influences. Palaces were also built at Athens, Thebes, Pylos, Lolkos and Orchomenos. Although Mycenae was discovered first in 1876 by German Heinrich Schliemann, it is possible that Tiryns was the first built as it follows the Minoan style of an open square court with a main hall surrounded by minor halls, chambers and corridors, unlike Mycenae where the main hall is separate.
The palaces were generally only one story in height and surrounded by massive rough shaped stone walls, while on the interior the plastered walls were richly decorated with frescos.
The wall that surrounds the palace at Mycenae consists of two entrances, one of which is called the Lion Gate. This large rectangular post and lintel opening is topped with two 3-metre-high relief carved lions, part standing, with heads turned outward. It is the largest known sculpture to come out of the Aegean Bronze Age civilisations.
It is very probable that the Mycenaeans employed Minoan artists, craftworkers and architects for long periods particularly in the early stage of their development, and perhaps it is through this process that they learnt many of their skills. Fresco painting for example is produced using the same Minoan technique.

Make ten questions about Ancient Art.

MODEL: Where are the earliest artifacts from?

I. Complete the chart:

II. Read the text and look at the reconstruction of Stonehenge in the picture. Fill in the gaps with correct word forms derived from the words in brackets.

WHAT IS STONEHENGE?

When we try to learn of the accomplishments of ancient man, we usually have to search or dig for evidence. But there is a case where ancient man has left all the evidence standing in a huge structure, and we still cannot figure out what it is, what it was used for, and who built it!
This is Stonehenge. It consists of large, standing stones in a circular setting, surrounded by an earthwork, and located near Salisbury, England. As long ago as the year 1136, it was written that the stones were __________ (magic) transported from Ireland by Merlin. Of course, this was only a legend. More recently, it was believed that Stonehenge was put up by the Druids, who were priests in ancient England. But there is _________ (actual) no reason to believe this is so.
Stonehenge has a somewhat complicated structure. On the outside is a circular ditch, with an entrance gap. Then there is a bank of earth. Inside the bank is a ring of 56 pits. Between these and the stones in the centre, are two more rings of pits.

The stone setting consists of two circles and two “horseshoes” of upright stones. Then there are separate stones which have been given names, such as the Altar stone, the Slaughter stone, two Station stones, and the Hele stone.
In most of the holes that have been excavated, cremated human bones have been found. By studying the ________ (pot) and objects found, and by making radioactive-carbon tests, it has been estimated that parts of Stonehenge date back to about 1848 BC, and, ________ (possible) 275 years _________ (early) or __________ (late) than this date.

Part of Stonehenge is aligned so that rising sun in midsummer is seen at a certain point, but nobody is sure if this was ________ (intention).
So this huge and ________ (remark) structure, which may be 4,000 years old, still remains a ________ (fascinate) mystery!

III. Write out all passive forms from the text defining the tense form, e.g. it was built (Past Simple Passive).

IV. Choose correct tense forms.

HOW WERE THE EGYPTIAN PYRAMIDS BUILT?

No one (knew, knows, is known) exactly how old the pyramids are. A thousand years before Christ, they (were, are, are being) already old and mysterious. The Great Pyramid at Giza (attributed, is attributed, has been attributed) to King Cheops of the fourth dynasty (about 2900 BC).
The pyramids are tombs. The ancient Egyptian kings (believed, believe, have believed) that their future lives (depend, depended, are depended) upon the perfect preservation of their bodies. The dead (is, are, were) therefore embalmed, and the mummies were hidden below ground level in the interior of these great masses of stone. Even the inner passages (are being blocked, have been blocked, were blocked) and concealed from possible robbers. Food and other necessities (had been put, were put, were being put) in the tombs for the kings to eat in their future lives.
The building of such a tremendous structure was a marvellous engineering feat. It (is said, says, is being said) that it took 100,000 men working for twenty years to build the Great Pyramid! Each block of stone is 7 feet high. Some are 18 feet across!

The blocks of limestone and granite used in building the Great Pyramid (are brought, were brought, have been brought) by boat from quarries across the Nile and to the south. This (can be done, could be done, could do) only three months each spring when the Nile was flooded. So it (takes, is taking, took) twenty years and some 500,000 trips to bring all the stone needed!
Boats (unload, were unloaded, unloaded) at a landing area connected to the site of the pyramid by a stone road. The blocks, weighing about 2 tons each, were then pulled up the road on sledges by gangs of men. Stone blocks pulled up the road (were laid, were being laid, had been laid) out in neat rows and then pulled to the site. The number of blocks in the Great Pyramid (is estimated, have been estimated, estimated) at 2,300,000.
As the pyramid rose, a huge ramp was built to get the materials to higher levels. Gangs of men pulled the blocks up the ramp. The final surface (is made, made, was made) of very smooth limestone with almost invisible joints. The pyramid (has, had, has had) three inner chambers.

V. Useful vocabulary:

SOME ARTIFACTS OF NEOLITHIC ART

Megalith a stone of great size, especially in primitive monumental remains, as menhirs, dolmens, cromlechs.

Dolmen a structure usually regarded as a tomb consisting of two or more large, upright stones set with a space between and capped by a horizontal stone.

Menhir an upright monumental stone, standing either alone or with others, as in cromlech.

Cromlech a circle of upright stones or monoliths.

Submitted by Irina Ishkhneli,
School No. 1738, Moscow

to be continued