Diagnostic Test 17 Practice Test

An archaeologist proposes that a newly discovered riverside site functioned as a seasonal trading hub rather than a permanent settlement. The hypothesis rests on the absence of long-term dwellings and the presence of surfaces suggesting repeated short-term construction. Proponents argue that traders and craftspeople likely converged during specific months to exchange goods, then dispersed. Critics suggest the site could instead be a ritual precinct or a small hamlet that eroded away. To adjudicate among these interpretations, researchers seek evidence of periodic occupation and wide-ranging exchange: recurring, temporary structures and material culture from diverse regions would favor the market hypothesis. Conversely, extended domestic features or localized toolkits would point toward a permanent residential community.

Which finding, if true, would most directly support the scholar's claim?

In accounts of an ancient coastal trade network, modern economists often assume that merchants prioritized profit, treating ritual exchanges as decorative extras. I argue this marketplace myth misreads the evidence: traders sought prestige and political alliances first, sometimes at the expense of immediate gain. Feast sponsorships and ceremonial gift cycles coordinated voyages; ship manifests track obligations owed to hosts as carefully as cargo weights. If alliance-building predominated, we should find itineraries that detour to maintain relationships even when prices were better elsewhere, and texts that frame exchanges in terms of honor and reciprocity rather than margins and arbitrage.

Which finding, if true, would most directly weaken the anthropologist's claim?