16Hit1600
Information and IdeasMediumFinding that supports a historical claim

Information and Ideas practice question

A historian claims that the medieval town of Wexcombe was a major centre of the wool trade.

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

  1. A. Tax records from the period list dozens of Wexcombe merchants dealing in fleeces, in quantities larger than those recorded for neighbouring towns.Correct
  2. B. The town's church was rebuilt on a larger scale in the fourteenth century.
  3. C. Sheep are still farmed on the hills around Wexcombe today.
  4. D. A merchant from a nearby town wrote that Wexcombe's weekly market was small and poorly attended.

Answer: A. Tax records from the period list dozens of Wexcombe merchants dealing in fleeces, in quantities larger than those recorded for neighbouring towns.

Period records of many merchants trading fleeces in large quantities, more than nearby towns, are direct evidence of a major wool trade.

Why the other answers are wrong

B. The town's church was rebuilt on a larger scale in the fourteenth century.
A bigger church hints at wealth but says nothing about wool.
C. Sheep are still farmed on the hills around Wexcombe today.
Present-day farming doesn't establish what the town traded in the Middle Ages.
D. A merchant from a nearby town wrote that Wexcombe's weekly market was small and poorly attended.
This would count AGAINST the claim.

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