剑桥雅思15Test1阅读Passage1原文及翻译：肉豆蔻--一种珍贵的香料

每年年中左右，国内“雅思图”都要翘首期盼一件重要大事的来临:雅思真题的发布。无论是备考初期、后期,甚至已经考过雅思的学生，也无论是学生还是老师,都会密切关注新题的发布。今年6月初,《剑15》如约而至、作为国内雅思培训的领军机构，新航道也时间为考生们带来了这太《剑桥雅思真题全解15:学术类》(以下简称《剑15全解》)。

本次我们盛情邀请了新航道全国冬分校最的学科带头人来组织编写这本《剑15全解》。其中，对于以客观选择题为主的听力与阅读部分，仍然请各校团队进行解题思路方面的指导;对于以主观题为主的写作与口语部分，我们则邀请了官方认证考官撰写地道的高分范文，作为官方范文之外的补充。下文中详细整理了剑桥雅思15Test1阅读Passage1答案及解析内容，一起来看一下吧！

剑桥15电子版本，请扫描二维码，暗号“优化+剑桥15全解”，会有老师联系并发送资料。

1剑桥雅思15Test1阅读Passage1原文

Nutmeg - a valuable spice

The nutmeg tree, Myristica fragrans, is a large evergreen tree native to Southeast Asia. Until the late 18th century, it only grew in one place in the world: a small group of islands in the Banda Sea, part of the Moluccas - or Spice Islands - in northeastern Indonesia. The tree is thickly branched with dense foliage of tough, dark green oval leaves, and produces small, yellow, bell-shaped flowers and pale yellow pear-shaped fruits. The fruit is encased in a fleshy husk. When the fruit is ripe, this husk splits into two halves along a ridge running the length of the fruit. Inside is a purple-brown shiny seed, 2-3 cm long by about 2cm across, surrounded by a lacy red or crimson covering called an 'aril'. These are the sources of the two spices nutmeg and mace, the former being produced from the dried seed and the latter from the aril.

Nutmeg was a highly prized and costly ingredient in European cuisine in the Middle Ages, and was used as a flavouring, medicinal, and preservative agent. Throughout this period, the Arabs were the exclusive importers of the spice to Europe. They sold nutmeg for high prices to merchants based in Venice, but they never revealed the exact location of the source of this extremely valuable commodity. The Arab-Venetian dominance of the trade finally ended in 1512, when the Portuguese reached the Banda Islands and began exploiting its precious resources.

Always in danger of competition from neighbouring Spain, the Portuguese began subcontracting their spice distribution to Dutch traders. Profits began to flow into the Netherlands, and the Dutch commercial fleet swiftly grew into one of the largest in the world. The Dutch quietly gained control of most of the shipping and trading of spices in Northern Europe. Then, in 1580, Portugal fell under Spanish rule, and by the end of the 16th century the Dutch found themselves locked out of the market. As prices for pepper, nutmeg, and other spices soared across Europe, they decided to fight back.

In 1602, Dutch merchants founded the VOC, a trading corporation better known as the Dutch East India Company. By 1617, the VOC was the richest commercial operation in the world. The company had 50,000 employees worldwide, with a private army of 30,000 men and a fleet of 200 ships. At the same time, thousands of people across Europe were dying of the plague, a highly contagious and deadly disease. Doctors were desperate for a way to stop the spread of this disease, and they decided nutmeg held the cure. Everybody wanted nutmeg, and many were willing to spare no expense to have it. Nutmeg bought for a few pennies in Indonesia could be sold for 68,000 times its original cost on the streets of London. The only problem was the short supply. And that’s where the Dutch found their opportunity.

The Banda Islands were ruled by local sultans who insisted on maintaining a neutral trading policy towards foreign powers. This allowed them to avoid the presence of Portuguese or Spanish troops on their soil, but it also left them unprotected from other invaders. In 1621, the Dutch arrived and took over. Once securely in control of the Bandas, the Dutch went to work protecting their new investment. They concentrated all nutmeg production into a few easily guarded areas, uprooting and destroying any trees outside the plantation zones. Anyone caught growing a nutmeg seedling or carrying seeds without the proper authority was severely punished. In addition, all exported nutmeg was covered with lime to make sure there was no chance a fertile seed which could be grown elsewhere would leave the islands. There was only one obstacle to Dutch domination. One of the Banda Islands, a sliver of land called Run, only 3 km long by less than 1 km wide, was under the control of the British. After decades of fighting for control of this tiny island, the Dutch and British arrived at a compromise settlement, the Treaty of Breda, in 1667. Intent on securing their hold over every nutmeg-producing island, the Dutch offered a trade: if the British would give them the island of Run, they would in tur*n give Britain a distant and much less valuable island in North America. The British agreed. That other island was Manhattan, which is how New Amsterdam became New "York. The Dutch now had a monopoly over the nutmeg trade which would last for another century.

Then, in 1770, a Frenchman named Pierre Poivre successfully smuggled nutmeg plants to safety in Mauritius, an island off the coast of Africa. Some of these were later exported to the Caribbean where they thrived, especially on the island of Grenada. Next, in 1778, a volcanic eruption in the Banda region caused a tsunami that wiped out half the nutmeg groves. Finally, in 1809, the British returned to Indonesia and seized the Banda Islands by force. They returned the islands to the Dutch in 1817, but not before transplanting hundreds of nutmeg seedlings to plantations in several locations across southern Asia. The Dutch nutmeg monopoly was over.

Today, nutmeg is grown in Indonesia, the Caribbean, India, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea and Sri Lanka, and world nutmeg production is estimated to average between 10,000 and 12,000 tonnes per year.

2剑桥雅思15Test1阅读Passage1原文翻译

肉豆蔻--一种珍贵的香料

肉豆蔻树是一种大型常绿乔木，原产于东南亚。在18世纪晚期以前，全世界只有一个地方能找到它：班达海中的几个小岛，属于印度尼西亚东北部的马鲁古群岛(又称香料群岛)。此树枝干粗大，树叶浓密坚韧，呈深绿色的椭圆状，开黄色钟状小花，结淡黄色梨形果实。果实包在肉质的外壳里。果实成熟时，外壳会沿着果实纵长的隆起处裂开。里面是一颗有光泽的紫褐色种子，长2-3厘米，宽约2厘米，周围有一层网眼状的红色或深红色覆盖物，称为“假种皮”。这些就是肉豆蔻仁和肉豆蔻皮这两种香料的来源，前者取自晒干的种子，后者取自假种皮。

肉豆蔻是中世纪欧洲烹饪中备受推崇且昂贵的原料，它曾被用作调味剂、药剂和防腐剂。在整个中世纪时期，阿拉伯人是欧洲的香料进口商。他们把肉豆蔻高价卖给威尼斯的商人，但他们从未透露过这种极有价值的商品的确切产地。直到1512年葡萄牙人到达班达群岛并开始开发其珍贵的资源时，阿拉伯人与威尼斯人对贸易的统治才结束由于总是面临来自邻国西班牙的竞争，葡萄牙人开始将他们的香料外销转包给荷兰商人。利润开始流入荷兰，荷兰商船队迅为当时世界上的商船队。荷兰人悄悄控制了北欧大部分的香料运输和贸易。随后在1580年，葡萄牙被西班牙统治。到了16世纪末，荷兰人发现自己被市场拒之门外。随着胡椒、肉豆蔻和其他香料在欧洲的价格飙升，他们决定反击。

1602年，荷兰商人创立了VOC，这是一家贸易公司，即众所周知的荷兰东印度公司。到1617年，VOC已经成为当时世界上最富有的商业公司。该公司在全球拥有5万名雇员，还拥有3万人的私人军队和200艘船的舰队。此时，欧洲各地成千上万的人死于鼠疫，这是一种高度传染性的致命疾病。医生们迫切希望找到一种方法来阻止这种疾病的传播，他们认定肉豆蔻有疗效。人人都想要肉豆蔻，许多人愿意不惜一切代价得到它。在印尼花几分钱就能买到的肉豆蔻在伦敦市场的售价是原价的68000倍。的问题是供应不足。这正是荷兰人发现商机的地方。

班达群岛由当地的苏丹统治，他们坚持对外国势力保持中立的贸易政策。这使他们能够免遭葡萄牙或西班牙军队的入侵，但也使他们面临其他入侵者的威胁。1621年，荷兰人占领了这里。一旦牢牢控制了班达群岛，荷兰人就开始保护他们的新地盘。他们把所有的肉豆蔻种植集中在几个易于把守的地区，将种植区外的肉豆蔻树连根拔起并摧毁。任何人若被抓到未经许可种植肉豆蔻幼苗或携带种子都将受到严厉惩罚。此外，所有出口的肉豆蔻都撒上石灰，以确保不会有可发芽的种子离开(班达)群岛到其他地方生长。荷兰统治的障碍只有一个。班达群岛中有一小块叫作岚屿的小岛，只有3公里长，不到1公里宽，当时处于英国人统治之下。经过几十年对这个小岛的争夺，荷兰和英国在1667年达成了协议，即《布雷达条约》。为了确保控制每一个生产肉豆蔻的岛屿，荷兰人提出了一项交易：如果英国人把岚屿给他们，反过来，他们会给英国一个遥远而不那么值钱的北美岛屿。英国人同意了。那个岛就是曼哈顿岛，新阿姆斯特丹就是这样变成纽约的。荷兰人就这样垄断了肉豆蔻贸易，这种垄断还持续了一个世纪。

后来，在1770年，一位名叫 Pierre Poivre的法国人成功地将肉豆蔻植株走私到了毛里求斯，一个非洲海岸的岛屿。其中一些后来出口到加勒比地区，在那里肉豆蔻又繁盛起来，尤其是在格林纳达岛上。紧接着，在1778年，班达地区的火山喷发引发了海啸，摧毁了一半的肉豆蔻树林。最后，在1809年，英国人回到印度尼西亚，用武力夺取了班达群岛。1817年，他们又将这些岛屿归还给了荷兰人，但在此之前，他们已将数百株肉豆蔻树苗移植到南亚多个地区的种植园。荷兰人对肉豆蔻的垄断最终结束了。

如今，肉豆蔻在印度尼西亚、加勒比地区、印度、马来西亚、巴布亚新几内亚和斯里兰卡都有种植，全球肉豆蔻产量估计平均每年在1万至1.2万吨之间。