Researchers in Germany have unearthed 400,000-year-old woode

[dheeraj787]

Researchers in Germany have unearthed 400,000-year-old wooden spears from what it appears was an ancient lakeshore hunting ground as stunning evidence of human ancestors who systematically hunted big game much earlier than believed.
A. it appears was an ancient lakeshore hunting ground as stunning evidence of human ancestors who
B. it appears had been an ancient lakeshore hunting ground and stunning evidence that human ancestors
C. appears was an ancient lakeshore hunting ground and is stunning evidence that human ancestors
D. appears to be an ancient lakeshore hunting ground, stunning evidence that human ancestors
E. appears that it is an ancient lakeshore hunting ground, stunning evidence of human ancestors who


Hello experts, please help:

1. Why not option A?
2. Why not option C ?
3. Why option D?
4. Can't "it" refer to Germany ? if not why not ?
5. Is there a rule that: "what" and "if" can not be used together?


Question Source: GMAT PREP.
Thanks & Regards,
Dheeraj

[RonPurewal]

Please ask more specific questions about choices A, C, and D. What do you already understand about those choices? What don't you understand? Etc.
There are lots of moving parts in these sentences. If you ask a non-specific question about an entire answer choice, it's impossible to tell what your actual issue is.

--

Regarding your question about Germany and "it""”It should be perfectly clear that the entire country of Germany was not a single hunting ground. So, no.

[VarunR617]

Hi Ron,

Sorry for bringing up a very old question and asking the same question that others already have but I went through all of your and Tim's explanations for this question and while I understand why D is correct - it's a 'resumptive modifier' with an adjective (this is the first time i'm encountering one with an adjective) - I don't understand why C is wrong.

This is how I looked at it - "what appears was..." is nothing but "what appears to be..." in the past tense since the 'to be' in past tense is 'was'. So I assumed that if one is correct then the other should be too given that it's only the tense that is changing. That is why I didn't think it was a wrong construction. What am I missing?

Regards,
V.

[MoriofMay]

Hi Ron,

This is how I looked at it - "what appears was..." is nothing but "what appears to be..." in the past tense since the 'to be' in past tense is 'was'. So I assumed that if one is correct then the other should be too given that it's only the tense that is changing.

I have no idea what does this mean. Would you please explain it to me, if possible.

But I think C is wrong because "and is stunning blablablah". There shouldn't be any parallelism between an ancient lakeshore hunting ground and evidence. In correct answer D, the "stunning evidence" functions as a appositive with a abstract noun to modifier the former sentence.

Do I think correctly? If I'm wrong, please correct me. Thank you so much

[Chelsey Cooley]

Hi Ron,

Sorry for bringing up a very old question and asking the same question that others already have but I went through all of your and Tim's explanations for this question and while I understand why D is correct - it's a 'resumptive modifier' with an adjective (this is the first time i'm encountering one with an adjective) - I don't understand why C is wrong.

This is how I looked at it - "what appears was..." is nothing but "what appears to be..." in the past tense since the 'to be' in past tense is 'was'. So I assumed that if one is correct then the other should be too given that it's only the tense that is changing. That is why I didn't think it was a wrong construction. What am I missing?

Regards,
V.

The past tense of 'appears to be' is 'appeared to be'. If you need to specify that the 'to be' part was also in the past tense relative to the appearance, you use the past perfect: 'appeared to have been'.

You might be thinking of the construction 'what it (verb) was', as in 'She was shocked by what it seemed was a live unicorn.' That one requires the 'it' to be there; it isn't there in (C).