Clara adjusted her magnifying visor, her breath fogging the brass surface of the sixteenth-century astrolabe she was restoring in her Boston laboratory. Under the soft glow of the halogen lamp, a faint scratch near the outer rim caught her attention—not a tool mark, but a deliberately engraved set of initials, "H.S.," dating back to its creation in Nuremberg. The discovery felt like the culmination of a decade-long obsession. It had been ten years since she first encountered a faint, ink-stained sketch of this very instrument in the margins of a medieval manuscript during her graduate studies in Heidelberg. That encounter had sparked a passion that eventually led her to resign from her secure academic position at the museum, a decision that shocked her colleagues. Free from administrative duties, she was finally able to travel to Munich last spring, where she successfully acquired the astrolabe at a private estate auction, bringing it back to her workshop to begin the painstaking restoration process that occupied her today.
According to the passage, which of the following events in Clara’s life occurred first chronologically?
- AClara noticed the engraved initials on the rim of the astrolabe.
- Clara examined a sketch of the instrument in Heidelberg.Answer
- CClara resigned from her position at the museum.
- DClara purchased the astrolabe at an auction in Munich.