In her study of ancient Mesoamerican agriculture, archaeologist Miriam Ortiz argues that the construction of *chinampas*—artificial agricultural islands—was not merely a response to land scarcity in the Valley of Mexico. Instead, Ortiz contends that these systems represented a deliberate strategy of political resistance by rural communities against tribute demands from the imperial center. She notes that local builders constructed *chinampas* in dispersed, difficult-to-monitor wetland sectors rather than in the centralized, easily accessible areas favored by imperial administrators. By choosing these isolated sites, the builders could underreport crop yields, thereby retaining a larger portion of their harvest and limiting imperial control.
Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?
- AIt states the primary thesis of the study by asserting that rural communities developed agricultural innovations primarily to preserve their political autonomy.
- BIt explains the administrative reasoning behind why imperial collectors preferred to establish centralized agricultural zones rather than monitor dispersed wetlands.
- It introduces a specific detail about the placement of the agricultural islands to support the claim that their construction was a form of political resistance.Cevap
- DIt suggests that the imperial center was entirely unable to collect agricultural tribute due to the remote location of the agricultural islands.