Part I
Professor: When we think of large monumental structures built by early societies, an Egyptian pyramid probably comes to mind. But there are some even earlier structures in the British Isles also worth discussing, and besides the well-known Circle of Massive Stones of Stonehenge, which don't get me wrong is remarkable enough, well, other impressive Neolithic structures are found there, too.
Oh, yes, we're talking about the Neolithic period here, also called the New Stone Age, which was the time before stone tools began to be replaced by tools made of bronze and other metals. It was about five thousand years ago, even before the first Egyptian pyramid; that's some amazing Neolithic monuments, tombs were erected at various sites around Ireland, Great Britain and coastal islands nearby.
但是不列颠群岛还有一些更早的建筑也值得讨论，除了著名的巨石阵圈，不要误会我的意思，巨石阵已经足够了不起了，但那里还发现了其他令人印象深刻的新石器时代建筑。
1. monumental|ˌmɒnjuˈmentl|
adj. a monumental building or sculpture is very large and impressive 高大的;威严的
E.g.: I take no real interest in monumental sculpture.
我对高大的雕塑没什么兴趣。
2. pyramid|ˈpɪrəmɪd|
noun. a large building with a square or triangular base and sloping sides that meet in a point at the top. The ancient Egyptians built stone pyramids as places to bury their kings and queens （古埃及的）金字塔
E.g.: We set off to see the Pyramids and Sphinx.
我们出发去看金字塔和狮身人面像。
3. Stonehenge |ˌstəʊnˈhendʒ|
noun. a circle of stones built on Salisbury Plain, England, by people during the Stone Age . When the sun rises on Midsummer's Day , the light forms a straight line through the centre 巨石阵（石器时代建造于英格兰索尔兹伯里平原，仲夏日朝阳升起时阳光通过中心形成一条直线）
E.g.: Stonehenge sits in the beautiful countryside near Salisbury, England.
巨石阵座落在英国索尔兹伯里附近的美丽乡间。
4. Neolithic |ˌni:əˈlɪθɪk|
adj. of the later part of the Stone Age 新石器时代的
E.g.: the monument was Stone Age or Neolithic
这个遗址是石器时代或新石器时代的产物
5. bronze 青铜; nickel 镍; gold 金; silver 银; copper 铜; lead 铅; aluminum 铝; mercury 汞; potassium 钾; sodium 钠; calcium 钙
6. erect |ɪˈrekt|
verb. to build sth 建立；建造
E.g.: The church was erected in 1582.
此教堂建于1582年。
Part II
I am referring, in particular, to structures that, in some cases, look like ordinary natural hills but were definitely built by humans, well-organized communities of humans, to enclose a chamber or a room within stone walls, and sometimes with a high, cleverly designed ceiling of overlapping stones. These structures are called Passage Graves, because the inner chamber, sometimes several chambers in fact, could only be entered from outside through a narrow passage way.
Student: Excuse me, professor, but you said passage graves, were these just monuments to honor the dead buried there? Or were they designed to be used, somehow, by the living.
Professor: Ah, yes! Good question, Michael. Besides being built as tombs, some of these passage graves were definitely what we might call Astronomical Calendars, with chambers that were flooded with sunlight on certain special days of the year, which must have seemed miraculous and inspired a good deal of religious wonder. But research indicates that not just light but also the physics of sound helped enhanced these religious experiences.
除了作为坟墓建造之外，这些通道坟墓里面有一些是我们称之为天文日历的，在一年中的某些特殊日子里这些房间里会充满阳光，这看起来一定很神奇，并且一定激发了很多宗教奇观。
1. enclose |ɪnˈkloʊz|
verb. to build a wall, fence, etc. around sth （用墙、篱笆等）把…围起来
E.g.: The yard had been enclosed with iron railings.
院子用铁栅栏围了起来。
2. chamber|ˈtʃeɪmbə(r)|
noun. a room used for the particular purpose that is mentioned （作特定用途的）房间，室
E.g.: Divers transfer from the water to a decompression chamber.
潜水员从水里转入减压舱。
3. overlap|ˌoʊvərˈlæp|
verb. if one thing overlaps another, or the two things overlap , part of one thing covers part of the other （物体）部分重叠，交叠
E.g.: A fish's scales overlap each other.
鱼鳞一片片上下交叠。
4. passage |ˈpæsɪdʒ|
noun. a long narrow area with walls on either side that connects one room or place with another 通道；走廊
E.g.: A dark narrow passage led to the main hall.
一条阴暗狭窄的走廊通向大厅。
5. flood |flʌd|
verb. to spread suddenly into sth; to cover sth 照进；覆盖
E.g.: The room was flooded with evening light.
室内一片暮色。
6. miraculous |mɪˈrækjələs|
adj. like a miracle ; completely unexpected and very lucky 奇迹般的；不可思议的；不平凡的
E.g.: The horse made a miraculous recovery to finish a close third.
这匹马奇迹般地恢复了状态，以微弱的劣势位居第三。
7. wonder |ˈwʌndə(r)|
noun. something that fills you with surprise and admiration 奇迹；奇观；奇事；奇妙之处
E.g.: The Grand Canyon is one of the natural wonders of the world.
科罗拉多大峡谷是世界自然奇观之一。
Part III
Student: How so?
Professor: Well, first the echoes. When a religious leader started chanting, with echoes bouncing off the stone walls over and over again, it must have seemed like a whole chorus of other voices, spirits of gods maybe joining in.
But even more intriguing is what physicists called Standing Waves. Basically, the phenomena of standing waves occurs when sound waves of the same frequency reflect off the walls and meet from opposite directions, so the volume seems to alternate between very loud and very soft. You can stand quite near a man singing in a loud voice and hardly hear him. Yet, step a little further away, and his voice is almost deafening.
As you move around the chamber, the volume of the sound goes way up and way down depending on where you are in these standing waves. And often the acoustics make it hard to identify where sounds are coming from. It's as if powerful voices are speaking to you, or chanting from inside your own head. This had to engender a powerful sense of awe in Neolithic worshipers.
基本上，当相同频率的声波从墙壁反射并从相反方向相遇时，就会出现驻波现象，因此音量似乎就会在非常响亮和非常柔和之间交替。
1. chant|tʃɑ:nt|
verb. to sing or say a religious song or prayer using only a few notes that are repeated many times 唱圣歌；反复地吟咏祷文；单调重复地唱
E.g.: Muslims chanted and prayed.
穆斯林们诵经、祈祷。
2. bounce |baʊns|
verb. if sth bounces or you bounce it, it moves quickly away from a surface it has just hit or you make it do this （使）弹起，弹跳；反射
E.g.: Short sound waves bounce off even small objects.
短声波即使遇到小物体都会产生回音。
3. chorus |ˈkɔ:rəs|
noun. a piece of music, usually part of a larger work, that is written for a choir (= a group of singers) 合唱曲
E.g.: the Hallelujah Chorus
《哈利路亚合唱曲》
4. intriguing |ɪnˈtri:gɪŋ|
adj. very interesting because of being unusual or not having an obvious answer 非常有趣的；引人入胜的；神秘的
E.g.: These discoveries raise intriguing questions.
这些发现带来了非常有趣的问题。
5. Standing Wave
a wave (as a sound wave in a chamber or an electromagnetic wave in a transmission line) in which the ratio of its instantaneous amplitude at one point to that at any other point does not vary with time 驻波，是指频率相同、传输方向相反的两种波（不一定是电波），沿传输线形成的一种分布状态。
6. deafening |ˈdefnɪŋ|
adj. very loud 震耳欲聋的；极喧闹的
E.g.: The noise of the machine was deafening.
机器的轰鸣声震耳欲聋。
7. way |weɪ|
adv. very far; by a large amount 远远地；非常；大量；很
E.g.: They live way out in the suburbs.
他们住在很偏远的郊区。
8. acoustics |əˈku:stɪks|
noun. the shape, design, etc. of a room or theatre that make it good or bad for carrying sound （房间、戏院的）传声效果，音响效果
E.g.: The acoustics of the new concert hall are excellent.
新音乐厅的传声效果极佳。
9. engender |ɪnˈdʒendə(r)|
verb. to make a feeling or situation exist 产生，引起（某种感觉或情况）
E.g.: The issue engendered controversy.
这个问题引起了争论。
10. awe |ɔ:|
noun. feelings of respect and slight fear; feelings of being very impressed by sth/sb 敬畏；惊叹
E.g.: She gazed in awe at the great stones.
她惊叹地盯着那些巨石。
Part IV
And another bit of physics at play here is something called resonance. I'm no physicist but, well, I imagine you've all blown air over the top of an empty bottle and heard the sound it makes. And you've probably noticed that, depending on its size, each empty bottle plays one particular musical note.
Or as a physicist might put it, each bottle resonates at a particular frequency. Well, that's true of these chambers, too. If you make a constant noise inside the chamber, maybe by steadily beating a drum at a certain rate, a particular frequency of sound will resonate, will ring out intensely depending on the size of the chamber.
In some of the larger chambers, though, this intensified sound maybe too deep for us to hear. We can feel it, we're mysteriously agitated by it, but it's not a sound our ears can hear! The psychological effects of all these extraordinary sounds can be profound, especially when they seem so disconnected from the human doing the drumming or chanting.
所有这些特殊声音所造成的心理影响是巨大的，尤其这些心理影响看起来似乎与人们敲鼓或吟唱没什么关系。
1. resonance|ˈrezənəns|
noun. the sound or other vibration produced in an object by sound or vibrations of a similar frequency from another object 共鸣；共振；谐振
E.g.: The ear has a set of filaments to vibrate in resonance with incoming sound-waves.
耳朵里有一组细丝能和进入的声波产生共振。
2. note|noʊt|
noun. a single sound of a particular length and pitch (= how high or low a sound is), made by the voice or a musical instrument; the written or printed sign for a musical note 单音；音调；音符
E.g.: He played the first few notes of the tune.
他演奏了这支曲子开始的几个音。
3. constant |ˈkɒnstənt|
adj. happening all the time or repeatedly 持续不断的;重复的;一直存在的
E.g.: She suggests that women are under constant pressure to be abnormally thin.
她暗示说女性总是处在保持身材异常瘦削的压力之下。
4. agitate |ˈædʒɪteɪt|
verb. if something agitates you, it worries you and makes you unable to think clearly or calmly 使焦虑；使狂躁不安
E.g.: The thought of them getting her possessions when she dies agitates her.
一想到他们可能会在她死后得到她的财产，她就心绪不安。
5. disconnected |ˌdɪskəˈnektɪd|
adj. not related to or connected with the things or people around 分离的；断开的；无关联的
E.g.: His ability to absorb bits of disconnected information was astonishing.
他吸收利用互不相关的零碎信息的能耐惊人。
Part V
And there can be observable physical effects on people, too. In fact, the sounds can cause headaches, feeling of dizziness, increased heart rate, that sort of thing, you see. Anyway, what was experienced inside one of these passage graves clearly could be far more intense than the everyday reality outside, which made them very special places.
But back to your question, Michael, as to whether these graves were designed to be used by the living, well, certainly with regard to astronomicalor calendar function that seems pretty obvious. And I wanna go into more detail on that now.
不管怎样，人们在这些通道坟墓中所经历的显然比外面的日常现实要强烈得多，这使得它们成了非常特别的地方。
1. dizzy |ˈdɪzi|
adj. feeling as if everything is spinning around you and that you are not able to balance 头晕目眩的；眩晕的
E.g.: Climbing so high made me feel dizzy.
爬那么高使我感到头晕目眩。
2. intense |ɪnˈtens|
adj. intense is used to describe something that is very great or extreme in strength or degree 强烈的;剧烈的;极度的
E.g.: The President is under intense pressure to resign.
总统承受着沉重的辞职压力。
