阅读理解

阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项中选出最佳选项。

　　All over the world, people use gestures: the way they move their hands or hold their heads has a particular meaning, and these movements are used to support what they are saying, or even to make words unnecessary. People nod and shake their heads; they wave their hands in special ways; they hold their thumbs up or down. Do these signs always have the same meanings, wherever they are used? And how have they come to have these meanings?

　　In Roman times, pointing with the thumb in a special way could spell death. When a gladiator was defeated in the games arena, one of two things could happen: he might be spared or he might be killed on the spot by the victor. His fate was decided by the emperor or nobleman who was holding the games, but the crowd of spectators could influence the decision.

　　They expressed their wishes by the position of their thumbs.

　　People often think that the life-or-death thumb signs were thumbs-up for life and thumbs-down for death, but this is not entirely accurate. A re-examination of Roman writings shows that what we call the“thumbs-up”sign was really a“thumbs-cover-up”: the thumb was held inside the closed hand. And the“thumbs-down”sign?

　　The crowd was seated above the arena, so if they pointed towards the gladiator with their thumbs, they would automatically point downwards. Pointing downwards with the thumb, with the fingers closed, was probably an imitation of the killing action of thrusting the sword down into the victim, who was lying on the ground. In this way the spectators encouraged the winner to take the loser's life. To give the opposite signal--spare him, do not use the sword--they held out their hands with the thumbs hidden inside their closed fingers, like the sword in its sheath. So the life-or-death gestures were either thumbs-hide for life, or thumbs-point for death, and our modern thumbs-up sign seems to have originated in a misunderstanding of the Roman records.

　　Nowadays many people used the thumbs-up sign meaning“OK”,“fine”,“good”. But Italians, the modern descendants of the ancient Romans, seem for less likely to use it than other Europeans. When questioned, 95 percent of Englishmen and Frenchmen agreed that they used the sign in this way, but the figure for Italians was only 23 percent. Many Italians even called it the“English OK”signal, and mentioned that they had seen it in films or on television. So it looks as if the popular thumbs-up, which started out as a mistranslation from the literature of ancient Rome, is now“returning”to the city from which it never really came in the first place.

　　Other hand signs are used when we want to tell someone to“come here”, i.e. the beckoning signs. Some people beckon with one finger, or two, but the most common way to beckon is with the whole hand: all four fingers open and close together. Some people do this with the palm facing upwards, and others do it in the opposite way, with the palm facing downwards. Which of these positions you use depends on where you live. If you are an Englishman or a Frenchman you always use the palm-down position. This is because Italians employ a good-bye wave that looks almost exactly like the Anglo-French beckoning sign. If they beckoned in the Anglo-French style you can imagine the confusion it might cause.

1．Who could decide the fate of the gladiator in Roman times?

[　　]

A．The victor.

B．The spectators.

C．The emperor or nobleman who was holding the games.

D．The judge.

2．The death thumb sign was _____.

[　　]

A．thumbs-up for death

B．thumbs-down for death

C．pointing downwards with the thumb, with the fingers closed

D．holding out the hands with the thumbs hidden inside their closed fingers for death

3．What does the word“spared”mean in paragraph 2?

[　　]

A．killed　　　　　　　　B．set free

C．allowed to live　　　　　D．wounded

4．What is Italians' good-bye wave like?

[　　]

A．Almost exactly like the palm-up position.

B．The palm-down position.

C．The popular thumbs-up position.

D．The popular thumbs-down position.