Sentence Correction

Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier, apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived about 4,600 years ago, was preserved uncrushed by snow and ice because of the body's unique topographical position.

A. apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived
B. the body of a shepherd, apparently, who was thought to live
C. the body of an apparent shepherd who was thought to live
D. the body of a shepherd who is thought of as apparently living
E. the body of a shepherd who was apparently thought to live

Shawshank wrote:Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier, apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived about 4,600 years ago, was preserved uncrushed by snow and ice because of the body's unique topographical position.

A. apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived
B. the body of a shepherd, apparently, who was thought to live
C. the body of an apparent shepherd who was thought to live
D. the body of a shepherd who is thought of as apparently living
E. the body of a shepherd who was apparently thought to live

IMO A

thephoenix wrote:

Shawshank wrote:Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier, apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived about 4,600 years ago, was preserved uncrushed by snow and ice because of the body's unique topographical position.

A. apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived
B. the body of a shepherd, apparently, who was thought to live
C. the body of an apparent shepherd who was thought to live
D. the body of a shepherd who is thought of as apparently living
E. the body of a shepherd who was apparently thought to live

IMO A

Hi phoenix,

Can you justify your answer. I am a bit confused with the use of "apparently" in all the answers..

Shawshank wrote:Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier, apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived about 4,600 years ago, was preserved uncrushed by snow and ice because of the body's unique topographical position.

A. apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived
B. the body of a shepherd, apparently, who was thought to live
C. the body of an apparent shepherd who was thought to live
D. the body of a shepherd who is thought of as apparently living
E. the body of a shepherd who was apparently thought to live

The sentence checks for modifiers .

Whatever sentence follows the opening sentence "Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier" Should modify the complete clause and not just the noun in the preceding clause .

Now if you look at options B, C , D , E all are starting with the body , where as in preceding clause we already have "the frozen corpse recently" and this makes the use of THE BODY in the modifying clause redundant .

In Option A a pronoun THAT is correctly used to refer to the body and is acting as an Absolute phrase thus modifying the complete clause preceding it .

rockeyb wrote:

Shawshank wrote:Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier, apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived about 4,600 years ago, was preserved uncrushed by snow and ice because of the body's unique topographical position.

A. apparently that of a shepherd who is thought to have lived
B. the body of a shepherd, apparently, who was thought to live
C. the body of an apparent shepherd who was thought to live
D. the body of a shepherd who is thought of as apparently living
E. the body of a shepherd who was apparently thought to live

The sentence checks for modifiers .

Whatever sentence follows the opening sentence "Glaciologists believe that the frozen corpse recently found in a melting Alpine glacier" Should modify the complete clause and not just the noun in the preceding clause .

Now if you look at options B, C , D , E all are starting with the body , where as in preceding clause we already have "the frozen corpse recently" and this makes the use of THE BODY in the modifying clause redundant .

In Option A a pronoun THAT is correctly used to refer to the body and is acting as an Absolute phrase thus modifying the complete clause preceding it .

Perfect explanation.

I don't know if my reasoning is sound, but I eliminated 'B', 'C', 'D', and 'E' because I thought "to have lived" was the only tense of "live" which made sense in the context of the sentence.

Shawshank wrote:Hi phoenix,

Can you justify your answer. I am a bit confused with the use of "apparently" in all the answers..

C , D And E clearly changes the meaning by changing the position of apparent
apparent shepherd in C ....apparent modifies shepherd which is wrng
same in D and E

in B again the intended meaning again gets changed when we say who was thought to live about 4600 yrs ago........

Thanks Guys for your explanations.

OA -- A