For the writers who first

Answer choices

1. A

   Correct52% picked this

   To say that feudalism by definition requires the existence of a nobility is to employ a

   Why this is right

   This captures the Rebuttal aspect of this paragraph: those writers in the first sentence seem to be wrong. They say that feudalism requires a noble class, but history says feudalism started in the 8th century while there wasn't a noble class until the 12th century.

   Skill tested: Most Supported · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

   52%
2. B

   Too Strong14% picked this

   Prior to the twelfth century, the institution of European feudalism functioned without the presence of

   Too Strong: no dominant class Dominant vs. Noble We can infer that prior to the 12th century, European feudalism functioned without the presence of a noble class. But is a "noble class" the same as a "dominant class"? It doesn't seem like those are interchangeable. For a long time, the Catholic Church ruled the land, and so the clergy would be the dominant class. But we don't call the clergy a class of nobles. So even though we know that feudalism functioned without nobles, it still could have had a dominant class.

   14%
3. C

   Out of Scope21% picked this

   The fact that a societal group has a distinct legal status is not in itself sufficient to allow that group to be

   Out of Scope: not a social class To prove a claim like, "The fact that X is true is not in itself sufficient to show Y", we need to know that sometimes something is X but not Y. So here we would need to know that sometimes a societal group has distinct legal status but is not properly considered a social class. We don't have any information to support that type of thing. By the time nobles had all their legal status in the 12th century, couldn't they have been properly considered a social class?

   21%
4. D

   Too Strong1% picked this

   The decline of feudalism in Europe was the only cause of the rise of

   Too Strong: the only Out of Scope: cause Nothing in this paragraph makes any causal claim about what led to the rise of European nobility. We can't infer that the decline of feudalism was a cause of the rise of nobility, let alone the only cause.

   1%
5. E

   Reversal13% picked this

   The prior existence of feudal institutions is a prerequisite for the emergence of a nobility, as defined in the

   The passage told us that feudalism required a noble class. This answer is saying that nobility requires feudalism. So this is just an illegal reversal of a conditional we were provided.

   13%