In the following passage, some words have been deleted. Read the passage carefully and select the most appropriate option to fill in each blank. From the beginning (1)_________ the eighteenth century, the ladies of European cities covered (2)_______ faces in layers of paint and powder. This particular fashion was largely brought (3) __________ by the urgent need to disguise the ravages of smallpox, (4)_________ left their faces pitted and scarred. During this same period, the ‘beauty spot’ was introduced to cover (5) __________ a facial defect.
Select the most appropriate option to fill in blank number 1.
- (a)about
- (b)in
- (c)on
- (d)of
Answer
Why
Correct — D. The passage sentence carrying blank 1 is "From the beginning (1) _____ the eighteenth century, the ladies of European cities covered (2) _____ faces in layers of paint and powder."
The trigger is the noun "beginning" immediately before the gap. A noun of part or position — beginning, end, middle, top — takes "of" before the whole it belongs to.
So the passage reads "from the beginning of the eighteenth century".
Why the others are wrong
- (a)about — "About" means "concerning" or "approximately". The gap needs a link between "beginning" and a period of time, not a topic and not an estimate.
- (b)in — "In" leaves "the beginning" standing alone. "From the beginning in the eighteenth century" floats "in the eighteenth century" as a separate time phrase, where the sentence needs one clear starting point.
- (c)on — "On" marks a surface or a specific date, as in "on 3 March". It never links "beginning" to a century.
Concept
Nouns that name a part or a position — beginning, end, start, middle, close, top, bottom — take "of" when you say what they are the beginning or the end of: the beginning of the century, the end of the road, the top of the page.
The preposition is fixed by the noun before the gap, not by the meaning of the sentence. Blanks like this reward memorised collocation, not reasoning.
Note the contrast: "at the beginning of" needs a complement, while "in the beginning" stands alone and means "at first".
This is blank 1 of a five-blank cloze about eighteenth-century European cosmetics.
Settle it from the two words on either side of the gap — "beginning ___ the eighteenth century" — before you read any further into the passage.
Key facts
- Part-and-position nouns (beginning, end, middle, top) take "of" before the whole: "the beginning of the century".
- "At the beginning of" names a point in time and needs a complement, whereas "in the beginning" stands alone and means "at first".
- Filled in, the passage opens "From the beginning of the eighteenth century, the ladies of European cities covered their faces in layers of paint and powder."
Study next
Common traps
- Testing each option against the whole sentence instead of against the two words on either side of the blank.
- Confusing "in the beginning", which stands alone, with "the beginning of", which must be completed.
The five blanks in this passage run preposition, possessive determiner, phrasal-verb particle, relative pronoun, phrasal-verb particle — English Q.21 to Q.25 of this shift (09 Sep 2024, 12:30).
A pure preposition blank is decided by the word immediately before the gap, which makes it the fastest mark in the set.
Related PYQs
No directly related past PYQ was found.