How will the right answer fit in terms of support and conclusion?

Only the right answer will be support that must be true if the conclusion is true.

Highlight the main conclusion in the passage, if there is one:

these tablets challenge the widely held belief among historians that the Sumerian civilization in Mesopotamia was the first to create literature.

Newspaper article: [BACKGROUND]. [SUPPORT]. Hence [CONCLUSION].

The author is trying to make a comparison to support their conclusion, but they only gave info about one side. We have a date for when Egypt managed to “create literature”, but not for Mesopotamia. The right answer will fill in the missing part of the comparison.

Map the wording of the answers to the wording of the passage:

(A) most of the recently discovered tablets…contain literary writing

The argument is about when all this went down, so this should sound pretty irrelevant to you. This doesn’t connect to the comparison the author is making, so it’s definitely not required.

(B) …has also kept other written records

So what? This is bringing something new the passage doesn’t mention, and that doesn’t directly connect to the comparison between Egypt and Mesopotamia.

(C) …the Sumerians did not create literature earlier than 3300 B.C.

Couldn’t have said it better myself. If tablets from around 3300 B.C. really do “challenge” the belief that the Sumerians were first, then the belief must be that the Sumerians were later than that.

(D) some historians are skeptical…

This is bringing in a new idea the passage doesn’t mention. There’s nothing about “authenticity” in there, so you want to agree pretty quickly that this doesn’t have to be true for the conclusion to work.

(E) the Sumerian civilization arose sometime between 3300 and 3200 B.C.

You like the dates in there, but be careful. You don’t care that this might add support for the conclusion. This isn’t a “strengthen” question. The question is if this must be true to make the conclusion work. And of course the answer is no. The Sumerians could have been around a long time, and everything the author said could still be true.

(C) is the correct answer.