fossils

倒装

Extinct but already fully marine cetaceans are known from the fossil record. How was the gap between a walking mammal and a swimming whale bridged? Missing until recently were fossils clearly intermediate, or transitional, between land mammals and cetaceans.

灭绝的完全海洋鲸类已经在化石记录中被发现。鲸鱼是如何从陆生哺乳动物过渡进化到海生哺乳动物的?直到最近，清晰表现鲸鱼在从陆生哺乳动物到海生哺乳动物过渡时期的化石才被发现。

Missing until recently were fossils clearly intermediate, or transitional, between land mammals and cetaceans. 的正确语序是——

Fossils, clearly intermediate, or transitional, between land mammals and cetaceans, （插入语）were missing until recently.

也可以这么理解——

Fossils (which are)clearly intermediate, or transitional, between land mammals and cetaceans, were missing until recently.

引导词which和be动词连着出现的时候可以一起省略，再给你一个例子体会一下——

Tom, an English teacher, came to my home last night.

= Tom who is an English teacher came to my home last night.

这样的句子多采用倒装结构，因为修饰成分多，避免在句子里相隔太远，再举几个例子你就明白了。

Friedrich Engels, however, predicted that women would be liberated from the "social, legal and economic subordination" of the family by technological developments that made possible the recruitment of "the whole famale sex into public industry".

句子中的

that made possible the recruitment of "the whole famale sex into public industry".

实际上等于that made the recruitment of "the whole famale sex into public industry" possible.

make ... possible 这个结构经常倒装，避免made和possible隔得太远，其实是为了读者看着方便，当然我们非母语者可能反倒觉得不习惯。

再比如

Proof were lacking that the quality of the impulse or its condition was influenced by these differences which seemed instead to influence the development patterning of the neural circuit.

这个GRE句子比较难，你不用明白意思，能看懂上面这个句子实际上等于

Proof that the quality of the impulse or its condition was influenced by these differences which seemed instead to influence the development patterning of the neural circuit were lacking.就行了。

还有的时候会副词提前，可能我们也不太习惯，比如——

In large part as a consequence of the feminist movement, historists have focused a great deal of attention in recent years on determining more accurately the status of women in various periods.

其中，determining more accurately the status of women in various periods 就等于determining the status of women in various periods more accurately