It provides background information on the topic.
and It gives the main topic of the paper.
The author's purpose in this passage is to inform. The author is informing the reader on how Elizabethans would typically store their food. It goes into details of differences between food types and some options for storing food and getting nourishment in summer and winter.
A connotation is the feeling a word invokes. A denotation is what the word literally says.
Example: If these words were on a trip, connotation would be the baggage, and denotation would be the traveler.
For those of us whose names are written, we will form a democracy to meet the needs that best fit the Colony.
I hope that helped.
