Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: Earth knowledge Bureau (ID:diqiuzhishiju), author: Zhao Haitao, drawing: fruit / proofreading: Chao Qian / Editor: moth

The original title: "just now, Henan is on the list!" "

* the writer is an associate researcher at the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and leader of the Erlitou task force.

Today, the results of the top ten new archaeological discoveries in 2022 are released! Henan is on the list, with three new archaeological discoveries selected.

Among them, the new discovery of "multi-net layout of Erlitou metropolis in Yanshi, Henan Province" is that archaeologists have discovered that road and wall planning is a number of square and regular functional areas, forming a grand pattern of multi-net format, and establishing the basic framework of urban planning and layout. These new discoveries provide an important basis for the study of the early national capital system in China.

It can be said that it is monopolized by the best in this respect.

▼ of the Top Ten Archaeological discoveries in China in 2022

According to historical records, the Xia Dynasty was the first "family" dynasty in Chinese history. However, this dynasty only existed in the literature in the past, and there is a lack of strong archaeological results to prove its existence.

Shiji Xia Benji, Southern Song Jian'an Huang Shanfu published ▼

In 1959, Mr. Xu Xusheng, a famous ancient historian, discovered the Erlitou site in Yanshi, Henan Province. Since then, after more than 60 years of excavation, archaeologists have found important cultural relics, such as the earliest urban trunk road network, the earliest palace city, the earliest palace complex with the layout of the central axis, and the earliest bronze ritual musical instruments.

▼ where the Erlitou site is located

At present, it is generally believed that the Erlitou site is the earliest large capital of the Bronze Age in East Asia. Erlitou Culture, represented by Erlitou site, is the earliest wide-area monarchy in East Asia from 3750 to 3530 years ago. In terms of time and spatial distribution, it is very close to the Xia Dynasty in the historical literature.

Bronze Jazz unearthed from Erlitou site in 1975

It is the earliest bronze container ▼ found in China at present.

Erlitou site and Erlitou Culture in archaeology, Erlitou site and Erlitou culture are two different concepts. Erlitou site is located in Yanshi District, Luoyang City, Henan Province, located in the middle of Luoyang Basin, the north bank of ancient Yiluo River, Erlitou Village and the surrounding platform with an area of about 3 square kilometers.

Geographical location of Erlitou site ▼

In the time range of about 5000 years ago, about 4500 years ago, 3750 times ago, 3530 years ago, and 3600 years ago, there were ancestors living here successively. Among them, the ancestors from 3750 to 3530 years ago created a series of achievements with the atmosphere of the dynasty, the so-called Erlitou site, which generally refers to the culture created by the ancestors of this era.

Erlitou culture refers to a kind of archaeological cultural relics represented by the culture created by the ancestors of Erlitou site about 3750ft 3530 years ago. It contains not only the culture of Erlitou site, but also the cultural features reflected by hundreds of sites with the same cultural characteristics in the same period around Erlitou site. In the historical documents, Heluo area is the center of summer people's activities. Therefore, it is generally believed in Chinese academic circles that this is the site of the capital in the late Xia Dynasty.

Now, we can see the elegant demeanor of Erlitou culture here.

In terms of time, Erlitou culture corresponds to the early Bronze Age. Judging by the stratigraphic burial sequence of the site, Erlitou culture is later than Longshan culture in the late Neolithic Age and earlier than Erligang culture in the early Shang Dynasty.

Hello, we are both ▼ from Erlitou ruins.

In space, Erlitou culture is mainly distributed in western and central Henan, Jinzhong in the north, Shanzhou in the west, Shangzhou in the upper reaches of Danjiang River in the west, northern Hubei in the south, and Kaifeng and Lankao in the east. This area is roughly equivalent to the territory of the Xia Dynasty.

▼ of Erlitou Cultural site Distribution area

In the summer of 1959, Mr. Xu Xusheng led an archaeological team to carry out a survey of the "Summer ruins" in the central and western parts of Henan Province and the southern part of Shanxi Province. In 1953, archaeologists discovered a site in Yucun, next to Baisha Reservoir in Dengfeng City, Henan Province, the first site of Erlitou Culture named in 1960.

Subsequently, archaeologists found many similar Erlitou cultural sites in central and western Henan and southern Shanxi, such as Erlitou in Yanshi, Gongyi Shaichai, Wangchenggang in Dengfeng, Coal Mountain in Linru Town, Ruzhou, and Dongxiafeng in Yuncheng, Shanxi Province. Among them, the Erlitou site in Yanshi, Henan Province is the most abundant and typical, so it is named after this kind of culture.

This is the iconic jade (horizontal screen) ▼ of Erlitou culture.

In the following 60 years, the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Cass) excavated the Erlitou site dozens of times and confirmed that the site, with an existing area of about 3 million square meters, was the largest settlement in China at that time. It can be divided into central areas and general activity areas.

China's earliest "well" shaped urban trunk road network has been found in the central area, forming a grand pattern of "nine palaces". The space surrounded by the "well" zigzag road belongs to the palace area, covering an area of nearly 110000 square meters, including China's earliest large-scale "quadrangle" palace complex and multi-entry courtyard palace complex.

General plan of Erlitou site ▼

The government-run handicraft workshop and the sacrificial area are located in the south and north of the palace area respectively. Cast copper workshops and turquoise processing workshops are found in the workshop area. The sacrificial area mainly includes circular ground buildings, rectangular semi-crypt buildings and tombs attached to these buildings. Walls were found on the outside of the palace area and the government-run workshop area.

Erlitou ruins palace area and government-run workshop area (Hengping) ▼

No large graveyard has been found at Erlitou site so far, but the layout of most tombs still shows the characteristics of relative concentration, division and fragmentation. The tombs that are centrally distributed and arranged in the same tomb area belong to the same family.

These archaeological discoveries prove that Erlitou site is the earliest large capital of the Bronze Age in East Asia and a key site for exploring the Xia and Shang dynasties, while Erlitou Culture is the earliest core culture and wide-area monarchy in East Asia. it shows that China at that time was gradually moving from a diversified state civilization to an integrated dynasty civilization.

The new discovery of Erlitou site since the autumn of 2020, there are mainly four new discoveries in the archaeology of Erlitou site: first, we have newly discovered the road and its walls on both sides, which enriches the connotation of the multi-grid layout of Erlitou capital. For the convenience of writing, we use "Gongxi Road" to refer to the north-south trunk road on the west side of the palace area, and so on in other directions.

▼ at the southwest intersection of the central district

The doorway on the newly discovered Gongbei Road, the southeast corner of the fence to the west of Miyagi, the southeast corner near the right angle, and the inside of the newly discovered Gongxi Road extends more than 200 meters to the north, and the width of the road from east to west is about 16 meters. there are long north-south rammed earth walls about 2 meters wide on both sides of the road. The rammed earth wall on the east side should be the wall on the west side of the sacrificial area, and the rammed earth wall on the west side should be the eastern wall in the west of the sacrificial area.

▼ on the road and wall on the west side of the sacrificial area

In view of the fact that Gongnan Road and Gongbei Road extend westward to more than 470 meters and 410 meters respectively, both of them exceed the east-west width of Miyagi (about 295 meters), and continue to extend westward, we speculate that there is at least one zone to the west of the workshop area, the palace area and the sacrificial area. it corresponds to the southwest corner of the palace city, the northwest corner of the Zhaofang area and the corner of the wall to the west of these two areas. The northwest corner of Miyagi, the southwest corner of the wall of the sacrificial area, and the corner of the fence to the west of these two areas.

These newly discovered roads and walls divide the capital of Erlitou into square and regular grid areas, with Miyagi in the middle.

Plane map of Erlitou site ▼

Second, we found aristocratic residential areas and burial areas to the west of the sacrificial area. The grid to the west of the sacrificial area newly excavated 900 square meters, revealing medium-sized rammed earth sites, tombs and a number of ash pits. The existing excavations have not yet found the boundary of the rammed earth site and are continuing to explore its scope.

In addition, we also found a tomb with bronze containers, and for the first time found a joint burial of many people and a number of tombs whose owners were amputated and beheaded.

This important new discovery provides important support for understanding the distribution of relics in the area and determining that the area is an aristocratic residence and burial area.

▼ of abnormally buried tombs on the west side of the sacrificial area

Third: the new discovery of handicraft workshop fills the gap in the layout of Erlitou city and handicraft archaeology.

A large area and rich remains of pottery-making have been found in the west of the sacrificial area and in the northwest of the site, including pottery kilns, mud pits, clay blanks, burning soil, slag, deformed pottery, a large number of broken pottery pieces, pottery mats, dressing tools, etc., covering all processes of pottery-making process. According to the excavated remains and nearby drilling, there may be a larger pottery workshop here. This is the first time that rich pottery remains have been found at Erlitou site.

▼ of pottery kilns found in the northwest of the site

We also found nearly 100 square meters of bone and horn processing workshops in the southwest corner of Miyagi. A large number of bones and horny relics are scattered on the surface, including animal limbs, ribs, antlers, antlers and so on. There are many marks of smashing, cutting and grinding in bone and horny relics, including raw materials, semi-finished products and waste, cones, pins, hairpins and other finished products, including relics from many links in the process of bone and horn processing.

The location of the newly discovered bone and horn processing workshop ▼

▼, a workshop for processing bone and horn tools

In addition, we have also discovered new relics that may be related to lacquer processing. In 2021, more than 800 pieces of pottery with red paint were unearthed in the western excavation area on the northern edge of Erlitou city, of which nearly 200 pieces were unearthed in only one ash pit. Most of these lacquered pottery pieces are pottery basin fragments, and some of them are red paint on the inner and outer walls and stubble, which may be containers containing lacquer liquid.

▼ with lacquer pottery in the western part of the northern margin of Erlitou site

Fourth, we cleared a high-standard tomb in the laboratory. A high-standard tomb was found in the No. 5 base site of the Erlitou ruins, and a number of pottery, lacquer ware, jade cicada and turquoise cicada, groups of turquoise beads, painted pottery and other objects have been cleared.

The cicada-shaped jade ware unearthed in the middle of the tomb is nearly 4 cm long, which is similar to the Xiao Jia roof cultural jade cicada unearthed from the Xiaojia roof ridge site in Tianmen City, Hubei Province, which may be related to the influence of this culture. Some experts speculate that the jade cicada may have something to do with the ancients' belief that insects "metamorphosis" and "feathering" facilitate communication with gods.

Above: top view of 2017 V M11 tomb

Bottom left: unearthed pottery; bottom right: unearthed cicada-shaped jade ▼

In addition, more turquoise inlays have been seen in the tomb, and we speculate that there will be large turquoise mosaic objects in the tomb.

Inlaid turquoise bronze medal decorated with animal face unearthed at Erlitou site in 1984 as ▼

What is the significance of the new discovery? The roads and walls in the central area of Erlitou capital divide the whole capital into several square and regular grid areas, indicating that Erlitou capital has a strict and clear planning. The palace district occupies the core, which shows the supremacy of monarchy and the high concentration of power center.

General plan of Erlitou site ▼

Important areas such as sacrificial areas, government-run workshops, aristocratic residential areas and burial areas surround the palace area. The outer sides of many areas, including the palace area and the workshop area, are also fenced off and protected. Over the years, different levels of buildings and tombs have been found in many grids, and each grid should be inhabited by different people, indicating that the layout of zoning, walls and burial has probably appeared in the capital city of Erlitou.

Such a strict, clear and orderly planning and layout showed that the social structure at that time was obvious, hierarchical and orderly, suggesting that there was a mature and developed ruling system and mode at that time, which was the most important symbol of entering the dynasty.

With the expansion of Erlitou culture, Yazhang

Radiate the influence of royal etiquette to South China and the wider region ▼

The layout structure of the integration of residence and burial has been found in the Yin settlements of Yanshi Shang City, Zhengzhou Mall, Anyang Yin ruins and Baoji Zhouyuan, indicating that this system was continued by the Shang and Zhou dynasties, reflecting the pioneering position of Erlitou culture and Erlitou Kingdom in Chinese history, as well as the leading role of Shang and Zhou civilization.

This layout of Erlitou capital also provides a useful reference for exploring the layout and structure of other capital sites in the pre-Qin period.

Part of the cultural relics ▼ unearthed from Erlitou site in recent years

The important new discovery to the west of the sacrificial area has enriched the connotation of Erlitou capital. Among them, rammed earth buildings and aristocratic tombs appear together, indicating that this area is an aristocratic residential area and burial area, and the residential area and burial area are in the same place.

The discovery of many random burials and abnormal tombs such as beheading and amputation of tomb owners in this area showed that there were more acts of violence at that time. These tombs are buried with pottery, indicating that the tomb owner is not the lowest population; it is in the same area with rammed earth buildings and noble tombs with bronze containers, not far away, indicating that the population in this area includes aristocrats and civilians.

The layout and diachronic changes of this region, its own characteristics, and its differences and relations with other regions need to be further explored.

▼ at the Archaeological excavation site of Erlitou site

In the past, few pottery remains were found in Erlitou capital, only a few pottery mats and more than ten pottery kilns were found, but these pottery kilns belonged to three periods and were relatively scattered, and did not form a concentrated distribution group of pottery kilns. The remains of pottery-making have been found in the west of the sacrificial area. With the progress of excavation and research in the future, it will be helpful to understand and discuss the distribution of pottery workshops at Erlitou site, the operation technology and process of pottery handicrafts, social relations and social division of labor.

The tomb cleaned in the laboratory is closer to the middle of the palace area than the No. 3 turquoise dragon-shaped tomb, and is better preserved than the No. 3 tomb, with a slightly larger scale, and belongs to the first-class tombs.

Turquoise Dragon (horizontal screen) ▼ unearthed in 2002

The variety, specification and quantity of funerary objects that have been cleared out in the tombs have been considerable, and coupled with the uncleaned accumulation below them, the total thickness of funerary objects exceeds all the tombs that have been found in the past. it is very likely to be the richest funerary object ever found at the Erlitou site.

These discoveries are of great value for exploring the tomb system, etiquette concept, craft level, ruling system and other issues of Erlitou culture.

Reference:

1. Zhao Haitao and Xu Hong "Archaeological Chinese Xia Culture Research Project: Erlitou site in Luoyang City, Henan Province"

two。 Zhao Haitao and Xu Hong, the Core and Leader of the General process of Chinese Civilization: the Historical position of Erlitou Culture, Southern Cultural relics, No. 02, 2019

3. Multi-net layout of Erlitou site Discovery: providing an important basis for the study of the early National Capital system

Http://www.henan.gov.cn/2022/09-26/2613417.html

* the unmarked source pictures are provided by the author.

Thank you for taking some photos of cultural relics taken by Professor Deng Cong of Shandong University.

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