Beijing, 25 Feb (People's Daily Online) -- A reporter learned from the State Administration of Cultural Heritage that the archaeological excavation of the Sanxingdui site sacrifice area is one of the implementation contents of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage's "Archaeological China" major project "Research on the Civilization Process in the Sichuan-Chongqing Region." Since the start of excavation in March 2020, the distribution range and internal pattern of the sacrifice area have been preliminarily clarified, and 6 new "sacrifice pits" have been discovered, and the field excavation work of K3, K4, K5 and K6 has been completed, and the excavation work of K7 and K8 has also passed the halfway point. Up to now, 6 newly discovered "sacrifice pits" have unearthed more than 11,000 pieces of numbered cultural relics, while more than 2,400 pieces of nearly complete instruments, including more than 870 pieces of bronze, 510 pieces of gold, more than 450 pieces of jade, more than 120 pieces of stone tools, 13 pieces of pottery, and more than 400 pieces of complete ivory.
Pit No. 4 unearthed a bronze figure kneeling on his knees. Courtesy of Sichuan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology
It is understood that important cultural relics include gold masks, bird-shaped gold leaf ornaments, bronze-crowned figures kneeling, bronze head-turned kneeling portraits, bronze standing figures, bronze heads, copper masks, bronze statues, copper statues, copper "altars", copper dragons, copper grid-shaped turtle back shapes, jade zhang, jade ge, jade chisels, sacred tree pattern jade quinoa, jade seats, jade knives, stone ges, pottery dwarf collar urns, pottery tip bottom cups, silk fabric residues, ivory carvings, sea shells, etc. Some cultural relics have never been seen before from the perspective of modeling and ornamentation.
Through excavations, it was clarified that the eight "sacrificial pits", including Pit No. 1 (K1) and No. 2 (K2), excavated in 1986, were located in a rectangular yellow-brown pure silt soil (the first layer of the excavation area) roughly parallel to the Sanxingdui city wall on the northeast side, that is, the suspected sacrificial area. There are no other residential remains in the sacrificial area that were contemporaneous with the "sacrificial pits", only 8 "sacrificial pits", small circular sacrificial pits, rectangular grooves, and ash ditches and large buildings with buried cultural relics similar to the "sacrificial pits". In the 8 "sacrificial pits", except for K1 and K2, which are suspected of opening under the layer, the rest are directly opened under the layer, K3 breaks the layer, K4 breaks the layer, K5 to K8 breaks the layer, and K6 breaks the K7. According to the above hierarchical relationship, combined with the K3 clay excavation pottery, K4 buried pottery, K4 dating results, and the currently clear K2, K3, K7, K8 excavated cultural relics can be combined and restored, the age of K1, K2, K3, K4, K7 and K8 is about 3200 to 3000 years ago, roughly equivalent to the fourth phase of the late Shang Yin Ruins, K5 and K6 years later, roughly equivalent to the early Western Zhou Dynasty.
Pit No. 3 unearthed a bronze-topped statue of a kneeling figure. Courtesy of Sichuan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology
The flat shape of the 8 "sacrificial pits" can be divided into three categories: wide rectangle, narrow rectangle and approximate square, K8 has the largest area, nearly 20 square meters, K5 and K6 are only 3.5 square meters and 4.1 square meters, respectively, with a very small area. Except for K5 and K6, all "sacrificial pits" are not in a due north-south direction, but are roughly northeast-southwest (K1, K2, K3, K4, K5) or northwest-southeast (K6, K7, K8). The burial of each pit, in addition to K5 and K6 is relatively simple, there is only one layer of buried cultural relics under the landfill accumulation, the remaining large pits are relatively complex, but the bottom layer is buried all kinds of cultural relics, which bury ivory. K3 dumped a pile of ashes in the northeast corner below the fill, above the tusks. K4 dumps a layer of ash up to 30 cm thick on top of the tusks from the southeast corner, and the eastern and western parts between the ashes and the fill soil are also filled with yellow-brown silt soil mixed with red burnt soil particles. The K8 accumulation is the most complex, first burying a large number of cultural relics of different sizes and textures, then burying a large number of ivory, then filling the south and north sides with yellow-brown silt soil mixed with red burnt soil blocks, then covering the whole pit with ashes, and then filling it with large pieces of red boiled earth and "stone chime" fragments of yellow-brown silt soil, and finally filling the soil for burial. There is no clear boundary between the different burial layers of the above large pits, and some of the ivory is actually mixed in various cultural relics, such as K3 and K8, and K3 and several bronze artifacts are obviously buried in the pit after the ivory is buried in the pit. The ashes of K3, K4 and K8 are not simple, including burnt soil particles and fragments and components of more small cultural relics or large cultural relics.
Pit No. 3 unearthed a bronze statue wearing a pointed hat. Courtesy of Sichuan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology
The relevant person in charge of the Sichuan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology said that the archaeological excavation of the sacrifice area of the Sanxingdui site is of great and far-reaching significance. First, the newly discovered unprecedented relics and cultural relics have further enriched the cultural connotation of the Sanxingdui site; it will also promote the study of the sacrificial behavior and sacrifice system of the Sanxingdui site and the ancient Shu civilization, and make up for the shortcomings and gaps in the previous exploration and research in this regard. Second, further explain the basic understanding that "ancient Shu civilization is an important part of Chinese civilization". In 1986, a large number of cultural relics were excavated from pits No. 1 and No. 2, which combined the elements of ancient Shu civilization, Central Plains civilization and other cultural factors in China, indicating that ancient Shu civilization was an important part of Chinese civilization, and several new artifacts excavated this time, such as the top statue of the kneeling bronze figure and the copper round mouth Fangzun excavated by K3, the jade and silk fabrics excavated from K4, the gold mask and ivory carving unearthed by K5, etc., further consolidated this understanding. Third, the new concept of "subject presetting, protection synchronization, multi-disciplinary integration, and multi-unit cooperation" is applied. This archaeological excavation and the innovative use of modern multi-functional protection greenhouses, constant temperature and humidity archaeological excavation modules, on-site emergency protection experimental platforms, multi-functional archaeological excavation operating systems, remote control systems, 24-hour uninterrupted shooting systems, etc., will surely have a positive and far-reaching impact on the development of Chinese archaeological disciplines, working methods and scientific and technological archaeology. Fourth, the system shows China's colorful and long-standing ancient civilization, which is an important source of strengthening cultural self-confidence and building a cultural power.