Wenbo Time and Space / Wen Wenbo Time and Space Author: Yin Bo edited and organized
At the beginning of 1928, when the Chinese scholar Wu Jinding was committed to finding China's independent painted pottery culture, exquisite polished black pottery broke through the ground from the Chengziya site, and the "Longshan culture" with black pottery as a typical feature was known to the world, and the "Chinese culture of the West" of Western scholars became self-defeating...... In December 1929, when archaeologist Pei Wenzhong excitedly identified the bones of ancient humans in Zhoukoudian, the first complete fossilized skull of "Peking Man" was confirmed, and the fact that there were human beings in Beijing hundreds of thousands of years ago shocked the whole world......
Since the beginning of the 20s of the 20th century, generations of scholars have sprung up one after another, and batches of major discoveries have sprung up, and Chinese archaeology has continued to make further progress. The charm of archaeology lies in exploration and discovery, and even subverts people's cognition. Is it knowledge, is it intuition, is it luck? Let's learn the stories behind these amazing discoveries from the top 100 archaeological discoveries in the past 100 years.
(Continued from previous issue)
01
"Half a silkworm cocoon" confirms that the Chinese raised silkworms in the Stone Age
After the New Culture Movement, the ancient history school of criticism, which advocated "the accumulation of ancient Chinese history", caused great doubts and tests on the authenticity of China's ancient history, and all ancient history seemed to be overshadowed by untruth. But it is easy to overthrow, but it is difficult to rebuild, and if the history of the three emperors and five emperors has become doubtful, then what should China's ancient history be like?
In this context, a group of archaeologists stood up and vowed to find a basis for China's ancient history in archaeology. Li Ji, the "father of Chinese archaeology", is one of them. Li Ji received his Ph.D. in anthropology from Harvard University in 1923 and was hired as a professor of anthropology and sociology at Nankai University upon his return. In 1924, Li Ji carried out his first archaeological work, and since then, Li Ji has gradually moved from anthropologist to archaeologist. The ruins of Xiyin Village, Xia County, Shanxi Province, are a major discovery presided over by Li Ji.
In January 1926, Li Ji planned to go to the Fen River basin for exploration. It just so happened that the China Geological Survey also sent researcher Yuan Fuli to Shanxi to conduct geological surveys. Because Yuan Fuli was also interested in prehistoric archaeology, the two decided to go to investigate together. In March, the two set off to Jinnan, Shanxi Province, to investigate the tombs of the Xia Dynasty emperors. On March 17, the two arrived in Yuncheng, and on the 22nd, the two arrived in Xia County, the capital of the legendary Xia Dynasty. On the 24th, the two accidentally discovered the prehistoric ruins of Xiyin Village while searching for the tomb of the emperor of the Xia Dynasty.
Li Ji and Yuan Fuli first discovered the Gray Soil Ridge Cliff where the Xiyin site is located
Regarding what the two of them saw and heard in Xiyin Village, Xia County, Mr. Li Ji had something to say:
"Something unexpected happened, as we passed through Xiyin Village, suddenly a large piece of prehistoric pottery shards appeared in front of us. The first person to see it was Mr. Yuan. This site occupies several acres of land, much larger than the one we found in Jiaotouhe, and the pottery shards are slightly different. ”
The duo collected a total of 84 pottery shards, and "14 of them were colored." Seven of the faience pieces are edged (3 with curled edges and 4 with flat edges). The main patterns are triangles, straight lines, and large dots. Several graphics are often used in combination. ”
The discovery of pottery shards is actually very common in archaeology, but the careful Li Ji still preserved the pottery shards, prepared to return to Beijing to study well, and designated Xiyin Village as the archaeological excavation site. The reason why Li Ji made this decision was that, on the one hand, because the prehistoric ruins of Xiyin Village covered a large area, and on the other hand, because this site was in the center of the royal capital during the founding period of the legendary Xia Dynasty, so it was particularly noticed by Li Ji.
Li Ji and Yuan returned to Beijing in April. Just when Li Ji couldn't wait to recuperate and visit Xia County again, he contracted typhoid fever and pneumonia, and has been bedridden for almost half a year. In September, Li Ji recuperated and asked Yuan Fuli to revisit his hometown again.
This time, Li Ji made sufficient preparations, this is also the first time Li Ji himself presided over the archaeology, his shovel fell on the ground of Xiyin Village, and thousands of years ago, the painted pottery buried by heavy soil, can shine again in modern times.
Excavation site map of Xiyin Village ruins
By November, Li Ji wrote to a friend:
"We dig day in and day out – just a few days of interference. We've unearthed more than 20 crates of pottery, but we haven't found any complete pots. Stone tools are also quite abundant. I've made a list of over 600 pieces, including the exact level, location, and time of discovery......"
The site of Xiyin Village unearthed typical pottery of Xiyin culture
Continuous excavation has led to a particularly significant discovery of Li Ji - half a silkworm cocoon. Li Jiyou said: "Our most interesting discovery is a half-cut, silky, half-cocoon shell. Microscopic examination revealed that the cocoon was half decayed, but still glowing; The cut part is very straight. Mr. Liu Chongle, a professor of biology at Tsinghua University, has seen it for me several times, and he said: Although he did not dare to conclude that this was a silkworm cocoon, he did not find any evidence that it was not a silkworm cocoon. Compared with the silkworm cocoons raised in Na Xiyin Village now, it is a little smaller than the smallest one. The cocoon was buried almost at the bottom of the pit, and it could not have been a later intrusion, for there was no trace of disturbance in the color of the earth on that side; It will not be the occasional spit of wild insects, because it is artificially cut. ”
Half of a silkworm cocoon unearthed from the site of Xiyin Village
The discovery of silkworm cocoons proves that the Chinese have been raising silkworms since the Stone Age. The discovery of the oldest silkworm cocoon at that time became famous at home and abroad as soon as it appeared. Some scholars doubt the authenticity of the silkworm cocoons and believe that they are later incorporated, but with the continuous development of archaeological work, some silkworm cocoons have been unearthed in Xia County, which proves the accuracy of Li Ji's discovery and provides extremely important evidence for the history of Chinese silk.
02
The tortuous discovery process of the Tao Temple site
Xiyin Village is in Jinnan, and Tao Temple is also in Jinnan, although Li Ji's archaeological investigation in Jinnan is very detailed, and in 1926 Li Ji presided over the excavation of Xiyin Village, but he missed the Tao Temple site. There are a lot of pottery shards near the Taosi site, which should be the easiest to find, but due to the influence of the ideological trend at that time, Li Ji had a skeptical attitude towards the "ancient capital of Emperor Yao", and the easiest to find became "black under the lamp", which was missed. Archaeological discoveries require solid investigation, but sometimes a bit of luck may be required. Of course, it is enough luck to be able to discover Xiyin Village, and it is not a pity that the ruins of Yaodu Tao Temple were not discovered. The secrets of the ruins of Yaodu Tao Temple will be gradually revealed after 1953.
In the past 40 years of archaeological excavations, with a large number of underground cultural relics unearthed, Yaodu has reached a consensus in Linfen, Shanxi, and has achieved a consensus on historiography, archaeology, and cultural scholars. The Taosi site is located in Taosi Village, Xiangfen County, Linfen City, Shanxi Province, which is a small village in the Linfen Basin. The discovery of the Taosi site is not unrelated to the discovery of Ding Village.
In 1953, near the village of Ding, some fossils were found while digging soil and sand, and the site was randomly implicated. The discovery of the Ding Village site has attracted strong attention from the government. At that time, archaeologists Jia Lanpo and Pei Wenzhong immediately realized the importance of the Ding Village site, so they took Ding Village as the focus of field excavation.
In April 1956, the government issued the "Notice on the Protection of Cultural Relics in Agricultural Production and Construction", and carried out a census of cultural relics across the country. This is also the famous first national cultural relics census, referred to as "one census".
Since the general survey of cultural relics has begun, the in-depth exploration of the area near the original key sites has become a proper meaning. In 1958, with the in-depth development of the cultural relics survey, the vicinity of the Ding Village site has also become one of the important areas for exploration. The site of Tao Temple is actually connected to the site of Ding Village. Under the survey of cultural relics, the ruins of Tao Temple were also discovered. Between the south ditch and the Zhaowanggou of Taosi Village, Ding Laipu found a lot of "gray pottery shards", and the area is also very large.
The excavation site of Tao Temple
"Ding", "come", "Pu", as soon as the archaeologists of Ding Village came to the nearby survey, the Taosi ruins were discovered, which was a joke at that time. But it is a pity that people at that time did not pay enough attention to this "gray pottery shard", and no one was familiar with this kind of pottery shard, so although the discovery of the Tao Temple site opened a new chapter in archaeology, its importance was recognized after a long time, and this delay was nearly 20 years later.
In 1973, although the Cultural Revolution was still a few years away, archaeological work had been initially resumed, and archaeologists from Shanxi Province re-examined the Taosi site. This re-examination successfully found that the Taosi site covers an area of millions of square meters, which is a very large site, and the period is also very early, so the Taosi site was selected as the primary excavation site of Jinnan archaeology.
In 1978, the Shanxi team of the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences cooperated with the Cultural Bureau of the Linfen Administration to excavate the Taosi site, and batches of aristocratic tombs and ancient people's residences were excavated. The most important thing is that the Taosi dragon plate is in the world, providing an interpretation of the early dragon image of the Chinese nation! A large number of cultural relics such as dragon plates, pottery drums, drums, large stone chimes, jade artifacts and so on have been unearthed, and the pottery temple culture has finally gained its due worldwide reputation.
Taosi M3072 unearthed dragon plate
Restoration of the gate of the Taoji Miyagi Castle
The ancient observatory of Taoji Temple shows the shadow of the sun at the vernal equinox
A fragment of a flat pot with the character "Wen" written in Zhushu
The status of Tao Temple in early Chinese civilization
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Visit Yaodu Tao Temple in search of "original China" 〡 Visit the ancients
03
From the cliff pottery shards, you can see the ruins of Banpo
The Banpo site, like the Tao Temple site, is a major archaeological discovery in the 50s of the last century. At that time, the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences listed Shaanxi as a key area for archaeological work. The Banpo site of Banpo Village, Shaanxi Province, is a typical matriarchal clan commune village site in the Yellow River Basin, about 6,000 years ago. The site was discovered in 1953.
In the spring of 1953, the Northwest Cultural Relics Cleanup Team explored the Banpo site in the process of exploring cultural relics. In September of that year, Shi Xingbang and Wu Ruzuo from the Shaanxi Provincial Archaeological Survey and Excavation Group came here for a review. From the autumn of 1954 to the summer of 1957, the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences organized five excavations of the Banpo site, all of which were presided over by Shi Xingbang.
The excavation site of the Banpo site
In 1953, Shi Xingbang brought an archaeological team to Shaanxi to prepare for the development of archaeology in Shaanxi. At that time, Shi Xingbang had already done some projects, and he had a better understanding of Shaanxi, and felt that Shaanxi was too rich, so he decided to carefully check some sites that had not received enough attention in previous archaeological work.
One day at noon, Shi Xingbang felt tired of his legs and feet during the investigation, so he found a ridge to rest his feet. When he sat down, he casually looked around. This look made him see that there seemed to be a neat cliff on the other side of the earthen beam on the opposite side of the riverbank.
Prospect of Banpo site
The reason why they investigated near the river was because it was more inconvenient for the ancients who did not have a city to get water, but they also wanted to avoid being flooded, so they would choose to live on a slightly higher soil ridge next to the river, which was convenient for getting water, and it was not easy to be flooded with crops, and many ruins were found in such places.
In the eyes of archaeologists, if they find neat cliffs, they are often willing to investigate, because cliffs can clearly show the strata and bring convenience to archaeological work. Shi Xingbang saw the neat cliff and stepped forward to take a closer look. This walk-in made him find that the cliff did not seem to be formed naturally, but was dug up by modern people.
At that time, the people living in the village would take soil from the mountains when they built something, and this fault should have been formed by the people of the village. Manually excavated strata will have more information than is naturally preserved. Shi Xingbang found some broken pottery pieces in the investigation of the soil layer, and the pottery pieces were scattered in the soil.
Shi Xingbang picked up a piece of pottery and looked at it. It was this not very casual look that made him realize the importance of the Banpo site at once. At that time, the pottery pieces that Shi Xingbang got obviously had traces of careful polishing, and Shi Xingbang was very excited when he saw the traces, maybe this is the production and living tools used by the ancients tens of millions of years ago!?
Later in-depth investigation revealed that this was indeed the case. Shi Xingbang was in his thirties when he discovered the pottery shard, and he did whatever he wanted, and his action was outstanding. With the discovery of this pottery shard, Shi Xingbang planned to inspect and excavate in an all-round and large-scale area, rather than slowly dividing and excavating piece by piece as in the past.
Shi Xingbang's bold actions allowed him to finally excavate the remains of a collapsed round house and a large rectangular house that were intact, and other traces of house ruins were also excavated. The Banpo site revealed for the first time the Neolithic closed settlement form and layout characteristics characterized by ring trench settlements in China, and this excavation of Shi Xingbang was also the first complete discovery of prehistoric residential remains by Chinese.
Schematic diagram of the Banpo site
(To be continued)
Picture | Yin Bo
Typography | Xiao Xie
Design | Yin Lisa