Mr. Pei Anping has written several articles on the issue of going up the mountain, and I have only browsed the first one of the past year. A few days ago, a colleague who usually did not have WeChat communication forwarded to me The latest article of Mr. Pei, in fact, I saw it in the group, but I still did not open it. Just two days later, I was going to go on a business trip, so I forwarded the article to a young colleague working there, asked him to read it, and explained it to me when we met. The day before yesterday, I met and learned some of the content of the article, and I did not ask carefully, but I felt the need to answer Mr. Pei.
I have no way of speculating about Mr. Pei's psychological state, and I have not actually read the specific content of the article, and the answer may not be targeted. I just believe that responsibility for archaeology is still the basic basis of Mr. Pei, so I will talk about real views on issues that may be related.
Because Mr. Pei posted in several archaeological groups, I will also make it public here. In order to save everyone's time, I try to be as concise as possible. Divided into several sections.
1. About the table mentioned in the first article on the comparison of Pengtou Mountain and Shangshan Mountain
Mr. Pei's first article was actually brought to my attention by Mr. Zhang Juzhong, who said that Lao Pei pointed out that the tables in the summary of my report "Pujiang Shangshan" mixed the things in the lower layers of the soap market into the Pengtou Mountain culture. I was taken aback, immediately checked, found that there was indeed an error, and immediately explained in the WeChat group, here to explain.
This table is transplanted from my "Cross-Lake Bridge Culture Research", which is a chart of "Comparison of Neolithic Cultures in Qiantang River and Dongting Lake" (see P200 of the book), which shows: 1. The first to third periods of Pengtoushan culture, the type of artifacts can be compared with the middle and late Shangshan culture to the early cross-lake bridge culture; 2. The fourth period of Pengtoushan culture can be compared with the early stage of the late cross-lake bridge culture; 3. The lower culture of Soap City corresponds to the late cross-lake bridge culture.
In order to highlight the leading position of the Shangshan culture in the early Neolithic "wilderness stage" of the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, I transplanted this table and slightly simplified it, and the result was wrong. One of the mistakes is to mistake the pengtou mountain culture from the first to fourth periods of the Pengtou mountain culture (the original intention should be to generalize the first to fourth periods, and somehow did not delete the word "one phase"); the second mistake is to mix the pottery of the lower layer of the soap market into the Pengtou Mountain culture. The reason for the mixing is that in the original table, the artifact map of the lower level of the soap city is next to the artifact map of pengtou Mountain Phase IV, which is in the comparative area of the cross-lake bridge culture. But even in this erroneous table, the comparison of the lower artifacts of the soap market is still the cross-lake bridge culture, not the shangshan culture.
Since this error does not affect the basic academic conclusions, in the PPT report of the Recent National Museum Academic Symposium, I also specially used this form to explain my academic views. But thank you Mr. Pei Anping for his correction, after all, any error in the article will bring chaos in academic communication. Apologies to other readers are also here.
Second, about the age of Pengtou Mountain culture and Shangshan culture
The early Shangshan culture was "around 10,000 years ago", which is a basic understanding of the Shangshan culture. This judgment refers to objective chronological data and is also based on staging. Shangshan culture is divided into early, middle and late three phases, here is not a specific introduction, presumably can be seen at a glance as a mid-term representative of the bridgehead site and as an early representative of the Shangshan site has a big difference. In the middle of the years, dating with the most reliable carbonized samples of annual plant seeds, the series of data from different sites fell around 9,000 years ago, which should be reliable. So, where should the location of the early years be? The earliest available data is more than 11,000 years, but most of them fall near 10,000 years, which is the basis for the conclusion of "around 10,000 years ago", although the accuracy of dating with charcoal pottery pieces is still doubtful. In view of the large variation in the types of artifacts between the early and middle periods, the staging may still be refined, and the phenomenon of thick lines in the current understanding of prehistoric archaeological chronology still exists, this judgment is not much abrupt. In cooperation with Peking University, we are already trying to solve the problem of possible mixing old charcoal in carbon pottery films, hoping to obtain more scientific dating data as soon as possible.
In fact, in my thinking, as long as the early days of the Shangshan culture predate the Pengtoushan culture (including Jiahu), the understanding of the origin of rice cultivation in the Shangshan culture will stand firm. From the perspective of the large cultural stage, they are in the same period of development, and going up the mountain to walk ahead of this era is the basis of understanding. Whether it is 10,000 or 9,500 is not the most important. The main basis for going up the mountain earlier than Pengtou Mountain, the first is the dating conclusion, the academic community generally believes that the upper limit of the Pengtou Mountain culture is 9000 years, and the middle of the mountain is determined to be 9000 years, which has a basic comparison; the second is the analysis of cultural factors, the mountain is more simple, such as the early pottery of the mountain is embodied in a more pure charcoal pottery, which is a newly emerged pottery system, and the early Pengtou Mountain is sandwiched with sand and charcoal, and the main thing that can be compared with the mountain is the charcoal pottery In particular, the early pottery of Pengtou Mountain appeared in the Jomon cooker and its supporting kettle branch that only appeared in the cross-lake bridge stage in Zhejiang, and the overall feeling was that it had fallen off.
This comparative understanding is premised on cultural interconnectedness. As the earliest occurrence area of rice culture in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, there are indeed many common phenomena, but it may be affected by the division of fauna, and the comparative study of culture in the region is obviously insufficient. The "six major fauna" are mainly based on the cultural pattern precipitated in the 5,000 and 6,000 years ago, and the cultural ties in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River 8,000 and 9,000 years ago deserve attention. After the discovery of the cross-lake bridge culture, the attention to the cultural relationship between the two places has increased, and the discovery of the shangshan culture has added the content of the connection.
3. General issues related to the culture of the mountains
Mr. Pei Anping has many dissatisfaction with the Shangshan culture and its research status. According to reports, he was quite critical of my lack of research results on the cultural typology of shangshan. But I have a basic confidence in the existing staging of the Shangshan culture and have also published it because it comes from actual material. Distinguishing the relatively thin mid-term remains of the Shangshan site (which was known as a late relic) from the stratification, which took a lot of effort at first, is still fresh in my memory, and then confirmed in different sites, which is one of the best achievements of my field career.
It cannot but be acknowledged that the most concerned research results of the Shangshan culture so far come from the fields of agricultural archaeology or scientific and technological archaeology. Field archaeology and its related typology and stratigraphic research can support this academic situation and complete the task.
But that's not all I'm trying to say. I would like to talk about the different historical conditions found at the Pengtou Mountain site, the Shangshan site, and the changes that have taken place in archaeology.
I don't know much about the academic history of Pengtoushan culture, but I still know a lot about the boom in archaeological and cultural research that began in the 1980s in the context of fauna type research. This also determines that Pengtoushan culture will have more typological analysis and cultural factor analysis research. Moreover, at that time, the Pengtou Mountain site was found, which was more cautious in judging the age, but as far as the actual result was concerned, the Neolithic age of the Yangtze River Basin was pushed forward for more than 1,000 years on the basis of Hemudu, which was a breakthrough result, which actually laid a foundation for the archaeological community to accept the Shangshan site relatively easily, which was an academic process. As far as the Zhejiang region is concerned, the Shangshan site was found in the late stage of the controversy over the age of the cross-lake bridge site, and from the example of the cross-lake bridge, the narrow typological research may not be reliable, at least delaying the archaeological process, and carbon fourteen determination is the key driving force to solve the problem. It should be said that "ten thousand years up the mountain" is not just deliberately rendered and publicized, but a product of the times, and is the inevitable result of the scientific and technological progress through carbon fourteen dating technology to archaeology. In the past twenty years, archaeology has quietly changed, I wonder if Mr. Pei believes it?
How to enhance and expand the cognitive ability and cognitive field of archaeology under the new historical conditions may be what Mr. Pei should think about more.
Fourth, on the origin of rice farming
The origin of rice farming is not only a problem of discovery, but also a theoretical problem. To "rice" with
Mr. Zhao Zhijun has already made a more thoughtful exposition of the distinction between "rice cultivation", so I will not dwell on it.
Is the journey from caves to wilderness a crucial step in rice cropping? From an empirical point of view, such a judgment can be made. In the Yangtze River Basin and South China, the sites that predate the uphill stage are cave sites, and of course, the mountain remains associated with the caves should be included.
So, can the early remnants of the seemingly "mature" Shangshan culture qualify as the "first footprint"? There are at least two concepts that influence thinking about the "front-of-the-hill" issue.
The first is to find the connection between the cave and the wilderness, and the basic logic is that there should be at least a primary stage before the "mature" ascent up the mountain. But archaeological cultures distinguished from artifact observations seem to be the product of technological inventions, and there may not be a logical germination period. Whether the emergence of charcoal pottery is directly related to the use of rice may be a real question.
The other is the opposite judgment, not from the cave to the wilderness, but from low to high, and the uphill culture may be an extension of the mysterious continental shelf culture. But judging from the actual findings in Zhejiang, it seems that this is not the case. The Shangshan cultural sites discovered so far are found in the upper river basins above 30 to 40 meters above sea level. Interestingly, most of the shangshan ruins in the upstream area have cross-lake bridge culture layered on top of it, while the cross-lake bridge cultural site in the low-altitude coastal area has no trace of the shangshan culture at the bottom. Jingtou Mountain, cross-lake bridge (including Xiasun), and huojiao ruins all belong to this situation, which may prove that there are no shangshan cultural sites in low-altitude areas.
The above is just extensive thinking. As the origin point of rice cultivation culture, Shangshan culture is an empirical judgment and does not require an ultimate proof.
5. About others
Mr. Pei's objection that "going up the mountain is not the earliest faience pottery", I do not know the reason for it, nor have I asked others. I won't answer.
Finally, I would like to thank Mr. Pei for being able to produce the form mentioned earlier, thanks to the several copies of the "Series of Hunan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology" sent by Mr. Pei.
Mr. Pei participated in several meetings at the site of the cross-lake bridge, and also visited the newly discovered shangshan site, remembering that he also said words of affirmation and encouragement, and later with the advent of the mobile phone era, he lost contact, and several mountain meetings were not invited, and he has always been sorry in his heart.
Welcome Mr. Pei to visit and guide the cultural sites on the mountain.
2021.12.5
Reprinted from Zhejiang Archaeology