Xu Hong
Zheng Yan
Theme: Resurrection History – The Romance and Temperature of Archaeology
When: 7pm, March 10, 2022
Location: "Reading Live" TikTok Live
Guest: Xu Hong, Researcher, Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences
Zheng Yan is a professor at the School of Arts at Peking University
Organizer: CITIC Publishing Group
Although the object of study is the essence of the country, archaeology is by no means a study of the country
Host: 2021 is the centenary of the birth of modern Chinese archaeology. First of all, I would like to ask Mr. Xu Hong, what do you think is "archaeology for a hundred years"? What events and developments have archaeology experienced in China in the past 100 years?
Xu Hong: Teacher Zheng Yan and I, the door to archaeology is basically 30 to 40 years ago, it can be said that we have witnessed a considerable part of the "archaeological century".
It is generally believed that Chinese archaeology was born in 1921, in fact, the academic community does not necessarily recognize this year, which is just a cheap common divisor. But basically everyone believes that the Swedish scholar Anderson discovered the Yangshao ruins in Yangshao Village, Shichi, Henan, and named it "Yangshao Culture", and it is more appropriate to take this as the beginning of modern Chinese archaeology.
I think it has a deep meaning. First of all, if we look at a discipline for a hundred years, it must be a brand-new discipline, and it is by no means a very old discipline. The beginning of archaeology is defined from the archaeological activities of a foreign scholar in China, and it can be said that Chinese archaeology is an imported product, which is of great significance. Therefore, we must first locate archaeology, although its research object is the essence of the country, but archaeology is by no means a traditional Chinese science, but a new learning from the West, which is a modern discipline.
A friend asked us what archaeology was like for the ancients? Before the archeological activities of the ancients were born in modern Chinese archaeology, we called epigraphy. Judging from the Chinese literature, there were antiquities unearthed during the Warring States period, and the Han Dynasty contributed the excavated bronze dings to the emperor, who also changed the era name because of this antiquity. Like this kind of preference for antiquities, just because of its value, or ornamental value, there are more values of writing on it, some university inquirers feel that there is more information about the antiquities with words, and the antiquities without writing are more contemptuous. Actually good old traditions have always existed, but this is not archaeology.
Archaeology is a new discipline that was born 100 years ago, due to the introduction of modern theories and methods.
Zheng Yan: The purpose and means are different.
Host: Why do academics disagree on 1921 as the starting point of modern Chinese archaeology?
Xu Hong: Because foreign scholars have already entered China to excavate before, some scholars believe that the starting point of modern Chinese archaeology should be earlier. Some scholars believe that Mr. Anderson's excavation is not the archaeological activity of Chinese scholars, and it seems inappropriate to define it as the beginning of Chinese archaeology, so some advocate starting from the excavation of Xiyin Village in 1926 or the excavation of Yin Ruins in 1928, because this was an excavation led by Chinese scholars and the Chinese government. But most scholars believe that the excavations of Anderson in 1921 should still be marked by the recognition of our academic community that any archaeological activity in present-day China is part of Chinese archaeology, which is very meaningful.
Archaeology first satisfies curiosity, and second, it helps to settle the body and mind
Host: You just mentioned foreign scholars, and we saw before that the British archaeologists Renfrew and Mr. Barn had a very romantic description of archaeology: "Archaeology is partly searching for ancient treasures, partly being rigorously explored by scientists, and partly engaged in creative imagination. "I would like to ask the two teachers to talk about each other, is archaeology romantic?"
Xu Hong: Teacher Zheng and I both majored in archaeology, but later Teacher Zheng joined the ranks of art history. People are art college professors, you look at people is an art model, so it is definitely more romantic for him. Now please ask Teacher Zheng to talk.
Zheng Yan: Some scholars have expressed that view of Lun Furu in different ways. What is archaeology first and foremost? It is to satisfy people's curiosity. If something doesn't satisfy people's curiosity, it's worth nothing. This set of knowledge does not consider what is useful and whether it can produce food, archaeology first undertakes not the material goal, but to satisfy people's curiosity, to say that the larger point is actually the search for truth. Truth is a very simple, very simple fact. The essence of archaeology at the beginning, like many other humanities disciplines, is to satisfy people's curiosity.
Xu Hong: Right. Archaeology is a curiosity about the human past. The simplest question – who am I? How did I get here? This is a question that everyone or all human beings are thinking about, and archaeology is exploring the answers to these questions.
Host: It is actually a process of restoring historical truth.
Zheng Yan: It is a kind of high-level spiritual activity of people. You have to ask how much money this thing can make, whether it can get rich or what, archaeology is really not used to solve these problems.
Xu Hong: I also once said that archaeology first can satisfy curiosity; second, it helps to settle the body and mind, and every adult will have such a need; and third, as you just said, be a cultured person. If you are only satisfied with eating and drinking Lasa at the animal level, archaeology is not related to the national economy and people's livelihood, you can completely not understand. But if you want to have a historical upbringing, then although I said that archaeology is useless, useless use is of great use, because everyone has cultural pursuits, and archaeology becomes "useful" at this time.
Mr. Renfrew, just mentioned, his first description of archaeology is "searching for ancient treasures" . However, because Chinese archaeology is an imported product, the archaeology introduced to China at the beginning is already relatively mature, so the first point that Mr. Lunfuru said we have downplayed from the beginning and begun to pursue this aspect of science.
One of the things I've said the most before is that archaeology is a science and engineering discipline in the liberal arts, and it is speculative, using materials, evidence, logic, and the process of derivation that connects them to explore the ancient world. In this way, everyone thinks that archaeology is very interesting, mainly because of its mysteriousness.
Someone may ask what archaeologists do? Why Archaeology? How about archaeology? For example, for example, archaeologists are most like detectives. The archaeological site is like the scene of a car accident or the scene of theft, the evidence of fragments needs to form a chain of evidence by looking for clues, and finally give everyone a restoration plan. Archaeologists, on the other hand, are particularly like translators. Wordless books, we can understand ourselves. Isn't it all dirt when you look at it? Archaeologists interpret the wordless book and turn it into knowledge that everyone can read. The books written by us archaeologists, such as Teacher Zheng's "Six Thousand Years: The Story of Cultural Relics" and our "Archaeological China: 15 Archaeologists Say Five Thousand Years", should be one of our interpretations.
To rebuild people's confidence in culture, archaeology is an important tool
Zheng Yan: Speaking of which, Teacher Xu, have you ever wondered the question: When did archaeology become serious in China? I find that we say archaeology is interesting, just a few years of things.
When we read books, the image of archaeology is very serious. When archaeology first entered China, it was a very serious face, and I think this was related to the academic environment and the background of the times at that time. After Gu Jiegang and other scholars destroyed the old historiography, another group of scholars wanted to establish a new kind of historiography. At present, people like Mr. Fu Si Nian are an important tool to rebuild people's confidence in culture.
In fact, archaeology in the modern sense was also related to national consciousness and national identity when it emerged in Europe. Scholars who study prehistoric culture have a very different interest in art than classical scholars. The situation in China is no exception, and field archaeology began by finding new materials and establishing China's "history of faith". When it comes to curiosity and interest, it is likely to reawaken the era before modern archaeology when people were obsessed with ancient artworks. This is good, and perhaps helps us to reflect on the tendency of a hundred years of archaeological singular scientism.
Xu Hong: To put it this way, archaeology began to complete the scientific problem, and then popularized it.
I have the same feeling as Teacher Zheng Yan, why does archaeology give people a serious image? It is because the historical responsibility we shouldered at that time made us very heavy, even the discipline of archaeology was very heavy. Now that everyone is well fed and clothed and then knows the etiquette, they gradually begin to think that archaeology is interesting, archaeology is interesting, because you are full, you are interested in useless learning.
Originally, archaeology was a science of manifestation. At that time, even Mr. Hu Shi lamented that there was no history above the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, and the entire traditional view of history, the Three Emperors and Five Emperors that we firmly believed in, was swept away and then left blank. In this context, archaeology came into being, and we gave it too much social responsibility. That is, it solves the problem of "Who am I?" How did I get here? What is China? How did China come about? "These are big problems. Therefore, we should say that archaeology was born as an obvious science, something related to all Chinese.
It's just that because we later spent decades in the field technical level in order to decipher the wordless book, this made us have a certain distance from the public for a while, which was equivalent to drilling into the ivory tower. To tell the truth, Zheng Yan's papers and books may be read more people, and like our Erlitou site archaeological report, five large books, 2,000 yuan a set, four or five million words, printed 1,000 sets, globally there is no need to reprint, because the sun is white in spring, the number of archaeological academic books is basically like this. People on the outside really don't know what we're doing, and there's a sense of mystery that has something to do with it. After the reform and opening up, our archaeology began to change from serious science to relaxed culture, began to popularize, and went to the public, which is basically such a trajectory, which is very interesting.
Zheng Yan: So, we have brought back the interesting side of it, the original factors in academic history.
Xu Hong: When Professor Zheng Yan and I went to college, there was no public archaeology as we now call it. We write as vividly as possible, but the historical view behind us is serious. Why are the books we write now popular? At the beginning of reform and opening up, the most popular at that time was the major "discovery" and "legend" that occupied the stalls, and the kind of fog covered by the entire cloud mountain. Why is it that after a period of time, like front-line archaeologists and mainstream scholars, they write more relaxed content? Because it has a deep academic background behind it.
Western archaeologists say that archaeology is a study of garbage
Host: In fact, everyone is still quite curious about how these archaeological sites were discovered, as far as you just said, archaeology is like a detective to explore, some scattered information, how did archaeologists find and stitch together little by little?
Zheng Yan: Just now Teacher Xu said what is the biggest difference between modern archaeology and ancient times. As far as the word "archaeology" is concerned, we have had it since the Song Dynasty. But it doesn't exactly translate from what we mean today about archaeology (Japanese scholars use these two Kanji to translate archaeology). Modern archaeology is based on fieldwork and excavations. Archaeologists are dusty and work like peasants, in a completely different posture from traditional Confucians. Archaeologists do act like detectives, but instead of sitting in a study and playing with antiques, they have to aim at the field. I'll tell two little stories and you'll understand.
The first example is the beginning of modern Japanese archaeology. One day in 1877, Dr. Edward Morse, a 39-year-old American zoologist, took a train from Yokohama to Shinbashi. When the train reached Omori near Tokyo, he saw from the window that there were a large number of shells piled up in the soil exposed by the railway project outside, and he immediately got off at Omori Station and went to investigate, where he found the Omori Beizuka ruins. The so-called shellfish is the accumulation of shells thrown away by the ancients after eating shellfish. Interspersed with pieces of pottery from the same era, these piles are the site of Japan's first Neolithic period, the so-called Jomon Period. This opens the first page of modern Japanese archaeology.
You wonder how many people pass by train there every day, and why only Morse notices such a problem? It's not just a matter of knowledge, it's a question of ideas. An old-school gentleman is unlikely to get out of the car. Morse, with a new vision, could bend down to further study these clues.
The second example is about our teacher, Mr. Liu Dunyan. In 1958, he saw an ancient painting, a Bogu diagram of the Qing Dynasty Gao Fenghan style, perhaps just a facsimile of Zhang. The painting depicts a strange artifact with several lotus flowers inserted in it. Mr. Liu recognized this artifact as a pottery of the Longshan culture. The painting may be a facsimile, but there must be a real painting behind it. The painter himself may not know the age of this artifact, but only says that it has an ancient meaning, seeing it as some kind of symbol of cultural tradition. Gao Fenghan inscribed a poem on the painting saying that this was found by the farmer in his hometown. Gao Fenghan's hometown is in Jiaozhou, and in 1961, Mr. Liu Dunyan ran to Jiaozhou to investigate, and sure enough, he found the ruins of the Sanli River.
Mr. Liu has a heart, and he knows that as an archaeologist, he not only has to appreciate this painting, but also to go to the field to investigate further.
You see, these two stories show that detectives such as archaeologists must go into the field and go deep into the scene of the ancients' "crime".
Xu Hong: We keep talking about what archaeology is, and what is the relationship between archaeology and the "Archaeological Map" written by the Northern Song Dynasty epigrapher Lü Dalin? Just now, Teacher Zheng Yan said that it was the Japanese—the Japanese who were extremely well-educated in ancient Chinese—and they used the word "archaeology" in the "Archaeological Map" to translate the word archaeology archaeology. But Lü Dalin's "archaeology" is actually good antiquity, related to antiques. Therefore, after the word "archaeology" was introduced, it was associated with modern Chinese archaeology that was born a hundred years ago.
Just now Teacher Zheng said that it is different from Jinshixue. Further, what is the difference if it is more superficial? In the past, the so-called interest in antiquities was all about the value of antiquities - good-looking, relatively high economic value, with writing on it, and so on. But Western archaeologists are very determined to say that archaeology is a study of garbage, that is to say, although we also dig up tombs with treasures, our annual "top ten archaeological discoveries" will have eye-catching things, such as Liangzhu and Sanxingdui, but archaeologists are not going to these treasures. Of course, this treasure has important information, but you see that the shellfish is the garbage left over from the shellfish that the ancients ate, and we think they are equally important. We study such things in order to explore history in a broad sense, to explore the past of mankind.
The historical context of the pluralistic integration of Chinese civilization was established by archaeologists
Xu Hong: Just now the host asked how the ruins were found. It is a pity to say that the important sites and good things we are looking for are often not discovered by archaeologists. Because there are too few archaeologists, you can't find them if you look for them with academic purposes. The Terracotta Warriors and Horses were dug out by farmers, and most of the jade artifacts in Liangzhu and the artifact pits in Sanxingdui were found by farmers from soil. But its value must be realized by professionals.
Therefore, when we say that archaeological discoveries are generally used to enter the field of vision of archaeologists and are made public by us in the academic community, this can be called "discovery". For example, Erlitou, before the farmers have long discovered, and then the local cultural relics cadres know, they led the famous ancient historian, archaeologist Mr. Xu Xusheng to go, Mr. Xu Xusheng wrote a report and published it, this is regarded as an official discovery, this is 1959. Xu Xusheng What are they going for? It was to find the capital city of the Xia Dynasty that Chinese haunted by dreams, and I did not expect to encounter such a large site, and it was only in the eyes of archaeologists that Erlitou entered the eyes of archaeologists.
Zheng Yan: It's a bit like zoology. Caught a wild boar and eaten, this is not a zoologist; caught it dissected, studied it, this is the zoologist.
Host: There are many archaeological sites found in "Archaeology in China", have they subverted everyone's understanding of history after discovery?
Xu Hong: At the time of the birth of Chinese archaeology, our understanding of the ancient history of China as shown by the underground remains was all blank, so any archaeological discovery at that time was subversive and filled in the gaps.
For example, Yangshao, once we didn't know that China had a long Neolithic age, and there were things like faience pottery. Our predecessors later discovered black pottery in Chengziya, Shandong, later than the Yangshao culture, and only then did we know that there was also black pottery culture. If you look at the Yin Ruins, the earliest writings (oracle bones) have been found here, and the capitals, tombs, and bronzes fill the gap of the Chinese Bronze Age. Then in Sichuan, no one thought that there was such a brilliant bronze civilization as Sanxingdui in that place. This process is almost always filling in the blanks.
Of course, there are fewer and fewer blanks now, but it is not to say that there are no more. Many of our current discoveries, such as the earth-shattering Shi'an City in northern Shaanxi, were discovered more than a decade ago.
Zheng Yan: I think that in addition to filling in the gaps, there are many aspects that enrich our understanding. For example, in the ancient history of our middle school textbooks in the past, everyone often feels that it is a line arranged successively by different dynasties. With archaeological discoveries, coupled with a comprehensive study of the literature, our understanding of history today is very different. For example, Xia, Shang, and Zhou are both a temporal relationship and a spatial relationship. By the end of the Xia Dynasty, merchants had risen. Before the Shang Dynasty was over, the Zhou arose from the west. Just mentioned Sanxingdui, as well as the sites and tombs of the same period in Hunan and Jiangxi, may be local regimes affected by the Central Plains to varying degrees, and there is basically no record in the ancient books. Through archaeology, we know that the development of the entire Chinese nation is a very complex system.
Xu Hong: Although there are many disputes and debates in our academic circles, for early China and for the ancient times of China, one of the greatest common denominators is pluralism and unity - from pluralism to unity. Now it is known that Chinese civilization was not a single-line development and evolution at the beginning, but at the beginning there was no center, little by little the central plains center came out, snowballed, and finally formed an imperial integration. Such a perception is entirely constructed by Chinese archaeology.
Host: It's full of stars.
Xu Hong: Yes, everyone is familiar with my book, and I have used three words to summarize this process: the first is "Full of Stars", which was proposed by Mr. Su Bingqi, a giant of Chinese archaeology, which is very graphic. Then from the second mile head, I think the Central Plains center came out, it was the state of "moon star rare". This is from centerless pluralism to centered pluralism. What is centered pluralism? The pits where the bronzes were piled up in Sanxing were of the same period as the Yin Ruins, but they were not under the control of the Yin Shang Dynasty. This is called pluralism with a center. As for the "Haoyue Volley", the unified Qin and Han Empires began to lay the foundation for the dynastic change of ancient China. From pluralism to unity, such a large historical context is established by archaeologists. Now that picture has become a consensus.