Chang Huaiying (Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences)
【Editor's Note】 Due to the sudden outbreak of the new crown epidemic, the fieldwork of Chinese archaeology in 2020 has been greatly affected in terms of time and environment. However, archaeologists have actively resumed work and created job opportunities, and archaeological work throughout the year is still frequently highlighted.
In addition to the top ten archaeological discoveries in the country in 2020, what other archaeological achievements are also worth paying attention to? The Surging News and Private History column specially invited 9 scholars from the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences to write a summary manuscript to sort out the major archaeological discoveries in China in the past year in a full-time and all-round way for the benefit of readers.
In 2020, the two-week archaeology of the whole country is still more eye-catching with the excavation achievements of high-grade tombs, and the archaeological discoveries in Duyi and settlements are fewer. Among all the discoveries, the information reflected in the bronze inscriptions of the Zhouyuan Discovery City Site and the Northern White Goose Cemetery is undoubtedly extremely important.
In the autumn of 2020, a joint archaeological team composed of the School of Archaeology of Peking University, the Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology and the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences excavated the Site of Wangjiazui at the Zhouyuan site. This excavation is also a teaching internship for students of the School of Archaeology and Literature of Peking University and the trainees of the Field Leader Training Course of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage. Since the excavations are not yet fully complete, the news of the excavations is less widely published on the Internet. However, from the scattered information on the official website of the Shaanxi Provincial Archaeological Research Institute, it can be seen that this excavation found the rammed earth foundation site of the Shang Period and the bronze tomb of the Late Shang Period at the Site of Wangjiazui. The rammed earth foundation site has a "concave" shape and an area of more than 700 square meters. The bronze tombs found have niches, copper dings and guises are in the niches, and there are weapons and bow-shaped instruments on the second-story platform, which is similar to the burial customs of tombs such as the He family in the 1970s. Clues to the rammed earth wall in the Western Zhou Dynasty were found outside the Wangjiazui excavation area, extending from north to northeast of Qijia Village to the north of Qiangjia Village, with a length of about 1300 meters, and the south wall extending from north to west of Qijia Village to the southwest of Hejia Village, with a residual length of about 700 meters, a wall width of 5 to 8 meters and can be enclosed. Rammed earth has been found to correspond to the rammed earth wall excavated before Fengyan Village, which should be the eastern section of the north wall. Whether the rammed earth wall belongs to Miyagi outside the Fengyan Palace Complex, or to the "Big City" of the Zhouyuan Ruins, the above discoveries are invaluable. Although no detailed information has been published, the sporadic clues have shown great academic significance. If the enclosed rammed earth wall can be confirmed, it will play a huge role in promoting the study of the layout of the Zhou Dynasty, and it is also a major breakthrough in the archaeology of the Zhou Dynasty. The original city site of the Zhou Dynasty, and even how to understand whether there was a "city" in the Zhou Dynasty, will play a key evidentiary role. In addition, Wangjiazui is the core site for exploring the boundaries between the pre-Zhou culture and the Shang and Zhou dynasties in the past, and the important bronze tombs found in the area many times in the past, the newly discovered rammed earth buildings and high-grade tombs in Wangjiazui indicate that the area is likely to be the core stronghold of the Zhou people in the pre-Zhou period.
The work of the Fenghao site last year was divided into two districts. In the west of Huayuan Village and the south area of Guanzhuang Village, the Shaanxi Provincial Archaeological Research Institute and other units continue to excavate the foundation site of large rammed earth buildings in the Western Zhou Dynasty on the basis of the work in 2019. Excavations in FY2020 have not yet fully revealed the rammed earth site, so its planar form remains unclear. However, there are animal skulls of cattle, sheep, pigs, deer and other animals found in the Western Zhou animal bone pits found near the base site, and the excavators proposed in an interview that the discovery may correspond to the "Tai Prison", speculating that the base site may be a Zongmiao Temple. The Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences continued its work at a pottery workshop in the west of Dayuan Village, Fengxi, and found the tombs of potters and suspected billet-making sites.
Archaeological work at the Liulihe site in Fangshan, Beijing, which has been dormant for many years, has gradually resumed in the past two years. In 2019, a large-scale rammed earth building was found on the northwest side of the Liulihe City site, and the rammed earth building currently revealed a range of about 28 meters long from east to west, about 26 meters long from north to south, and the thickest part of the foundation reached 1.62 meters, and was rammed layer by layer. There are many sets of walls and several column holes preserved on the rammed earth foundation, and the highest part of the wall remains 0.91 meters and is about 0.4 meters thick, and the column holes vary in size and use in different ways. At least four layers of human activity surfaces, the wall can also be seen in the patch marks, it can be seen that the base site has been abandoned and reused at least four times. Network news shows that the base site was built no earlier than the early Western Zhou Dynasty, and the abandoned date was no later than the late Western Zhou Dynasty, with a large time span. This is the first large-scale rammed earth building site found in Liulihe City. In the past, fewer city sites were found in the Western Zhou princely states, and fewer rammed earth foundation sites were found in the cities of the princely states. The new discovery of the Liulihe River has taken a solid step forward in the exploration of the layout of the first-class cities and palace architecture systems of the princely states in the Western Zhou Dynasty.
Rammed earth foundation site found at the Liulihe site
In the Central Plains, a large number of Western Zhou Dynasty tombs, cellars and sacrificial pits have been found at the Western Zhou Dynasty ruins, and a number of tombs from the Spring and Autumn Period have been excavated, and a number of important relics have been excavated. Most of the western Zhou tombs have waist pits and two-story platforms, and the phenomenon of martyrdom is found when filling in the soil, and it is judged that these tombs are the cemeteries of the Yin remnants. This is the first time that the tombs of Yin relics have been found in the Sanmenxia area. Although the number of bronze tombs along the southern foothills of the Taihang Mountains to the Kunhan Traffic Road in the past is relatively complete, the chronological sequence from the first to the fourth phase of the Yin Ruins is relatively complete, and there is not much missing ring on the whole. The discovery of the tomb of the Yin remnant is even more important because it is located on the south side of the Kunhan Ancient Road.
The Dong'an and Western Zhou ruins in Zouping, Shandong, also had a breakthrough in excavations in 2020. Important discoveries are the carriage and horse pits and a small number of tombs in the site, and there are few other living relics. The size of the pit is roughly 3×4 meters, and each car (two or four horses) is buried with 1 car. Among them, the No. 1 carriage and horse pit level is the highest. The pit is a cart of four horses, with 4 luans and 4 crowns, each horse is equipped with bronze gizzards, horse moths, horsebits, ornaments, bra ornaments and a string of sea shell horsetail decorations, which is currently the most complete and highest-grade carriage and horse pit in the Western Zhou Dynasty in Shandong. The age and burial method of the Chema Pit at this site are basically the same as those of Chen Zhuang Che Ma Hang, and the grade is also similar. This discovery further confirms that the existence of contemporaneous high-profile remains outside the Chenzhuang site was crucial to understanding the political landscape of the Lubei region before the middle of the Western Zhou Dynasty.
In Jiangnan, there are major discoveries of mound tombs in the Jinqu Basin. In 2020, three mound tombs were excavated in Mengjiang Village, Quzhou, one of which was a shallow pit wooden tomb built of cooked earth, although the rafters had collapsed, they retained a clear "herringbone", and the charcoal layer on the rafters was well preserved, reflecting the structure well, providing an important basis for exploring the origin of the "herringbone" rafters in the southern region. The situation of Pier No. 3 is different, and its structure is divided into two parts: the outer mound and the central tomb, and the diameter of the mound is about 58 meters. A circle of pebbles is arranged at the edge of the mound as a boundary marker, and the central tomb is a carapace-shaped deep pit wooden rafter tomb built of cooked earth, which is divided into three parts: the burial chamber, the Yongdao and the tomb passage. The 6 groups of utensils placed in groups at one end of the cobblestone bed in the middle of the tomb are mainly primitive celadons, and each group of primitive celadons has a different combination, which seems to have a difference in kiln mouths and exquisite shapes, providing a good specimen for the study of the chronology of primitive porcelain in jinqu area. In recent years, the mound tombs in the Qujiang area have been continuously "satellite-released", but as a whole, they should still belong to the category of Yue tombs, but the tombs are larger in scale and higher in rank, indicating that there was a regional political center in the Jinqu Basin in parallel with the northern region of Zhejiang at the time of two weeks or even the late Western Zhou Dynasty.
Ruins of Mengjiang Village
The discovery of tombs at the time of two weeks is the most concentrated at the junction of the three provinces of Jin, Shaanxi and Yu, and the frequent emergence of high-grade tombs shows the evolution of the political pattern before and after the eastward migration of the Zhou Dynasty.
Although the excavation of the Hancheng Taoqu Cemetery is a rescue excavation, it is of great significance. According to sporadic clues on the Internet, there are at least 8 east-west alpha-shaped tombs in the cemetery. During the rescue excavations, the excavated tombs were excavated at a time of two weeks. Excavators speculate that it may belong to the Liang state tombs of the two-week period. Combined with the discovery of cemeteries such as Taoqu, Liangdai Village, and Liu Jiawa, the problem of feudalism in the eastern Zhou Dynasty in the Guanzhong region, especially the recalculation of the center of the political geography of the Zhou people after the Pingwang moved east, should be able to make a breakthrough.
The Chengcheng Liujiawa site continued to be excavated in 2020, and this year's work focused on the East II Cemetery and the Tomb of the Monarch in East I. The tombs excavated in the East II district this year are all in a north-south direction, and there are no waist pits, niches, or martyrs. The tomb of the monarch is attached to the burial car and horse pit, and at least 13 cars are buried with it.
During rescue excavations at the White Goose Cemetery in Yuanqu North, 9 high-ranking noble tombs were found in the early and middle Spring and Autumn periods. The tombs in the cemetery are sparsely distributed, mainly large and medium-sized tombs, and the area of the tomb is mostly between 10-31 square meters, all of which are rectangular vertical pit tombs, north-south, and the mouth is large and small. Most of the tombs are pair tombs, and there may be at least two groups of couples buried together, of which M6 is a charcoal tomb, and the recognizable tomb owner of the tomb is facing north and leaning back and straight. Except for Tomb No. 5 and Tomb No. 9, waist pits have been found, most of which contain martyr dogs, M1 fillers and even martyrs. The cemetery unearthed more artifacts, copper amphora quite a remnant of the Rong Di meaning, many tombs also unearthed copper boxes (匮), after testing and analysis, found that there are animal oils and plant essential oils containing cosmetics containers. There are more than 50 bronze artifacts with inscriptions in the Northern White Goose Cemetery, which involve "Zhongshi", "Taibao Yanzhong", "匽", "虢季" and so on. Excavators believe that the Northern White Goose Cemetery is the Caiyi of the Zhao Gong family in Chengzhou, but if it is the tomb of the noble branch of the Zhao Gong Yan State of the Ji surname, why there are waist pits, martyrs, and how to understand the inscription materials of the marriage with the Yu Kingdom, these are the confusion brought to the academic community by the inscriptions unearthed from the Northern White Goose Cemetery.
Northern White Goose Ruins
The Northern White Goose Cemetery is seized
Northern White Goose Copper Dagger
Northern white goose copper jar
In any case, in the Taoqu, Liujiawa, and Beibaige on both sides of the Yellow River, combined with the Liangdai Village and Shangcunling Cemetery discovered in the past, two weeks later, the Guanzhong nobles came out of the East Xun letter, and after skimming the Kanto, the adjustment and reshaping of the political pattern have made a crucial progress that is completely different from the literature under the empirical evidence of archaeological work.
Excavations continued in 2020 at the Xuyang Cemetery, where the equivalent of the LuhunRong royal family was once again discovered. The newly discovered M15 in Area 17A is east-west, 7.85 meters long and 5.5 meters wide, and 5 people are martyred in the tomb, along with the combination of copper ding, bean, pot, plate, and za, chimes, chimes, chimes, chariots, horses, jade, etc. There are funerary carts and horse pits, pig pits, dog pits, sheep pits and so on around the tomb. Some small and medium-sized tombs are buried with relics or in niches, or inside and outside the coffin at the bottom of the tomb, and some of them are filled with the phenomenon of burial of cattle, horses and sheep's heads. The carriage and horse pits are all rectangular earth pits, east-west, generally burying 1-7 cars, 2-18 horses, and a large number of horses, cattle and sheep's head hooves. The discovery of the Xuyang cemetery confirms the historical event of the "Internal Migration of the Rong People to Yiluo" and is also a reflection of the reshaping of the political territory after the Zhou royal family moved east.
Xuyang Cemetery tomb excavation site
Xu Yang chimes
Xuyang stone chime
Tombs from the Spring and Autumn period have also been found at the western site of Shichilu Temple, and because of the unique combination of pottery excavated from the single ear pot, clay pot, and clay pot, it was determined that it was a tomb of the Rong people. This is the second Rongren cemetery found in the hinterland of the Central Plains after the Xuyang Luhun Rong Cemetery, which once again confirms the history of the internal migration of the Rong people and provides new materials for exploring the distribution of the Rong people who have migrated internally.
The Eastern Zhou tombs of the West Cemetery of ShichiLu Temple are combined with burial pottery
Also a remnant of the early Spring and Autumn Period, the sites of Shijia and Yucun in Ning County, Gansu Province continue to work. The work ideas in 2020 have been greatly adjusted. This year's work focuses on the area of city sites and high-grade building sites discovered in the summer and fall of 2019. The newly discovered trench, located on the outside of the city wall, was dissected and confirmed to be an inverted trapezoid with a large outsole. The high-grade building area is concentrated in the northeast of the city site, and 3 large housing sites have been cleaned up, all of which are rammed earth high-rise buildings, surrounded by steps or "human" shaped ramps, and the column network group is arranged in double or single columns. Half-crypts and planar rammed buildings have been found in the residential areas. After 5 consecutive years of work, it can basically be confirmed that the Shijia and Yucun sites are a large settlement in the two-week period, a key material for establishing the archaeological and cultural sequence of the Western Zhou to Spring and Autumn Period in the Longdong region, discussing the relationship between Qin and Rong after the Eastward Migration of the Zhou Dynasty, and the filling and integration of political geopolitical spaces.
Nanyang's "Invisible Tomb" caused a heated debate in 2019 because it was the relic of the prince Chao Ben Chu. In 2020, the cemetery continues to work. In this year's work, it was confirmed that the main burial chamber of the cemetery was 41 meters north and south, 43 meters from east to west, the length of the tomb passage was 26 meters, and the main tomb funerary car pit was 75 meters long and 9.8 meters wide. In 2020, it was also found that there were 8 rows of funerary tombs on both sides of the main tomb, 39 funerary tombs on the north side, 5 funerary tombs on the north side, 8 rows of funerary tombs on the south side, and 55 funerary tombs. Judging from the current situation of the funerary tombs that have been excavated, these funerary tombs are in the shape of "A", the layout is regular, and some also bring their own carriage and horse pits, indicating that the owners of these funerary tombs have a higher status before they were born. There are also ground building foundations found on the north and south sides of the tomb of the tomb owner, which is in the shape of a "mountain", which some experts believe or "enjoy the hall". Regardless of the nature of the cemetery, it is the most well-known and highest-ranking Chu tomb in nanyang.
Donglai Cemetery in Tengzhou, Shandong Is located in Guanqiao Town, Tengzhou City, and is part of the Dahan Ruins along with the Dahan Cemetery. Excavations in 2020 are divided into east and west parts. The western excavation area is located on the west side of the cemetery, mainly exposing two chema pits, dating from the early Warring States period. Pit No. 1 is about 25.4 meters long from north to south and about 3.5 meters wide from east to west, and there are nine surviving cars, most of which have two horses. Pit No. 2 is about 8.5 meters long from north to south and 3.4 meters wide from east to west, and contains three carriages, two of which are two horses each. The two horse pits may have been funerary pits for individual tombs in the Daehan cemetery. The Eastern Excavation Area is located in the southwest of donglai cemetery, and 50 tombs of various types have been cleaned. There are 9 medium-sized tombs, the burial chamber area is 5 to 20 square meters, a small number of tomb passages, mostly composed of rafters and utensil boxes (pits), individual martyrs, the identity of the tomb owner is a low-level nobleman, the era is mostly the late Spring and Autumn Period, and some are in the middle of the Warring States period. This excavation is of great significance for understanding the relationship between Donglai and Dahan cemeteries and understanding the burial customs in Lunan area.
On the southwest side of the west gate of the small city of qiguo, a group of more important rammed earth foundation sites were discovered in 2020. This group of base sites is close to the city wall, the overall east-west distribution, the total area of about 30,000 square meters, a total of 16 rammed earth foundation sites were found, distributed in 4 rows. In the western part of the excavation area, minted remains such as Qianfan abandoned pits and wells have also been found, breaking the rammed earth foundation site and its related remains in the lower layer, and it can be seen that there are two periods of different natures here: the early rammed earth complex, and the late western area as a coinage workshop. This group of rammed earth buildings appears to be a closed area of the building complex, and some scholars speculate that it may have a certain correlation with the Minoru Gakuen.
In Jiangnan, the Zhejiang Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology and the Xiaoshan Museum conducted rescue excavations at the Shamaoshan kiln site in Xiaoshan. The accumulation layer of kiln waste from the Spring and Autumn Warring States period in the lower layer of the site was confirmed and cleaned up. The kiln site mainly burns hard pottery with printed patterns, but a small number of original porcelain pieces have also been found. The original porcelain recognizable vessels are shaped like cup bowls, pots, etc., and the decoration is mostly grid pattern. Among the printed hard pottery products, there are recognizable pots, plates, etc., and the decoration is mainly based on the rice pattern, and there are a small number of zigzag patterns, rice sieves, checkered patterns, etc.
After basically completing the work of the Eight-Acre Dun Cemetery, Anji Shangmashan began to work on Tomb No. 179. The cemetery is adjacent to the Eight Mu Dun Cemetery, which is a mound above the surface, the top is relatively flat, slightly covered, the east-west diameter is about 65 meters, the north-south short diameter is about 30 meters, the area is about 1600 square meters, and the existing height is about 5-6 meters from the surface. A total of 3 tombs, 2 pits and 1 remain of the building under the tomb were found in the pier. The two funerary tombs in the pier are small in scale and date to the late Warring States period. M3 is the main tomb of the mound, located in the west of the middle of the mound, the mouth of the burial chamber is 11.7 meters long and 5.75-6 meters wide, the slope tomb is located in the west of the burial chamber, the plane is trumpet-shaped, the connection with the burial chamber is the widest, the mouth length is 8.7 meters, the width is 1.8-4.13 meters, the oblique straight wall, the bottom width is 1.36-3 meters. Traces of herringbone wooden rafters were found in the burial chamber. Three east-west cushion marks were found at the bottom of the tomb, located on both sides and in the middle of the chamber. This excavation has completely restored the construction process of the entire mound for "site selection - leveling the land - laying loess - building under the tomb - piling the soil to leave a pit - building a burial tomb - sealing the soil into a mound", which provides a reference and reference for the excavation of the mound tomb in the future, and the excavated relics in the tomb provide a clear reference ruler for the chronological study of the mound tomb.
Between the flashes of light, a brief inventory of the new discoveries of the archaeological work of the Xia Shang Zhou in 2020 is slightly inventoryed, due to the limitation of academic vision, it is inevitable to hang a leak, because the material comes from the Network, the understanding is bound to be superficial. But overall, in the summer of 2020, the archaeology of the Shang and Zhou Dynasties has made many breakthroughs in the sites of continuous work, and discoveries such as the newly discovered city sites in Zhouyuan are significant. The newly discovered North White Goose Cemetery not only enriches the material and cultural materials of major historical problems, but also poses a certain challenge to the previous archaeological understanding or hypothesis due to the new inscriptions. With the full publication of the data, the research of the academic community will also deepen. At the same time, the migration of Rongdi data in the hinterland of Wuyue, northwest China and the Central Plains in Jiangnan has continued to grow in recent years, and it can be boldly predicted that the topic of sinicization and Huaxiaization of the surrounding areas outside the traditional Central Plains will become an academic hotspot and a new growth point in a very short period of time. As a researcher, how fortunate it is to be born at this time!
(The text information and pictures used are from the official website of relevant scientific research institutions or WeChat public accounts and news media reports, hereby explained!) ）
Editor-in-Charge: Zhong Yuan
Proofreader: Yan Zhang