#头条创作挑战赛#严先生潜心于考古, he is the founder of the Neolithic archaeological discipline system in China, the leader of the development of Chinese archaeology, and a banner of Chinese archaeology.
Recalling the past, on October 15, 2006, Mr. Yan attended the "Academic Symposium to Commemorate the 80th Anniversary of the Excavation of Xiyin Ruins" in Shanxi, where he summarized and evaluated the historical significance of Xiyin archaeology and discussed the cultural nature of Xiyin Ruins. Earlier, in July 1963, Mr. Yan wrote an article "Analysis of the Prehistoric Remains of Xiyin Village", which stated his research views on classical archaeological sites and culture in his youth, which was included in the book "Yangshao Cultural Research". These articles were later published in the "Luming Collection" and "Sanjin Archaeology" (II) compiled by the Shanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology and the Shanxi Provincial Archaeological Society.
October 15, 2006 Speech at the opening ceremony of the "Academic Symposium to Commemorate the 80th Anniversary of the Excavation of Xiyin Ruins".
It is very meaningful that we are gathered here today to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the excavation of the Xiyin Village site. 80 years is not a short period of time, and it represents almost the entire process of the development of Chinese archaeology. Of course, the state of archaeology in China today is not the same as that of 80 years ago, but a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and I believe that the archaeology of Xiyin Village will play a fundamental role in the development of Chinese archaeology in the future. To illustrate this issue, I would like to address two issues.
First, it was the first time that a Chinese scholar presided over a field archaeological excavation. The site of Xiyin Village was excavated in 1926, and although the excavation of the Yangshao Village site before that was also carried out by the geological survey of a Chinese academic institution, the presiding officer was a foreign expert hired by the government at that time, and the Chinese scholars only did some auxiliary work. The excavation of the Xiyin Village site was entirely presided over by the Chinese scholar Li Ji, with the participation of Yuan Fuli and others. Since then, Chinese archaeology has gradually embarked on its own path of development.
Second, the first archaeological excavation was carried out in a planned way by exploratory methods, and the changes in the strata were recorded in detail. The excavations in Yangshao Village were tentative, digging a pit in the east and a ditch in the west, and only the cemetery at site 12 was slightly larger. The stratigraphy is only recorded in depth, there is no record of changes in the cultural strata, and there is no decent stratigraphic profile. Although Xiyin Village was also excavated according to the horizontal depth, it paid attention to the changes in soil color and had a clear stratigraphic profile map, on which you can see the changes in soil color at different levels. This is not easy, and many archaeologists in the West still use this method.
Third, for the first time, small relics were recorded and collected according to three-dimensional coordinates, and pottery shards were collected according to horizons, which provided a scientific basis for further research. Until now, most of our construction sites still use this method of recording and collecting relics.
Fourth, the excavation of Xiyin Village was completed in December 1926, and in August 1927, the archaeological report "The Prehistoric Remains of Xiyin Village" was published in a timely manner to inform the academic community of the excavation results. We often can't do that now.
Fifth, when the report talks about the painted pottery in Xiyin Village, it is believed that it should be studied as a whole with other pottery that coexists, and it is not necessary to talk about its origin separately, which is the first time that the painted pottery is questioned by Xi.
Sixth, after the excavation is over, let Liang Siyong sort out the pottery shards in time. Liang Siyong was the first scholar to classify and describe all the pottery shards of the Fourth Exploration Method, and was a pioneer in exploring how to conduct typological research.
Seventh, there are often unexpected coincidences in historical encounters. The significance of two of the most important founders of Chinese archaeology is self-evident in their first attempts here.
Eighth, of course, the archaeological excavation of Xiyin Village also has limitations, mainly because the stratigraphic relationship has not really been clarified. Although the report noted the phenomenon of relics such as pits, and discussed the possibility of whether they were caves, and the remains of several ash pits can be clearly seen from the excavated topographic map surveyed and mapped by Yuan Fuli, the excavations did not have separate numbers, did not treat the accumulations in the ash pits as separate stratigraphic units, and did not pay attention to whether there was a broken relationship between the relics and the strata or between the relics and the relics (e.g., located in the 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 6. The 2.59-meter-deep ash pit at the turn of the probe may have a broken relationship with the largest ash pit to the south of it). This cannot but affect the accuracy of staging studies. This was unavoidable in early archaeological excavations. This problem was not gradually solved until the archaeological excavation of Yinxu in Anyang.
The cultural relics of the Xiyin Village site are much simpler than those of Yangshao Village. According to the current understanding, it only has the remains of Yangshao culture, and it is mainly the remains of the Miaodigou type, and there are no relics of the Longshan culture period at all (it was not until the second excavation in the autumn of 1994 that the second excavation found the remains of the second phase of Miaodigou and later). The ruins of Yangshao Village are from the early Yangshao culture to the late Longshan culture in the Central Plains. If the excavation of Xiyin Village was carried out before the excavation of Yangshao Village, it is likely that it would have been called Xiyin Culture without the name of Yangshao Culture, and the relationship between Yangshao Culture and Longshan Culture would not have been so complicated when discussing the relationship between Yangshao Culture and Longshan Culture in the 30s of the 20th century. The fact is that at that time, the stratigraphic relationship between the Longshan culture and the Yangshao culture in Hougang and other places in Anyang was mainly emphasized, and the distribution of the two cultures was paid attention to at the same time. If we use the relatively simple data of Xiyin Village and Buzhao Village to screen the data of Yangshao Village, we can not only clearly distinguish Yangshao culture and Longshan culture (should be called Longshan culture in the Central Plains), but also further see the difference between Xiyin and Hougang. The concept of a so-called mixed culture will not be raised. But history cannot be assumed. Academic research always takes a tortuous path.
At the turn of the fifties and sixties of the 20th century, due to the excavation of sites such as Banpo in Xi'an, Miaodigou in Shaanxi County, Yuanjun Temple and Quanhu Village in Huaxian County, and Wangwan in Luoyang, the understanding of Yangshao culture and the relationship between Yangshao culture and Longshan culture gradually deepened. In 1962, Yang Jianfang first comprehensively proposed the types and periods of Yangshao culture, and in 1965, Su Bingqi's "Some Questions on Yangshao Culture" promoted the study of Yangshao culture to a new level. Considering that the information of some typical sites is not published satisfactorily, it will affect the depth of research. I spent a lot of energy on the analysis of typical sites, and on this basis, I conducted a more detailed periodization study of the Yangshao cultural relics in each natural area, and then carried out a study of the periodization and classification of the entire culture. Finally, the process and internal mechanism of the occurrence, development and decline of the whole culture are discussed, and the role of the surrounding culture in the development of Yangshao culture is discussed. It strives to deal with the study of archaeological culture dialectically from the perspective of development, evolution and interrelationship, and avoids static research methods, as well as external factors and isolated development theories.
Since about the 90s of the 20th century, more and more relics of Yangshao culture have been discovered, and the connotation of Yangshao culture is very complex. Some scholars still adhere to the concept of Yangshao culture, but they divide different cultural periods and cultural types under Yangshao culture, and have different understandings of the time and space scope of the entire Yangshao culture. It is natural to have different opinions, and academic research often finds solutions to problems and the way forward in debates with different opinions. I am in favor of retaining the name of Yangshao culture, and I am not opposed to dividing it into several cultures under Yangshao culture. According to the principle of dividing archaeological culture proposed by Childe and Xia Nai, no matter how small the scope is, it can be called archaeological culture. It's just that we have to conduct a hierarchical analysis of archaeological culture, there is a big culture, there is a small culture or a subculture, and we can't cook it in one pot. Yangshao culture is the first archaeological culture to be discovered and named in the history of Chinese archaeology. At that time, it was believed to belong to the late Neolithic period to the era of copper and stone use, which was characterized by painted pottery, and was probably the culture of the ancestors of the Han people; Now it seems that these observations are basically correct. Yangshao culture is a big culture. In the past, the Majiayao culture was once called the Yangshao culture of Gansu, and its status was equivalent to the subculture under the Yangshao culture. Later, it was renamed Majiayao culture, or redivided into Majiayao culture and Banshan-Machang culture, which is essentially only a specialized local type of Yangshao culture in the late period, or a subculture, which cannot be equal to Yangshao culture. The Haisheng Bulang culture, which was also found in Inner Mongolia, is also a local type specialized in the late Yangshao culture, and it is also a subculture. And so on, some subcultures can also be delineated.
Whether the Yangshao culture can exist as an independent archaeological culture with its own characteristics depends on whether it has basic common characteristics to distinguish it from other archaeological cultures before and after it and in its neighbors. The most characteristic pottery of Yangshao culture is the small-mouthed pointed bottom bottle, which is one of the main utensils of various periods and local types of Yangshao culture, which is not found in other cultures. The basic combination of utensils of Yangshao culture is bottles, bowls, pots, jars, and urns, which were formed in the early stage of Yangshao culture, that is, the Banpo period, and are also the most important utensils in other periods. This is not only different from the previous Baijia culture (Laoguantai culture), Peiligang culture and later Longshan culture in the Central Plains, but also different from the adjacent Dawenkou culture, Hongshan culture and Daxi culture at about the same time. Yangshao culture is known for its faience pottery, which is clearly different from earlier and later cultures. But there is more than one culture of painted pottery, what are the characteristics of painted pottery of Yangshao culture? The faience of Yangshao culture is very complex, and it is difficult to generalize the common characteristics. However, as long as it is compared with the surrounding culture, there are still certain regular differences. The painted pottery of Yangshao culture is mainly painted with black color on the red pottery ground, and the early period is mostly composed of straight lines and straight side blocks, the middle period is mostly composed of curved and curved edge blocks, and the late period is mostly composed of straight lines and curves, which is different from the Hongshan culture, and also different from the Dawenkou culture and Daxi culture. Animal patterns such as fish, birds, frogs, and deer of the Yangshao culture are also not found in other cultures. Yangshao culture is a strong culture, it has a clear influence on the surrounding culture, but also accept some influence of the surrounding culture, so it is not strange that there are some painted pottery patterns the same or similar, but after all, each has its own characteristics. From these aspects, Yangshao culture is completely valid.
The study of Yangshao culture involves many aspects, not only the cultural characteristics, distribution range, cultural periodization, local types, specific dates and relations with other cultures, nor the specific process of its occurrence, development and disappearance, as well as the internal mechanisms and external causes that trigger such changes, as well as the economy of this culture, such as agriculture, animal husbandry, gathering, fishing, hunting and other livelihood economy, as well as the construction industry and the manufacturing of stone tools, pottery, bone horn mussels, etc., as well as the handicraft production economy such as textiles and weaving. There are also technologies for the realization of these productions, distribution and exchange of products, etc., some of which have been specifically studied but not well understood, and some of which have not yet been studied. The same is true for the study of family form, social organization and social nature, customs, art, religion and other spiritual culture at that time. Some of these are key issues, and I made some immature comments in my speech to commemorate the 65th anniversary of Yangshao culture. 20 years have passed, and there doesn't seem to be much progress, and I don't have many new ideas, so I won't delay everyone's time.
The unveiling ceremony of the monument for the 80th anniversary of the excavation of the Xiyin site
The original text is included in "Luming Collection: The 80th Anniversary of Mr. Li Ji's Excavation of the Xiyin Site and the 50th Anniversary of the Houma Workstation of the Shanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology"
July 1963 Analysis of the prehistoric remains of Xiyin Village
The Yangshao cultural site in Xiyin Village, Xia County, Shanxi Province was excavated in 1926. Some comrades think that this rich Yangshao relic is very simple, it belongs to the same cultural type of the same period, and can even be used as a typical site for naming cultural types, thus proposing the name of the Xiyin type. Some comrades believe that the content is complicated, and because of the sloppy field work in the past, different types of things from different periods are mixed together, so it is very inappropriate to use it to name a cultural type. We believe that the Xiyin Village site is a simple Yangshao cultural site, and its cultural content is far simpler than the connotation of Yangshao culture named after the Yangshao village site. According to the current level of understanding, most of the relics in Xiyin Village belong to the type of temple ditch, but there are also a small number of earlier and later remains, which cannot be regarded as the same type in general, but need to be specifically analyzed.
The excavation materials of Xiyin Village are mainly found in Li Ji's "Remains of the Prehistory of Xiyin Village" and Liang Siyong's "Neolithic Pottery of the Prehistoric Site of Xiyin Village, Shanxi", and later Wu Jinding published some new materials in the book "Pottery of Chinese Prehistory". If the above three contain plates or illustrations, in addition to the duplicates, a total of 65 pieces of painted pottery, 31 pieces of plain pottery, and some stone tools and bone tools are obtained. Comparing these relics with those that have been scientifically excavated and studied, they can be broadly divided into the following three categories.
The first group has fewer remains, among which are:
1. Straight mouth round bottom bowl: a straight mouth, the abdominal wall is rounded, the lower abdomen is obliquely closed, and the bottom is round. The other piece is only the mouth, fine clay red pottery, the outer edge of the mouth is decorated with black broad-banded color patterns, and the color width is about 5 cm slightly weaker.
2. Fish-pattern faience pot: one is a fragment of the mouth, fine clay red pottery, the edge is narrow and rolled, the lip and the edge of the surface are decorated with black color bands, the abdomen is decorated with fish-shaped color patterns, only the tail remains, it is similar to the fish tail on a painted pottery pot in Xi'an Banpo. Another fragment of the abdomen of a faience pot, decorated with black color, is composed of straight lines and wide strips, much like a variant of the fish pattern.
3. Extravagant mouth string pattern jar: There is a fragment of the mouth, when it belongs to a kind of extravagant mouth belly or curved belly of the sand jar, the shoulder and upper abdomen are decorated with string patterns, and the lines are thicker, arranged tighter, parallel and neat.
The characteristics of the above-mentioned five pottery shards in terms of shape and ornamentation are all frequently seen in the Yangshao relics of the Banpo type, and they often coexist with each other. For example, in the 55T1 (3) and T22 (3) formations of Banpo in Xi'an, there are fish pattern painted pottery pieces and wide band pattern painted pottery bowl pieces coexist, and M32 has a straight mouth round bottom bowl and a luxury mouth curved belly string pattern jar. In 60F1 of Xiameng Village, Bin County, there are straight-mouthed round bottom bowls, wide-band pattern painted pottery bowls and extravagant string pattern sand jars coexist. The string patterns on these cans are also thicker, tighter, parallel and neat, which are the characteristics of the Banpo type, and are very different from the string patterns on the sand jars of the temple ditch type, which are generally thinner, thinner, less neat, and often intertwined with the lines. It can be seen that although there are few pottery shards of the first type in Xiyin Village, they are remarkable, and they should be of the same type in the same period, and generally belong to the Banpo type (this is the view at that time, and now it seems that it should belong to the Dongzhuang type of the Banpo period. — Author's note).
The second type of remains accounts for the vast majority of the remains, some of which are as follows:
1. Mouth painted pottery bowl: the most numerous, are fine clay red pottery or off-white pottery, mouth, folded abdomen, the lower part of the oblique collection. A few have white clothes, mainly decorated with black patterns, and some also have red patterns. There are five main types of motifs:
a. vertical arc pattern: a row of vertical arc pattern is decorated on the edge of the mouth, and some of the crescent lines below it are divided into several units by the crescent pattern standing on the side, and there are three diagonal diagonal diagonal lines in each unit, and a dot is embellished in the middle section; some dots are moved to the upper left of the diagonal oblique line; some crescents become concave chord right triangles, the diagonal oblique lines are shortened, and the end intersects in the middle of the horizontal line below.
b. Pod pattern: Because the two concave chord right-angled triangles are butted in the opposite direction, a pod-shaped ground is formed in the middle, and there is a thin line along the long axis of the pod, and a dot is dotted in the middle of the line.
c. Convex arc: Each unit is overlapped by two to three convex arc lines, and there is a dot below. Some of the compositions are repetitions of the same unit, while others are arranged alternately with network cells.
d. Grid pattern: Each unit is composed of grid patterns to form rectangular squares, some are arranged alternately with convex arc patterns as mentioned above, and some are arranged continuously by rectangular squares, leaving a narrow and long gap between each two rectangular squares, with dots in the middle.
e. Narrow strip pattern: a red narrow strip is decorated on the edge of the mouth, and the same pattern has been seen in the bottom ditch of the temple and the latter part of the first phase of Luoyang Wangwan.
2. Painted pottery bowl: only fragments. The shape is a mouth, a folded abdomen, and a thick lip, decorated with groups of grid patterns and overlapping triangle patterns.
3. Painted pottery pots with curly edges: there are a lot of them, and they are all fragments. Fine clay red or off-white pottery with black patterns. There are two main motifs:
a. Petal pattern: It is connected by the vertices of many concave triangle patterns to form five or six petal-shaped grounds, and a dot is decorated in the center of the flower to represent the stamens.
B. whirlwind hook pattern: composed of dots, curved strips, concave triangles and thin lines, etc., the pattern of each unit is always around a dot as the center of the whirlwind, and the units are hooked with each other, it is difficult to break apart, usually this pattern is called vortex or dot hook leaf pattern.
4. Painted pottery beans: only the fragments of the bean plate remain, and there is no circle foot. The shape is the same as a complete painted pottery bean unearthed in Xiguanbao, Huayin, Shaanxi, because it is known to be a bean. All fine clay pottery, oblique straight wall, there are vertical ridges under the plate. Some have red pottery clothes, decorated with black colors, and the motifs are mostly horizontal braided patterns and feather patterns.
5. Small-mouth bottle: only fragments remain. Clay pottery, only the neck is colored, and the abdomen is decorated with thin lines. Liang Siyong once imagined that the two parts of the pottery shards at the mouth and bottom were restored into a small-mouth pointed bottom bottle, which was slightly like a ring-shaped pointed bottom bottle at the bottom of the temple.
6. Pottery stove: only the fragment of the mouth, for the sand pottery, the outer wall has string patterns and additional pile patterns, and there is a mud protrusion of the kettle in the mouth, which is unique to the pottery stove of the type of ditch at the bottom of the temple.
7. Sand cans: all mouth or abdominal fragments. The mouth section is similar to that of a railroad track. The belly is decorated with sparse lines, sometimes cut by horizontal strings or scratches, and sometimes with additional piles.
All of the above-mentioned types of pottery can be found in the first phase of the temple ditch, and many cases of coexistence can also be found. For example, H10 has various pottery bowls decorated with vertical arc pattern, convex arc pattern and grid pattern coexist with curly edge curved belly basins decorated with whirlwind hook and pattern, H46 pottery bowls decorated with convex arc pattern and pod pattern coexist with curly edge curved belly basin decorated with petal pattern and whirlwind hook pattern, H47 clay pots decorated with convex arc pattern and petal pattern coexist with sand clay stoves, H346 has vertical arc pattern bowls, petal pattern pots and sand clay pots, etc. There are also fragments of small mouth bottles decorated with colored patterns and line patterns at the same time, although it is not known that other utensils coexist with it, but the style of its faience pattern is still consistent with other faience at the same site. It can be seen that the second type of pottery in Xiyin Village, except for the painted pottery beans, can be determined to belong to a pottery group. They coexist with each other, and never with the pottery of the first type and the third type of pottery described later, and certainly belong to the other type. Since all this kind of pottery can find the same specimen in the first phase of the temple ditch, it naturally belongs to the type of temple ditch.
As for the painted pottery beans, only the fragments of the potato plate are produced in Xiyin Village and Miaodi Ditch, and the shape and pattern are quite consistent. However, the painted pottery beans in the ditch at the bottom of the temple were mistakenly identified as the circle foot bowl by the excavation report, and the vertical ridge of the lower part of the bean plate was mistakenly identified as the short circle foot, and the unearthed unit was not published. To answer this question correctly, it needs to be illustrated with the help of a complete faience bean unearthed in Xiguanbao, Huayin. The painted pottery beans of Xiguanbao have a straight mouth and oblique straight abdomen, and the lower part has vertical ridges, and the upper and lower sections of the exterior are decorated with horizontal braided patterns and feather-like patterns respectively, which are consistent with the residual beans of Xiyin Village and Miaodi ditch, which can fully indicate that the fragments of the latter two belong to beans rather than bowls. There is also a row of four petal patterns in the middle section of the Xiguanbao painted pottery bean plate, and the center of the flower is divided by horizontal and vertical strips, which is common in the type of temple bottom ditch, and often coexists with the vertical arc pattern, convex arc pattern, bean pod pattern of painted pottery bowls and painted pottery pots decorated with swirl hook patterns (such as temple bottom ditch H43 and H46 are all), it is certain that these beans are not another pottery group, they should also belong to the temple bottom ditch type.
In addition to the above two types of relics, there are a small number of pottery shards in Xiyin Village that may be classified as the third category of relics. Among them are black pottery bowls with mouth wheels, fragments of sand jars decorated with thin strips and additional mounds, and some vessels with low ring-feet. They seem to be similar to the characteristics of the second phase of Wangwan in Henan or the Qinwangzhai type, and their age should be later than the first and second types of relics. This is consistent with the observations on the stratigraphy. According to the excavator Li Ji, "the dark component (i.e., black pottery or dark gray pottery) is increasing every time, and the oily red (i.e., the pottery shards of red clothes) is the most in the upper gray layer", indicating that the relics in the upper layer of Xiyin Village are indeed somewhat different from the lower layers. It's just that there are so few relics that it's not easy to fall into a certain type exactly.
Some stone tools, bone tools and small pieces of pottery have also been found in Xiyin Village, among which pottery rings, pottery balls, spinning wheels, bone awls and bone needles have been found in the remains of the Banpo type and the temple ditch type, and it is not certain which type they belong to. A large number of flint tools were also found in Xiyin Village, and Li Ji used them all as arrowheads. Its raw materials, preparation methods and size are close to those of fine stone tools, but the shape is not like the arrows of fine stone tool culture. This stone tool not only coexists with the relics of Yangshao culture, but it is also difficult to determine which type it belongs to. The only types that can be roughly determined are the convex arc blade stone shovel, the profile oval stone axe and the rectangular perforated stone knife, all of which are similar to the similar artifacts from the first phase of the temple ditch, and they are the remains of the temple ditch type.
The above analysis shows that Xiyin Village is a Yangshao cultural site, and most of the relics belong to the Miaodigou type, but there are also a small number of earlier or later relics, which cannot be regarded as simple things of the same type and same period. We know that the excavation scale of the Xiyin Village site is very small, Li Ji made a very detailed division of the strata, and later Liang Siyong made a very detailed analysis of the pottery shards, why did they not distinguish them? I think that's a historical limitation. Although we cannot demand the current level of understanding from our predecessors, we should always have a clear understanding of the work at that time.
The excavation of Xiyin Village was at the beginning of the development of field archaeology on the mainland. From not knowing the importance of field excavations to actually carrying out field work, from only knowing the collection of gold and stone characters to collecting ordinary cultural relics such as the most inconspicuous pottery shards of ordinary people, this is a great progress in itself, and it is a sign of the beginning of modern archaeology in the mainland, but some of the earliest excavations carried out by the Swedish scholar Andersen with the cooperation of other staff of the Geological Survey Institute at that time did not have strict coordinates, and the stratigraphic observation was not detailed, and the collection of relics only recorded the depth of the excavation, and did not divide the level according to the soil quality and soil color. Li Ji's excavation in Xiyin Village has been greatly improved on the basis of Andersen. For the first time, he used the exploratory method to excavate, dividing the exploratory area into 2 meters square. At the time of excavation, a large layer of 1 meter deep was divided, and sublayers were divided according to the original layer of the sediment in the large layer, and some explorers at that time divided a total of 33 layers from the topsoil layer downward, and collected and recorded the unearthed relics according to these layers. This method is much more detailed and sophisticated than the one adopted by Andersen in Yangshao Village, but it still seems to have serious shortcomings today. First, it is not necessary to divide the large layer with a depth of 1 meter, it will inevitably divide some primary layers, which is easy to cause illusions; Second, although the division of substrata is carried out according to the soil color of the original accumulation, the division is too fine, the primary and secondary are not distinguished, and the relationship between the entire strata of each exploration party is not considered, and it is impossible to distinguish which are meaningful strata and which are only local soil color changes. Thirdly, and this is the main one, is the notion that there are no relics to break the relationship, and at that time it was already observed that the strata were "full of crossings and pockets", but they were puzzled. In fact, this so-called cross-shaped and bag-shaped state is a reflection of the bag-shaped ash pits breaking each other on the stratigraphic profile. On the topographic map drawn by Yuan Fuli after the excavation, it can be clearly seen that there are many circular pit bottoms, and some of the pits have broken each other. For example, a pit located at a depth of about 4.5 meters from probe 2 to 4 and a pit at a depth of 2.59 meters from probe 6 to 7 have been cut off from the extension line of the pit, and the relationship has obviously been broken. Since these phenomena were not known at that time, it was certainly impossible to divide them as a stratigraphic unit, which was the main reason for the ambiguity of stratigraphic relations. Fourth, most of the published relics do not indicate the hierarchy, and it is difficult for readers to judge their interrelationship from the stratigraphic relationship. Although Liang Siyong's analysis is very detailed, due to the mistakes of the stratum itself, and his analysis does not start from the strata, but only examines the changes of various factors in the stratum after the analysis is completed, and of course it is impossible to carry out the correct staging. As for the concept of cultural type, it was not taken into account at all at that time.
Since we already know that the Yangshao relics in Xiyin Village are not pure, and know the reasons why it is not pure, it is naturally not appropriate to use it as a representative of the type. Some people may say that the relics of Yangshao in Xiyin Village are not simple, but after all, the relics belonging to the first and third categories only account for a small proportion. Because according to the analysis of Comrade Yang Jianfang, the painted pottery at the bottom of the temple can be divided into two groups, A and B, and the painted pottery in Xiyin Village is only equivalent to the group A of the ditch at the bottom of the temple, so it is generally called the type of the ditch at the bottom of the temple, and it is better to call it the type of Xiyin Village and the type of Sanliqiao respectively. However, the fact is that the division of the two groups of patterns A and B does not conform to the objective reality, because there are many units in the bottom ditch of the temple where the two groups of patterns A and B coexist. Besides, Xiyin Village is not only a group of patterns. In the units of group B painted pottery drawn by Yang Jianfang, there are many patterns that are common in the second class of relics in Xiyin Village, such as the vertical arc pattern, petal pattern, grid pattern of H346, the vertical arc pattern of H12, H305 and H327 and the pod pattern of H72, etc., are typical patterns in the second type of relics in Xiyin Village, how can it be said that the painted pottery of Xiyin Village has nothing to do with the so-called group B painted pottery in the temple ditch? It can be seen that it is not that the first phase of the temple ditch is more complex than Xiyin Village, but that the Xiyin Village is more complex than the first phase of the temple ditch. As a typical site of cultural type, it is always better to have a simple connotation and clear characteristics. Therefore, I still advocate retaining the name of the Miaodi ditch type, and there is no need to set up another name like the Xiyin Village type.
This article was written in July 1963 and included in Yan Wenming's book "Yangshao Cultural Research", Cultural Relics Publishing House, 1989 edition