Text/Liu Yutao
Jiaodong Peninsula is the largest peninsula in China, its climate is warm, terrestrial resources and marine resources are very rich, very suitable for human habitation, as early as 10,000 years ago, there were primitive humans here to breed and live, ancestors in the coast to fishing, hunting, gathering as the main source of livelihood. About 7000 to 8000 years ago, primitive humans in Jiaodong entered the matriarchal clan society, and the ancestors moved to the highlands near the sea and formed a number of villages that began to take shape. After the establishment of the Xia Dynasty, the tribes living in Jiaodong were called "Laiyi". In the long-term practice of life, Laiyi people have formed their own unique food culture, which has a long influence and has left a deep imprint on our lives to this day.
The primitive Laiyi people mainly lived in gathering and hunting. Gathering and hunting are the earliest forms of human production, especially in resource-rich areas such as the Jiaodong Peninsula. The Laiyi people generally live in the vicinity of hilly mountains and dense woods, relying on the gifts of nature, they collect the roots, stems, leaves, and fruits of wild plants for food. This point, in the modern archaeological results have also been verified, archaeologists in the shell hill site in the formation of a lot of carbonized plants fruit, as well as a variety of stone tools, these stone tools are not only more numerous, shape and method of playing are not the same, of which stone axes, small grinding stones, grinding discs, grinding rods, stone balls and so on are the most distinctive.
The Laiyi people's fisheries and fishing activities have formed a primitive and unique dietary characteristic. Because the continental shelf of Jiaodong Peninsula is relatively gentle, with the ebb and flow of the tide, there will be a large number of shellfish and coastal shoals with the seasonal monsoon is more suitable for shellfish survival, Laiyi people generally live in the highlands not far from the sea, the beginning may be unconscious to the nearby "beach" to pick some shellfish, fish, and began to try to eat, slowly these nutritious, delicious seafood, it has become a good rich food for Laiyi people, creating a precedent for Jiaodong flavor to seafood as the main cooking raw material. According to the excavations of the "Baishi Village Cultural Site" and the "Qiujiazhuang Cultural Site", the ancestors at that time, in addition to mainly collecting plants as food, mainly fed on seafood such as sea shellfish, and the remains of seafood they ate were piled up, forming a "shell hill culture" with obvious coastal characteristics. As the Laiyi people's understanding of the ocean deepened, they set their sights on the sea, and began to grab natural stones from the mountains for processing, and then to carry out fishing production activities along the coast. According to the analysis of fish skeletons excavated from archaeological excavations, the fish caught by the Laiyi people at that time were not only coastal fish such as sea bass and black seabream, but also deep-sea fish such as true seabream. What is even more amazing is that at that time, the Laiyi people already knew the knowledge of poisonous fish and mastered the method of removing the poisonous part. For example, the redfin oriental dolphin is a highly toxic fish because its liver, ovaries and skin are highly toxic, and it must first remove internal organs and blood and wash it before eating. Judging from the physical objects of the excavated redfin oriental dolphin fish bones, the Laiyi people at that time were able to remove the poisonous parts very well, and then eat them with confidence after deep processing.
The developed farming technology and pottery craftsmanship are a sign of the high culinary level of the Laiyi people. The industrious and wise laiyi ancestors gradually lived a sedentary life after entering the clan commune, and primitive agriculture and primitive animal husbandry also rose. The main crops cultivated by the Yilai people at that time were rice and millet. In the past, we generally believed that the production area of rice was in the water town of Jiangnan, and the so-called "land of Chuyue, the land is wide and sparsely populated, rice soup fish, or fire ploughing and water", is the true portrayal of agricultural operations in Jiangnan. However, the remains of rice excavated from the Yangjiaquan site in Qixia, Yantai, suggest that the Laiyi people may also have been one of the pioneers in inventing rice cultivation. Therefore, many scholars in China and Japan believe that Japanese rice originated in China, and pointed out that "spreading to Japan through the Jiaodong Peninsula" is one of the most important transmission routes, that is, through the Jiaodong Peninsula, the Liaodong Peninsula, the Korean Peninsula, and the Kyushu region of Japan.
During this period, the Laiyi people also invented pottery. At first, they could only make ancient and simple pottery, and later created beautiful and gorgeous faience pottery, and in the middle and late period of primitive society, the Laiyi people fired the world-famous black pottery as thin as eggshells, which today people describe as "black as lacquer, bright as mirrors, thin as paper", and its craftsmanship is breathtaking. In September 1982, the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences carried out scientific excavations at the Dakou Site of Yanji Island in Changdao County, and unearthed a large number of black pottery, most common in cups, beans and plates, and its style is simple and elegant, thick and practical, and it is a fine product of black pottery.
The expansion of cooking raw materials and the reform and innovation of dietary tools have greatly improved the cooking level of primitive humans in China. We can imagine a scene of life on a certain day in the laiyi people in ancient times: on a windy and sunny night, when the moon was empty, the half-hidden and half-exposed grass huts revealed a faint light. On the flat ground, the women wore clothes sewn from animal skins, and the men were next to the roaring campfire, on the one hand, the meat of the prey boiled in bronze and the boiling of cooked fish and shrimp from another pottery mane, they humbly drank the newly brewed fruit wine in the pottery bowl, while chewing on the cooked meat and seafood, happily talking about the scene of hunting animals, all of which showed that the cooking and diet of the ancient Dongyi people at that time had formed a system.
The prosperity of winemaking culture marks the development of Laiyi food culture. The brewing of wine can be traced back to the ancient times with wild fruits natural fermentation of "natural wine", with the improvement of agricultural technology level, Laiyi people have a surplus of grain, they slowly learned to make wine, that is, with the germination of grain after cooking and fermentation, can brew a more mellow wine, this is called "the beauty of Qingli, began with the silk". A large number of wine vessels from the Longshan culture period have been unearthed throughout Jiaodong, mainly including high-handled cups, amphora cups, cylindrical cups and some handmade small cups. Due to the rise of the ceremonial system in the Longshan culture period, these wine vessels were mostly ceremonial vessels for the heavens and the earth, so the water wine brewed with grain also became an indispensable jade liquid jelly in the ceremonial activities at that time. It can be said that the winemaking industry of the Laiyi people has progressed with the prosperity of the agricultural economy, and it is an inevitable product of the development of Laiyi food civilization to a certain stage.
The development of society has promoted the final formation of laiyi people's dietary characteristics. With the development and progress of society, the productivity level of laiyi people has been greatly improved, and by the Shang and Zhou dynasties, laiyi people began to enter the slave society and establish their own country, and their food culture underwent a qualitative leap, forming the trend of Lu cai jiaodong flavor.
It is an important ancient country in eastern Shandong, and in ancient documents such as "Spring and Autumn", "Zuo Zhuan" and "Shi Ji" are written as "Ji", and in the excavated bronzes, "Ji" is written more. The glyph is the pictogram of a bundle of silk, and the ji is derived later. His own country was already established in the Western Zhou Dynasty, and when the history of King Yi of Zhou was recorded, Ji Hou said bad things about the Duke of Qi in front of Zhou Tianzi, resulting in the Duke of Qi'ai being cooked, which shows that the State of Ji was quite powerful in the princely states at that time. According to the excavated cultural relics, the Jiguo catering industry at that time was very developed, not only had a high level of cooking, but also attached great importance to the etiquette of eating, "the major events of the country, in the ceremony and rong", from the excavation of the Jiguo bronze ceremonial vessels, there are mainly Ding, 汲, Ji pot, pot, box, etc., especially in December 1972, Laiyang Zhongjing Commune Qianheqian Village unearthed the pot, its shape is quite similar to the bag pot, thin and thick, small mouth, the same body decorated with gorgeous ripple patterns, the abdomen is equipped with three buttons, for a special kettle, the bottom of the pot has a noose rim circle foot On the flat bottom of the circle foot there is an inscription of 13 words: "He is a cast pot, and the minister uses it to draw eternal treasure." It is explained that the maker of the instrument was his own prince, and he gave the pot to his subordinates.
According to historical records, at the beginning of the Zhou Dynasty, Zhou Tianzi sealed Jiang Ziya in Qiyingqiu, "Yingqiu Bianlai", "Laiyi and the Dispute between Yingqiu and Yingqiu", which shows that the power of "Laiyi" at that time was still quite powerful. Due to the strong resistance of "Laiyi" and in order to stabilize the political position of the East, when Qi destroyed Lai in 567 BC, the rulers of Jiang Qi adopted the policy of "simplifying their reasoning because of their customs", and did not fully implement the etiquette system of the Zhou Dynasty, which was also an important reason for the prominent cultural characteristics and long duration of the Jiaodong region.
In short, the ruins of primitive humans and a large number of cultural relics excavated throughout the counties and urban areas of Yantai can prove that the food culture of the original Laiyi people has its unique development origin, which is a laiyi culture that is different from the Central Plains culture, and its gastronomic style of good governance seafood has been basically fixed at this time.
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