Like Jinshang, Huishang and Zhejiang Shang, Fujian Shang was a famous shang gang in ancient China. The academic community has always understood that Fujian commerce began in the Han and Tang Dynasties. In fact, Fujian merchants began in the Shang Zhou, as early as the Shang Zhou Fujian most of the time was still in a barbaric state, northern Fujian took the lead in stepping out of the pace of civilization, played a strong sound of the era of commodity culture, became the birthplace of Fujian merchants and a hot land to drive Fujian's commodity economy.
During the ancient Fujian period from the Shang Zhou to the Warring States, our ancestors, the ancient Min people, began the earliest commodity production in Fujian at the source of the Minjiang River.
Pottery production began in ancient Fujian. In 1990, Fujian Province conducted archaeology on Hulu Mountain in Wuyi Mountain and cleared out 22 shang dynasty kiln group sites. Archaeology has found that the mountains around the kiln group are not used for crop cultivation, but for the extraction of soil for pottery and the placement of finished pottery products, indicating that the ancient Min people living here are not engaged in agricultural farming but engaged in the professional production of pottery, and the ancient Min people use the pottery produced in exchange for the grain, livestock, and ge ma they need for their lives. In 2005, Fujian Province carried out rescue archaeology of Mao'er'an in Xianyang Town, Pucheng County, and cleaned up a group of 9 pottery kilns in the Shang Dynasty, and also cleaned up the tombs of 21 ancient Min kiln workers, which was listed as one of the "Top Ten Archaeological New Discoveries" in China in 2006. The two most interesting dragon kilns in this kiln group are the earliest Shang Dynasty dragon kilns found in China so far, known as the "originator of the Chinese Shang Dynasty dragon kilns": when the Chinese land uses round and oval kilns to fire three or five finished products at a time, the dragon kilns here can fire hundreds of pottery at a time. This kind of mass firing reflects both their large-scale production and the degree of specialization of potters. This mass production of potters not only shows the typical commodity production activity that distinguishes it from small production, but also means that they must concentrate on "abandoning agriculture and business" and exchanging their products for subsistence needs. The production and exchange of this product at the source of the Minjiang River is undoubtedly the birthplace of Fujian's ancient commodity activities.
From the printed pottery and black-clad pottery produced by the ancient Min people in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties to the Han and Wei celadons and the Tang and Song Dynasties, in the long ancient times, northern Fujian led the way to consumer fashion.
Boat manufacturing began in ancient Fujian. The source of the ancient Minjiang River is the starting point of Fujian shipbuilding. The Wuyishan ship coffin of the Shang Zhou Dynasty showed the shipbuilding ability and high wisdom of the ancient Min people.
The "No. 1 Ship Coffin" taken from the Guanyin Cave in Wuyishan in 1973 and the "No. 2 Ship Coffin" taken from the Wuyishan White Rock Cave archaeology in 1978 are all made of "Minnan", which is shaped like a river canopy boat from the end and tail, with the front groove of the coffin covering the bow and the rear groove covering the hull. The "Ancient History of Fujian" edited by Qiu Rongzhou expressed the following amazement at the production process of the two coffins: "The shape of the coffin is regular, the surrounding area is cut into right angles, and the trimming is extremely neat, the mouth of the child and mother is tightly closed, the chisel hole at the bottom of the cover is symmetrical, and the creation is uniform; the four walls inside the coffin are flat, and the wall thickness is only 2 to 3 centimeters... Reflects the proficiency of carpentry and the skill of applying knives. ”
The shipbuilding technology embodied in the coffins of ancient Min people developed the ship, bow ship, building ship and amazing sea ship "Fish" in the hands of the later Minyue people; continuing to the Three Kingdoms, the entire "Jian'an County" was only dedicated to the manufacture of boats for Eastern Wu, and the shipbuilding base was located in the continent outside the west gate of Jian'ou, and after the ships were built here, the "Captain of the Dian Boat School" and the "Wen Ma Boat Tun" continuously transported the ships to the Wudi of the Yangtze River. This shipbuilding base in northern Fujian lasted for more than 2,000 years and was still in full production until the end of the "Cultural Revolution" in the last century.
Ancient Min began tea production. When and where did the aroma of Chinese tea rise? The record of tea that can be found in the history of letters is that the Eastern Jin Dynasty's "Huayang Guozhi" first recorded that when King Wu of Zhou was cutting down the King of Shang, "Min Pu", who led his troops to participate in the battle, offered tea to King Wu of Zhou. "Min Pu" means the ancient Min people, and "Min Pu tea offering" means that Chinese tea production originated in the ancient Min people during the Shang Zhou Dynasty.
From the Shang Zhou "Min Pu Offering Tea" to the Wuyi Mountain Tea, which was praised as the "Late Ganhou" in the Han and Jin Dynasties, to the "Beiyuan Imperial Tea Garden" and its "Beiyuan Tribute Tea" in Fengfeng Town, Dongfeng Town, Jian'ou City, which was famous in the Tang Dynasty for five generations, the source of the Minjiang River can be described as the central source of Chinese tea, until the Ming and Qing Dynasties were repeatedly strictly prohibited by the imperial court to "build tea into the sea", and it was impossible to prohibit northern Fujian tea from going north to the central plains to the east.
Cotton and linen weaving began in ancient Fujian. The history of Chinese textiles confirms: "The earliest cotton fabrics in China were excavated in the coffins of Wuyishan ships. "The coffin of the Shang Zhou ship unearthed not only the silk fabric of "smoke-colored silk veil", but also the hemp fabric "silk cloth" that was ahead of the time, especially the cotton products in the ship's coffin, which was first discovered in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties in China, which greatly exceeded the traditional understanding that cotton was introduced to China in the Han Dynasty. The ship coffin shows that the ancient Min people were the first people to plant cotton in China, and the source of the Minjiang River in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties was the place where China's advanced textile industry was.
The textile industry, which began in the Shang and Zhou dynasties, has continued in history. By the end of the Tang Dynasty, the source of the Minjiang River could even be used to make paper and paper clothing, which was historically known as "jade buckle". There is also a kind of "Lian's paper" made in the Shaowu Guangming area through 72 complicated processes, and its production process was included in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage list in 2006.
The sword casting that began in Ancient Min. In 2005, a batch of early Zhou swords excavated from the Jiutudun Tomb in PuchengGuan means that the earliest crudely cast swords in China appeared in northern Fujian, starting from the Shang Zhou "Pucheng Sword", and the swords unearthed from northern Fujian to the Spring and Autumn Period also include zhenghe "iron mountain sword", Jianyang "Xushi sword", Jian'ou "Chen Tian sword", "Xia Bao sword" and so on. Yang Chun, former president of the Fujian Provincial Museum, once pointed out: "The sword, as a manifestation of cultural maturity in the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, Fujian is currently the most discovered. Zhong Shaoyi, an ancient weapons historian at the Academy of Military Sciences of China, pointed out: "Fujian has successively unearthed some bronze swords of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (Spring and Autumn), and the bronze swords found there are mainly concentrated in northern Fujian. ”
Ancient Chinese swords were excavated in northern Fujian, which corroborates the legend of Ou Yezi in northern Fujian", indicating that the ancient Min people formed a casting industry famous for casting swords, and the source of the Minjiang River is the hometown of Chinese swords.
Pottery, tea, shipbuilding, cotton and linen weaving, sword casting... The clever Fujian people have long had the awareness of industry in the Shang Zhou period, and all this has also become the beginning of the Fujian merchants, and the bloodline of the Fujian merchants has been passed down from more than 3,000 years ago to the present. (Source: Minbei Daily)