The Red Star News reporter recently learned that in the latest article published online by the British authoritative archaeological journal Antiquity magazine recently, a major discovery was disclosed: Chinese archaeologists found the world's oldest coinage workshop confirmed by carbon 14 dating in a large bronze casting workshop at the site of Xingyang Guanzhuang in Henan.
The first author of this paper is Zhao Hao, an associate professor at the School of History of Zhengzhou University, who said in an exclusive interview with Red Star News reporters that through the dating of carbonized millet in the ash pit of the mint workshop site, they learned that the workshop belonged to 640 BC to 550 BC, in the Spring and Autumn period of ancient China.
More than 60 coinage pottery fans, confirming the existence of the oldest minting workshop
Zhao Hao told reporters that this paper was completed in the first half of last year, and the on-site excavation time was mainly concentrated in 2017-2018, "After the excavation, it will take a lot of time to study and analyze, measure the age, etc., it took about a year, and then after the paper was submitted to the revision and publication, it will take more than a year." ”
From 2017 to 2018, the archaeological team of Zhengzhou University found two bronze cloth coins and more than 60 pottery fans for coinage during archaeological excavations at the Guanzhuang site in Xingyang, Henan. The discovery of coins is not particularly surprising, and the discovery of the coinage Tao Fan is truly exciting – because it means the existence of a very old mint workshop.
"It's like finding a renminbi is not rare, but finding a mint is rare." Zhao Hao said, "Coins are used for circulation and can appear in many places, but in the Spring and Autumn Period when metal currencies were just beginning to become popular, the number of coinage workshops was obviously extremely limited." ”
To date, the ruins of the Spring and Autumn Period coinage workshops have been found in only 3 cities in China, namely Houma in Shanxi and Xinzheng and Xingyang in Henan. Hou Ma and Xin Zheng belonged to the State of Jin and the State of Zheng respectively during the Spring and Autumn Period, while Xingyang was under the rule of the State of Yu during the Spring and Autumn Period, and was later fought back and forth for a long time by the Zhou royal family, the State of Zheng and the State of Jin.
Zhao Hao told the Red Star News reporter that the age of the coin minting of these three sites should be similar, but the sites of Houma and Xinzheng were discovered earlier (the former was discovered in the 50s and 60s of the last century, the latter was discovered in the 90s of the last century), the level of scientific and technological archaeology is not as good as today, and there is no accurate carbon 14 dating, and it has not been able to strongly confirm the status of "the world's earliest minting workshop" in the international archaeological community.
The coinage workshop excavated by Zhao Hao and his archaeological team at Xingyang Guanzhuang did not exist independently, but was part of a large bronze casting workshop, the main body of which was a two-week period city site with a "convex" pattern, which was built around 800 BC.
Aerial view of the Guanzhuang copper workshop site area
"The whole workshop is mainly based on the minting of weapons, ceremonial vessels and carriage and horse tools, while coins are made by craftsmen 'by the way', so the area occupied by the coinage site is relatively small." Zhao Hao said, "The Spring and Autumn Period is also the embryonic and development stage of China's metal currency, and the demand for coins is not very large. ”
At that time, the manufacture of these cloth coins was not "mass production", but to make a coin to make a core model (a pottery model for minting copper coins), each of which was unique. But on the other hand, the cores of each coin were highly similar in size, indicating that the coins minted at that time already had obvious specifications in terms of weight and size.
An unused empty cloth core fan excavated from the Guanzhuang site
Empty Shoubu: Ancient coins of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty developed from the shape of agricultural tools
This ancient coin found by Zhao Hao and others at the Guanzhuang site is called "empty head cloth", which is a kind of cloth coin. Cloth coins first evolved from bronze agricultural tools "hammer", which is a shovel-shaped copper coin circulating in the Central Plains countries during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, also known as shovel cloth.
In the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, when the metallurgical industry was not yet developed, metal agricultural tools were not only practical, but also valuable, and easier to carry and preserve than livestock and grain. As a result, it gradually separated from ordinary exchange items, and then gradually evolved into a stable metal coinage, while retaining the shape of its original agricultural tools to a certain extent.
According to the shape, cloth coins are divided into two categories: empty first cloth and flat first cloth. The first thing that appears is the empty first cloth, there is a handle on the top of the cloth, there is a hole in the handle, you can insert a wooden handle, and you are still simulating the appearance of the shovel, so it is called an empty first cloth; in the second stage, the cloth head becomes relatively flat, and there is no hole, so it is also called flat first cloth. Overall, the development trend of cloth coins is: the body of the coin continues to shrink, the weight is reduced, in order to be lightweight, easy to carry and use, and the shape and ornamentation also tend to be fine and beautiful.
Finished empty cloth excavated from the Guanzhuang site
The era of cloth coin minting is generally believed to have begun in the Spring and Autumn Period and prevailed in the Warring States. Some researchers have also compared a number of Western Zhou "bronze shovels" (original cloth coins) excavated in 1976 in Lintong Zhikou Street, Shaanxi Province, with the Shang Dynasty bronze shovels excavated from the Yin Ruins in Anyang, Henan, and believe that cloth coins first appeared in the Western Zhou. More researchers have linked historical records in various ancient documents and believe that at the time of the Yin Zhou Dynasty, money and minting had developed into money.
However, from the perspective of all aspects, the bronze shovels of Yin Shang and Western Zhou are large in shape and heavy in weight, and have not yet departed from the original shape of agricultural tools, mainly in physical form, together with pearls and jade, shells, etc., as property to be exchanged.
Cloth coins in the Spring and Autumn Warring States period currency for more than 300 years, after qin shi huang unified China, abolished the original currency, unified minting Qin half two coins, and later Wang Mang of the Han Dynasty once imitated the cloth coins, after the Mang Han, the cloth coins permanently withdrew from the historical stage.
Legendary Amber Gold Coin: The world's oldest coin
With the exception of ancient China, when did the earliest metal currency in circulation in other parts of the world begin to appear? In archaeology, the answer to this question is currently more uniformly concentrated between 630 BC and 570 BC. In addition to the Central Plains of China, the Indus Valley and the Lydian kingdom of Turkey at that time had early metal coins.
"There are three criteria for defining the world's earliest metal currency." Zhao Hao said, "First of all, it must be minted and issued in the state, and the currency itself must be guaranteed by political authority; second, it must be able to produce in large quantities, not occasionally; the third is to have a relatively unified physical norm." ”
The site of the world's oldest coin, which is currently thought to have unearthed the world's oldest coins, is the ancient city of Ephesus in the kingdom of Lydia. Lydia is located in the western part of present-day Turkey, around the 6th century BC, Lydia began to mint a gold and silver gold coin (composition of 3 gold and 1 silver), commonly known as "amber gold".
Since the gold coins were discovered by British archaeologists in the early 20th century, their age has been disputed by the international archaeological community.
"The gold coins were originally found in a jar under a temple in the city of Ephesus, and were a cellar. Archaeologists mainly start from the stone of ancient buildings to infer the age, because carbon-14 measurement is mainly organic matter, not suitable for metals and stones, so the reliability is controversial and understandable. Zhao Hao said.
After 1990, the ancient city of Ephesus ushered in new archaeological excavations: a team of Experts from Germany and Austria continued to investigate the origin of the amber coins and confirmed that the Ephesian amber gold coins should be stored around 610 BC. Zhao Hao also visited the archaeological site of Ephesus in 2018.
Zhao Hao told reporters that the most suitable carbon 14 dating method is plant seeds, and it is best to be annual plant seeds. "Because carbon-14 dating indicates when organic matter dies, trees can often grow for decades or even hundreds of years."
In the ash pit at the mint workshop site in Guanzhuang, Zhao Hao and his team found carbonized millet and wheat, which should have come from the grain eaten by the mint craftsmen at that time. The age of the workshop is derived from the analysis of carbonized millet. "Because the amount of wheat is small, and it is also possible that foreign crops obtained through trade, and millet is a native crop in the Central Plains, it will be more accurate and more reassuring to measure millet."
Eventually, archaeologists got a relatively accurate chronological range: 640 BC to 550 BC. "I would like to emphasize that these cloth coins at the Guanzhuang site are not the oldest coins in the world that have been found so far, and the gold coin cellars in the ancient city of Ephesus in Turkey are still the earliest metal coins found by archaeological work." Zhao Hao said, "However, no coinage site has been found in the city of Ephesus. Therefore, the Guanzhuang site, a copper minting workshop from the Spring and Autumn Period, is the world's oldest mint discovered by archaeology so far and confirmed by carbon 14 dating. This also once again illustrates China's important position in the history of the world's early monetary development. ”
Red Star News reporter Qiao Xueyang pictured according to the interviewee
Edited by Li Xueli
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