What did the ancestors of ancient Shu eat and live more than 4000 years ago
More than 4,000 years ago, what did the ancient Shu ancestors in the Chengdu Plain eat?
There is an answer to this question.
The Chengdu Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology recently announced the latest annual field archaeological excavations at the Baodun site. Remains of paddy fields more than 4,000 years ago have been discovered in the site. This is the earliest paddy field discovered on the Chengdu Plain so far, and it is also the upper reaches of the Yangtze River. The earliest discovery of rice fields is of great significance to understanding the prehistoric rice planting history of the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the Chengdu Plain.
At the same time, this archaeological excavation also discovered for the first time carbonized bamboo used as building components during the Baodun period.
This is the earliest organic building component found in the Chengdu Plain so far, which further confirms the long history of bamboo mud wall construction in the Chengdu Plain.
Previously, through plant archaeology, the Baodun site discovered the remains of carbonized rice, millet, millet and other plants 4500 years ago.
According to the archaeological excavation of Baodun Ancient City, it was confirmed that Chengdu is the birthplace of rice culture civilization on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the Chengdu Plain, laying the economic foundation of ancient Shu civilization.
The earliest rice fields are hidden in the ground two meters below
How did the Tianfu pastoral scrolls of "Minjiang Water Run, Maolin Xiuzhu, Meitian Miwang, Shu Feng Yayun" painted?
The ruins of Baodun Ancient City in Xinjin, Chengdu, are solving the mystery.
According to Tang Miao, deputy director of the Baodun Workstation of the Chengdu Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, with the approval of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, the field archaeological excavations at the Baodun site this year will last October to April this year.
Within the excavation area of 1,000 square meters, a total of 68 ash pits, 8 ash ditches, 5 tombs, 1 bedding site and 1 slope protection site were cleared. Tens of thousands of Baodun period pottery pieces and stones were unearthed. Ten stone tools, carbonized bamboo slices used as building components during the Baodun period were discovered, and the remains of a paddy field in the Baodun period were discovered.
During the excavation process, the archaeologists found a horizontal strata at a place 2 meters below the ground, which extends from the northwest to the southeast of the excavation area.
What surprised the archaeologists was that the stratum was extremely pure compared with the common living stratum of human beings. There were almost no relics left by human beings, such as pottery pieces, and the soil was basically silt.
"This information shows that the stratum is not simply a lake and marsh accumulation, and has a certain relationship with rice cultivation. In this regard, the archaeologists promptly sent two soil specimens collected in the stratum for inspection." Tang Miao introduced, on 2 pieces. The test results of soil specimen phytoliths showed that there are rice phytoliths distributed in this stratum, which are the main crop types. Rice phytoliths include fan type, bimodal type and side-by-side dumbbell type.
Among them, the bimodal phytolith content is the highest, the phytolith concentration is higher than 100,000 grains/g, and the fan-type phytolith concentration is higher than 80,000 grains/g. It can be said that from the biological indicators, the formation can be basically judged as Rice Fields.
"In order to further verify the preliminary judgment, systematic sampling and testing of the stratum soil were carried out. Through comprehensive testing and research on rice, weeds associated with rice, and soil micro-morphology, the identification of this area as a paddy field has been strengthened. "Tang Miao said, this will be the earliest rice field discovered in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River.
In order to protect the precious cultural heritage to the utmost extent, the archaeologists adopted a method of excavating the rice field area by retaining a large area and dissecting it in a small area.
In this area, a relic of a ditch connected to the area, a relic of a suspected field ridge, and a number of relics of suspected rice root nests were found in this area.
Due to the limitation of the excavated area, this paddy field has not yet been excavated to the border.
After systematic testing of samples by archaeologists, in addition to carbonized rice found 4000 years ago, the remains of millet, millet and other plants were also found in the archaeology of Baodun site. Through the analysis of the unearth ratio of rice, millet and millet in different relics, It was confirmed that the agricultural economic structure of the ancestors in the Baodun period was mainly rice, and also planted millet and millet, and collected wild peas, coix and other plants as food supplements.
The earliest housing bamboo components in the Chengdu Plain were discovered for the first time
A large number of remains of residential buildings have been discovered in the Chengdu Prehistoric City Sites.
However, due to the acidic soil environment of the Chengdu Plain, as of last year, no remaining organic building structures have been clearly discovered.
Therefore, looking for the organic matter of architectural remains has become a major focus of archaeological excavations.
In recent years, the Chengdu Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology has been exploring the relationship between man and land in the Baodun period of the Chengdu Plain. Through continuous search, it has finally made breakthroughs in the exploration of human settlement patterns.
During the archaeological excavation of the Baodun site, 6 pieces of carbonized bamboo were found in the red-burned soil foundation site that collapsed on the edge of the platform.
This confirms that the construction of bamboo (wood) bone mud wall-based trough-type residential buildings has been started by Sichuanese from prehistoric times, and this tradition lasted until the end of the 20th century.
"The moment the bamboo was unearthed, I was very excited. It turned out to be a trace speculation of the bamboo (wood) bone mud wall foundation trough construction. After waiting for 8 years, I finally saw the carbonized bamboo building components 4,500 years ago. "Tang Miao said, physical evidence directly proved the existence of the bamboo mud wall.
What kind of bamboo do these pieces of bamboo correspond to?
How to properly protect them?
After the excitement, problems followed one after another.
In this regard, the relevant personnel of the Science and Technology Archaeology Center and the Cultural Relics Protection Center of the Chengdu Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology quickly followed up on the identification and protection of bamboo species.
The discovery of rice fields and bamboo buildings gave Tang Miao a new judgment on the geographical space where the ancient Shu people lived during the Baodun period.
He believes that the ancestors of Baodun chose loess terraces with higher geographical locations to build their residences, while tombs are usually distributed in low-lying areas near the front and back of houses or beside the terraces.
The low-lying areas that had dried up during the Baodun period were also used to make stone tools or other handicraft activities.
The more low-lying wetlands are used for rice cultivation.
The paddy fields recently discovered in Baodun are located in this area.
The spatial pattern of residence, production and life of Baodun ancestors is similar to the living pattern of Linpan in western Sichuan.
Tang Miao believes that “the forest-panel living space model in western Sichuan is an adaptive use of the micro-topography of the alluvial plain by the crowd. Through the exploration of the micro-topography of the ancient city of Baodun in recent years, one can see the Taoism of the ancestors of Baodun. The Living Wisdom of Law and Nature."
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Baodun Ancient City Ruins
Since the late 1990s, the Chengdu Plain has successively discovered the ruins of Baodun Ancient City, Pixian Ancient City, Wenjiang Yufu City, Dujiangyan Mang City, Chongzhou Shuanghe Ancient City, Chongzhou Zizhu Ancient City, and Dayi Yandian Ancient City. The ruins of 8 prehistoric ancient cities including the ruins of Dayi Gaoshan Ancient City.
Among them, the Baodun ancient city ruins in Xinjin District of Chengdu is the most.
The site of Baodun Ancient City is the earliest and largest prehistoric city site in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River in my country.
The 8 ancient cities have similar cultural features and continue around the ages. The academic circles named this culture "Baodun Culture".
There is an obvious continuation relationship between Baodun culture and Sanxingdui culture in terms of pottery, stoneware craftsmanship, city wall construction technology, architectural form, and production economy. Sanxingdui and Baodun have a cultural inheritance relationship.
From the earlier longan bridge culture, to the Baodun culture, Sanxingdui culture, and the twelve bridge culture represented by the Jinsha site, the development of the ancient Shu civilization for more than 2,000 years is outlined.
(Our reporter Li Xiaodong)