China News Agency, Beijing, January 17th: From hand shovels to satellites, how does Liangzhu archaeology reflect archaeological changes?
"China News Weekly" reporter Ni Wei
A Luoyang shovel, a few centimeters to ten centimeters in diameter, can be inserted into the ground several meters deep at a time.
A remote sensing satellite, flying in the space of 200 kilometers to 36,000 kilometers, can photograph half the earth at a time.
Now, both are used in archaeology.
It has been a hundred years since modern archaeology entered China, and the archaeological technology is not the same as it was a hundred years ago.
Relying on Luoyang shovels and hand shovels to excavate underground treasures is in line with people's traditional impression of archaeology, but it is far from the whole of contemporary archaeology.
Today, archaeologists often use satellites, drones, etc. to determine the location of the shovel before field exploration.
The Liangzhu site in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, was selected as a world cultural heritage in 2019.
The Liangzhu Culture was active between 5,300 and 4,300 years ago, and is considered to be the earliest state form in East Asia, demonstrating the five thousand years of Chinese civilization.
Several major discoveries in Liangzhu archaeology are quite dramatic, and the technological iterations on the Liangzhu construction site also reflect the changes in archaeology.
Salvage Liangzhu Culture from the Bottom of the Pond
In the Liangzhu Museum, there is a mottled archaeological report on display. The cover is light yellow, with some dark stains looming. The upper two characters are Liangzhu, and the signature below it is: Shi Xingeng.
This archaeological report was published during the Anti-Japanese War in 1938 and was the first published record of the Liangzhu site.
The first generation of excavators at the Liangzhu site was almost only Shi Xingeng.
He was only 25 years old when he first discovered the Liangzhu site.
In 1936, he worked as a geological and mineral assistant at the West Lake Museum, and participated in the excavation of the ancient Hangzhou ruins organized by the museum.
A few stone axes with holes made him seem familiar, and they seemed to have appeared in his hometown of Liangzhu.
Inspired, Shi Xin went back to her hometown and started an investigation on her own.
He recorded that crucial moment: on November 3, 1936, at 2 p.m., passing by a pond dried up by irrigation pumping, "accidentally found a piece or two of black glossy pottery".
From December of that year to March 1937, with the support of the West Lake Museum, Shi Xin presided over three excavations, unearthed a large number of stone tools, pottery and jade.
At that time, it was the eve of the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, and the excavation work was over hastily, and only 12 sites were vaguely marked, such as "chessboard tomb", "maoan front" and "goushan front and back".
In July 2019, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, tourists stop in front of the ruins of the South City Wall in the Liangzhu Ancient City Ruins Park.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Wang Gang
On August 14, 1937, Hangzhou suffered an air raid.
Three months later, Japanese troops landed on the north shore of Hangzhou Bay.
At the end of that year, when Hangzhou fell, various institutions were forced to relocate. The director of the West Lake Museum recommended Shi Xin to Ruian County to serve as a secretary in the Anti-Japanese Self-Defense Force.
Shi Xin is even more determined to make the discoveries in his hometown public. He imitated the archaeological report of Chengziya in Shandong Province and wrote "Liangzhu".
"I would like to commemorate my hometown with this book", he wrote this inscription in the frontispiece.
Shi Xin also discovered, based on the limited latest archaeological developments, that the black pottery in Liangzhu is similar to the black pottery unearthed in Longshan Chengziya a few years ago.
At that time, Chinese archaeology had only started for more than ten years, and the revolutionary technology "carbon 14" that could directly detect the age would have to wait another 30 years before it was introduced into China.
To judge the age of cultural relics, only two traditional methods can be used: stratigraphy and typology of artifacts, that is, through the depth of buried strata and the characteristics of the artifacts, compare the newly unearthed artifacts with the discovered artifacts, and judge who is earlier and who is later. Location age.
In 1939, 28-year-old Shi Xin contracted scarlet fever and died of peritonitis.
The initiator did not know until his death what the ruins he excavated meant.
Later, Xia Nai named the "Liangzhu Culture", making it written into the history of civilization as an independent culture in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River.
Su Bingqi creatively divided the land of China into six major regions, and put forward the theory of the independent origin and development of the regions. Because of the existence of Liangzhu culture, the southeast surrounding Taihu Lake became one of the six major regions.
In May 2020, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, the jade tomahawk components in the Liangzhu Museum attracted people's attention.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Yin
Bamboo sticks peeled off the shocking "Royal Mausoleum"
The Liangzhu ruins fell silent.
In the spring of 1963, Mu Yongkang, a representative of the second generation of Liangzhu archaeologists, came to Sujia Village in Anxi near Liangzhu to conduct a small-scale excavation, and only found pottery pieces and half a jade cong.
After that, the excavation stalled again.
After the reform and opening up, the archaeological work was fully resumed, and the Zhejiang Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology was established. Due to Shi Xingeng's "Liangzhu" report, the institute took the Liangzhu site as one of its priorities.
In 1981, Liangzhu Archaeology was restarted, hosted by Wang Mingda, who graduated from Peking University with a major in archaeology.
On the afternoon of May 31, 1986, on a hillside named Fanshan at the Liangzhu site, archaeologist Chen Yueyue removed a clod from the exploration site, with small jade particles and patent leather stuck to it.
He carefully held it in front of team leader Wang Mingda. Wang Mingda bent down and glanced at it. He immediately jumped into the pit from the 1.6-meter-high partition beam, crouched where the clods were dug, and observed for a full quarter of an hour.
Wang Mingda suppressed his excitement and did not dare to shovel with his hands. He folded a bamboo piece from the soil pan, and carefully picked off a small piece of soil, revealing patent leather and many small jade grains.
As it got dark, they quietly covered it with nylon film and covered it with dirt.
At this point the rain began to fall, and they covered the entire tomb and ran back to their home in the heavy rain.
That night, they drank a drink excitedly, worried before going to bed, and patrolled in the rain.
Afterwards, the high-level tombs of the anti-shan were gradually stripped from the soil layer of 5,000 years.
The technology was very primitive at that time, and modern equipment was hardly seen throughout the archaeological site.
There are astonishingly many jade articles in the Tomb of Fanshan, and they are almost completely covered at the bottom of the tomb, with no place to stand.
Archaeologists have created an original "earth method". Two large bamboos are placed at the mouth of the pit, and four ropes are hung down. Two bamboos are also tied at the lower ends of the ropes. Wooden boards are placed on the bamboos, just like a chain bridge. , look down to clean up.
This excavation has brought a new understanding of the original position, compatibility relationship, and combination of jade articles in the tomb. Therefore, the research on Liangzhu jade articles has expanded from single-piece research to assembly, bead-encrusted, and inlaid research, which is of breakthrough significance. .
Looking at the whole country, the 1980s was a period when prehistoric archaeology fully blossomed.
The Niuheliang site in Liaoning, the Lingjiatan site in Ma'anshan in Anhui, and the Sanxingdui site in Sichuan, these discoveries, together with the progress of the Liangzhu site, have promoted a heated discussion on the history of civilization for five thousand years.
A year before the excavation of the Fanshan Tomb, Liu Bin graduated from Jilin University with a major in archaeology and was assigned to Zhejiang. He will become the leading figure of the third generation of archaeologists in Liangzhu.
"Since Fanshan, Liangzhu archaeology has 'opened up'," said Wang Ningyuan, a researcher at the Zhejiang Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology and a third-generation Liangzhu archaeologist.
More than 30 years later, Liangzhu brought more surprises to people: in 1987, the Yaoshan altar and the noble cemetery were discovered; from 1992 to 1993, the Mojiaoshan palace was unearthed; from 2006 to 2007, the ancient city wall was discovered, which is the same as that of Liangzhu. The first discovery of the site and the excavation of the Fanshan tomb are listed as the three major archaeological milestones in Liangzhu.
Tourists visit Liangzhu Yaoshan Ruins Park in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, October 2021.
The site is an important part of the Liangzhu ancient city site and an important complex site of altar and tombs in the early Liangzhu culture.
(UAV photo) Photo by China News Agency reporter Wang Gang
Satellite images open "eyes of the sky"
In 2007, the ancient city walls of Liangzhu, about 1,700 meters from east to west and 1,900 meters from north to south, were all found, with a total area of about 3 million square meters, and the overall appearance of the ancient city of Liangzhu was revealed.
Liu Bin used his imagination: According to the traditional Chinese structure of the outer city and the inner city, will Liangzhu also have an outer city?
The outer Guo is bigger than the inner city, and it is too difficult to rely on the Luoyang shovel to explore.
As an attempt, the Institute of Archaeology used GIS (Geographic Information System) software to make a digital elevation model (DEM) of the site area for the first time, and made amazing discoveries: the Mojiao Mountain palace site, which has been dug for so many years, as well as the large and small Mojiao Mountain and Wugui Mountain. A raised platform is clearly visible in the model.
Looking outside the city, a rectangular structure emerges from the southeastern part of the ancient city, with three sides in the north, east and south, surrounding the city wall.
Then, the archaeological work on the wall was quickly carried out, and the outer Guo of the ancient city was found.
The so-called "digital elevation model", in layman's terms, is to paint objects of the same height on the map with the same color.
In this way, even if a city wall is broken into scattered small sections, because the basic height is the same, it will be displayed in the same color on the map, so the veins of the city wall can be clearly seen.
In October 2020, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, tourists visit and learn about the Mojiaoshan Palace in the Liangzhu Ancient City Ruins Park.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Wang Gang
High-tech exploration of the rise and fall of the ancient city
In the geological archaeology laboratory of the Liangzhu Site Archaeology and Protection Center, almost all stone samples collected from nearby mountains are stored in the collection cabinet.
After the discovery of the ancient city wall in 2007, archaeologists collected these samples, hoping to find out where people quarried stones, how long it took, and how they were transported.
Ji Xiang, a fourth-generation Liangzhu archaeologist who was born in the 1980s, is an expert in geological archaeology. He participated in the geological archaeological project of the Liangzhu site when he was a graduate student.
"This is to study the way of life, production and society in the ancient city of Liangzhu, so as to gain a general understanding of the exchanges between different regions at that time." Ji Xiang explained the use of the stone samples.
They concluded that the ridges were calculated according to the texture and shape of the city wall padding stones. At that time, the city wall padding stones were transported by bamboo rafts, and the possible transportation paths were restored according to the location of the river channel and the quarrying point.
"In the past, I could only look at it with the naked eye to roughly judge where it came from. Now, under the infrared and fluorescence detection equipment, we can analyze the chemical elements and mineral structures of stone, jade, and soil, and compare them carefully." Ji Xiang said. , the farthest rock mine discovered so far, about 100 kilometers away from the ancient city.
The Liangzhu Site Archaeology and Protection Center has set up a number of scientific and technological laboratories, and has also cooperated with many domestic universities to restore high-precision hydrology, geomorphology, geomorphology and other key time points 7,000, 5,500, 4,200, and 3,800 years ago. climate environment.
These studies provide clues for the rise and fall of the ancient city of Liangzhu: about 4,200 years ago, the Yuhang Basin in Hangzhou suffered a continuous flood, and the ancient city of Liangzhu disappeared. It was not until the Warring States Period after 2000 that humans came to live here again. .
"Now there are more technical means. The old man used to build the frame. Now we are filling the frame with details." Ji Xiang said.
(Finish)