China News Agency, Chengdu, April 6th: Zheng Zhexuan: How did the 130,000-year-old Ache Axe witness the fusion of early human cultures?
China News Agency reporter Yue Yitong
"The Pilo site has found abundant hand axes and thin-blade axes with regular shapes and mature technologies, which are the most typical cultural remains of the late Acheulite stage found in East Asia, and are also known to be the highest Acheuli technology in the world. The product has drawn a stop for the more than half-century-long 'Movis Line' debate, connecting the East and West Acheulic cultural transmission belts, and has special significance for understanding the migration and cultural exchanges of ancient people on the east and west sides of the Eurasian continent."
Zheng Zhexuan, director of the Paleolithic Research Office of the Sichuan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology and the executive team leader of the Piluo site archaeological project, recently accepted an exclusive interview with China News Agency "Dongxiwen", said that the discovery of the Piluo site in Daocheng County, Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province Uncovering the historical process of early human conquest of the high-altitude extreme environment of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau provides physical evidence.
The following is a summary of the interview transcript:
China News Service: As a large Paleolithic wilderness site located on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, what is the significance of the discovery of the Pilo site?
Zheng Zhexuan:
The Pilo Site is the largest and most abundant Paleolithic site found on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Its discovery has achieved zero breakthroughs in Paleolithic archaeology on the Western Sichuan Plateau.
The average altitude of the site is 3,750 meters, with an area of about 1 million square meters. It was at least 130,000 years ago, and such a huge single Paleolithic site is relatively rare.
In the area of 200 square meters that has been excavated, tens of thousands of stone artifacts have been unearthed, and seven continuous cultural layers have been discovered.
On the whole, the Pilo Site is a rare super-large Paleolithic wilderness site with a special time and space location, a large scale, well-preserved strata, clear cultural sequences, rich relics, distinctive technical features, and superimposed multiple cultural factors. academic significance.
The excavation site of the Pillow site.
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
It is particularly important that hand axes and thin-bladed axes with abundant, regular shapes and mature technology have been discovered at the Pilo site, which are the most typical cultural remains of the late Acheulite stage found in East Asia, and are currently known to be the highest altitude in the world. The Acheul technology products have put a stop to the "Movis Line" debate that has lasted for more than half a century, connecting the Acheul culture transmission belt between the East and the West, and understanding the migration and culture of the ancient people on the east and west sides of the Eurasian continent. Communication has a special meaning.
At the same time, the Piluo site has been completely preserved and systematically displayed the Paleolithic cultural development process of "simple stone-core stone-flake combination-Asheli technical system-small stone-flake stone tool system", and it is also a tool for revealing the early human conquest of the high-altitude extreme environment of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Historical processes provide physical evidence.
Asheli tool set at the Pillow site.
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
China News Agency reporter: How did the complete remains of Acheuli technology found at the Pilo site break the "Movis Line" hypothesis?
Zheng Zhexuan:
"Asheli" is a technical model in the Paleolithic culture, dating from about 1.7 million to 100,000 years ago. It was named after Saint Asher, which was first discovered in France.
The most typical Asheli technical system is mainly a combination of a hand axe, a thin-blade axe, and a hand pick. Its symmetry, neatness, and the pursuit of exquisiteness and the implementation of technology reflect the early humans' cognition, mastery and even aesthetics of technology. Ability, recognized as the first heavy-duty tool with standardized processing in human history, represents the highest level of technology in stone tool processing during the evolution of early humans to Homo erectus.
In the 1940s, Harvard anthropologist Haram Mowes put forward the hypothesis that there were two different cultural traditions and cultural regions in the East and the West in the early Paleolithic period of the Old World. The boundary between the two cultural regions, Roughly passing through the northern part of the Indian peninsula, it runs northwest to southeast, and this boundary is called the "Movis Line".
The hypothesis holds that in the Paleolithic Age, Europe, the Middle East and Africa to the west of the line were the advanced areas of early human culture, represented by the Acheulean hand axe, and the advanced cultural circles that were able to master advanced tool-making techniques; China and other regions to the east of the Sri Lanka Line are "marginal regions with a cultural lag" characterized by the tradition of making simple choppers and smashers, and lack relatively fine stone tool techniques such as hand axes.
With the advancement of archaeological work, some Acheulite remains have been discovered in China and the East Asian region where the Korean Peninsula is located. However, there is a view in the international academic community that such stone tools can only be called "Acheuli-like technology".
The typical Acheuli remains found at the Pilo site fill in the key blanks and missing links of the technical system, connecting the Acheuli cultural transmission belt from the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent, China to the Korean Peninsula, and are useful for understanding the migration of ancient people and cultural communication. Special value and significance, completely breaking the "Movis Line" hypothesis.
The Pillow site collects Acheuli remains.
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
In fact, the technology of the Paleolithic Age does not matter if it is advanced or backward. In the process of adapting to nature, early humans would choose the tools that are most suitable for the environment and themselves.
Whether a hand axe or a smasher, as long as it can ensure the survival, development and reproduction of the population, it is the most suitable tool. It is a false proposition to distinguish between the advanced and the backward.
China News Agency reporter: The Pilo site is located on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau at an altitude of 3,750 meters. What key role did its discovery play in studying the historical process of early human conquest of high-altitude extreme environments?
Zheng Zhexuan:
Until a few years ago, the international academic community generally believed that humans conquered the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau after the Agricultural Revolution, that is, about 10,000 years ago.
Because in previous perceptions, the harsh conditions of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau were too challenging for early Paleolithic humans with relatively low productivity.
In recent years, the research results of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou University and other units have pushed forward the time when early humans landed on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau to about 190,000 years ago.
View of the ruins of Pillow.
The current excavation results reveal that the Pilo site has 7 continuous cultural layers, which are completely preserved and systematically show the cultural development process of the Paleolithic Age, including at least three different stone tool industrial systems. Preliminary optical luminescence dating results show that the site The upper strata are dated no later than 130,000 years ago, establishing for the first time a coherent and iconic Paleolithic cultural sequence of a specific period in southwestern China.
The strata and some relics of the Pillow site.
Photo courtesy of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage issued by China News Service
Previous research results are more inclined to believe that even if early humans were able to climb the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in the Paleolithic Age, it was a random and accidental situation, and it was impossible to survive for a long time.
The discovery of continuous cultural layers at the Piluo site shows that early humans repeatedly moved here for about 100,000 years, which provides rich materials for the study of the historical process of early human conquest of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.
At the same time, a variety of different stone tool technology systems converged here, indicating that early humans used various methods to adapt to the extreme environment of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and their cognitive ability, adaptability and survival strategies to nature were more flexible than ever imagined.
China News Agency reporter: How can the remains of Acheuli technology discovered at the Pilo site witness the fusion of early human cultures?
Zheng Zhexuan:
The simple stone-core and flake assemblages unearthed from the Piluo site are very closely related to the early humans in South China, and the people they represent may have climbed the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau from South China. It indicates that the remains of Acheuli technology at the Piluo site are likely to interact with the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent; the appearance of small stone flakes and small amphibians at the Piluo site also shows a connection with northern China.
The three-phase change process of the relics at the Pilo site.
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau where the Piluo site is located is located at the crossroads of East-West exchanges. The above findings combined with its special geographical location can prove that the Paleolithic Age, at least the eastern edge of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, was not a barren land or a cultural desert, but a cultural exchange. The gathering place, the crowd size, cultural richness, and frequency of cultural exchanges are beyond people's perception in the past.
In fact, in the Paleolithic Age, the world did not care about countries or nations, and the migration of people was multi-directional and complex. Through continuous migration, communication, integration, and evolution, early human beings could better survive in a common home—the earth, and constantly It is only by promoting the continuous development of human beings that we have gradually formed what we are now.
Dating back to millions of years ago, human beings all have the same root and the same origin, and the archaeological excavation results of the Pillow site also reflect the concept of "community with a shared future for mankind" to a certain extent.
(over)
Interviewee Profile:
Photo by China News Agency reporter Wang Lei
Zheng Zhexuan, deputy director of the Institute of Archaeology, Sichuan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, director of the Paleolithic Research Office, executive team leader of the Pilo Site Archaeological Project, undergraduate and postgraduate studies in the School of Archaeology and Museology, Peking University, long-term work in the field archaeological excavation first String.