China News Agency, Hefei, August 1st: Why did the Jade Shuanglianbi from the Lingjiatan site become the inspiration for the design of the Beijing Winter Olympics medals?
——Interview with Zhang Jingguo, researcher of Anhui Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology and the first archaeological leader of Lingjiatan Site
China News Agency reporter Zhang Qiang
The Lingjiatan site is located in Hanshan County, Anhui Province, with a total area of 2.2 million square meters. It is a central settlement site in the late Neolithic Age from 5800 to 5300 years ago. It has been selected as one of China's "Hundred Years of Archaeological Discoveries", and is also known as the "Three Prehistoric Jade Cultures in China" together with Hongshan Culture and Liangzhu Culture, and is the only one in Anhui Province.
Entering the "Jade Age", what kind of civilization did the Lingjiatan site in Anhui emit more than 5,000 years ago?
Zhang Jingguo, a researcher at the Anhui Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology and the first and five successive archaeological leaders of the Lingjiatan site, said in an exclusive interview with China News Agency's "East-West Question" that the Lingjiatan site is very important for the study of the evolution of ancient Chinese society and the influence of the culture of east, west, north and south. Communication and collision have a prominent position and are of great significance to the study of ancient religions, countries, primitive philosophical thoughts, the origin of the calendar system, as well as manufacturing technology, craft aesthetics, urban construction, dragon and phoenix culture, etc.
The design idea for the back of the medal of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics comes from the jade double-coupled bibliography unearthed at the Lingjiatan site.
This year's Winter Olympics medals are inspired by the ancient concentric round jade bi.
Image source: CCTV News Client
The following is a summary of the interview transcript:
China News Service reporter: What are the important archaeological excavations at the Lingjiatan site? What kind of dawn of civilization does it show?
Zhang Jingguo:
Since the discovery in 1985 and the first excavation in 1987, the Lingjiatan site has been excavated 13 times, with a total excavation area of more than 6,000 square meters and more than 3,000 cultural relics unearthed, including about 1,200 jade artifacts. Eagle, turtle, pig, phoenix, huang, jue, tiger, bi, primitive gossip, etc.
The abundant unearthed jade wares not only show the worship of the sun god by the ancient ancestors of Lingjiatan, but also reflect the philosophical thoughts of the ancestors of Lingjiatan.
The jade double-joint bi and jade crown have the shape of "zhong", which embodies the philosophical thought of "harmony between man and nature", which is embodied by exquisite craftsmanship.
Jade wares unearthed from the Lingjiatan site are mainly jade ritual ware, which is a symbol of identity, status, power and wealth, marking that Lingjiatan has entered a new social form of "taking jade as a gift".
Its production technology was in the leading position in the Neolithic Age in China at that time. The diameter of the hole left by a hole drilled on the back of a jade man was only 0.15 mm. This kind of drilling technology was very shocking more than 5,000 years ago, attracting the attention of scholars at home and abroad.
Among them, jade-making machinery - semi-automatic standard weights, jade cutting techniques such as wire cutting and slice cutting are inherited and still used today.
The unearthed jade crown is the originator of the crown design of all dynasties in China, and the shapes of all dynasties have its design elements.
Lingjiatan National Archaeological Site Park tomb sacrificial area.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Qiang
A well-preserved large-scale ring-moat settlement site was discovered at the Lingjiatan site, surrounded by several small settlement groups in a "stars-arching-moon style" structure.
From the perspective of large buildings such as trenches and altars, the ancestors of Lingjiatan have mastered the ability to build large-scale public facilities, reflecting the ability of organized social scheduling. Lingjiatan already has developed agriculture, and carbonization was found in red pottery blocks. For japonica and indica, there are surplus grains to support public activities.
The altar is divided into three layers, reflecting the existing architectural thinking of the ancestors.
Lingjiatan also found many stone pillars ranging from a few meters to more than ten meters. We believe that it is a building for observing astronomy. Its construction date is a thousand years earlier than the British Stonehenge building, and it was later destroyed due to historical reasons.
These indicate that Lingjiatan has entered a civilized society.
At present, archaeologists are excavating the large-scale red pottery block accumulation area in the Lingjiatan site.
The prediction is a large palace or temple building.
The jade culture of Lingjiatan site can reach its peak, and it is inseparable from its natural environment and rich jade resources.
It is located in the collision zone between north and south of China, where economic and cultural exchanges collide with sparks of civilization.
Archaeology found that the Lingjiatan site started rice farming. With the material foundation, the ancestors of Lingjiatan had surplus labor for spiritual civilization construction.
Relic restorers at Lingjiatan National Archaeological Site Park restore cultural relics unearthed from the Lingjiatan site.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Qiang
China News Service reporter: What is the greatest contribution and significance of the spiritual civilization construction of Lingjiatan site in the process of Chinese civilization?
Zhang Jingguo:
No civilization exists without spiritual culture.
The spiritual civilization construction of Lingjiatan Culture is in a leading position in the same period.
At the same time, many other cultures have just reached material civilization, while Lingjiatan culture has risen to spiritual civilization, which is its greatest contribution and milestone in the process of Chinese civilization.
The late scholar Jao Tsung-I once commented: "The Lingjiatan site is a milestone in the 'cultural revolution' of China's Neolithic Age".
Before the Lingjiatan period, the artifacts unearthed in the ruins and tombs were mainly stone tools and pottery, accounting for more than 70%.
From the Lingjiatan site, jade accounted for 75% of the unearthed artifacts, and stone tools and pottery receded to a secondary position. This shows that the age of the Lingjiatan site was a turning point in the development of Chinese jade culture, and it was also the peak period. It changed the The spiritual and cultural aspects and material and cultural basis of Chinese history.
For example, primitive gossip pictures were found in jade artifacts found in the Lingjiatan site, which is the source of Chinese philosophical thought.
Historical documents record that King Wen of Zhou made gossip 3,000 years ago, while Lingjiatan culture dates back 5,300 years.
The philosophical thinking of Chinese dragon and phoenix culture has been perfectly reflected in Lingjiatan, and the jade dragon and phoenix pendant, a combination of dragon and phoenix, has been unearthed.
The Chinese nation has always paid attention to the dragon and phoenix culture, and the jade dragon was unearthed at the Lingjiatan site. This is the first jade dragon in China to match the dragon and the phoenix. In the next few thousand years, the image of the Chinese dragon is no different from this jade dragon.
The hardness of Lingjiatan jade is mainly 6 to 7 degrees. The ancestors can carve and shape it into an awesome divine object, which is a great manifestation of civilization.
So far, the Chinese people's love for jade has not diminished, and they like the warm and tough quality of jade, which is likened to jade virtue.
This is the continuation of civilization.
Chinese jade culture is unique in the world and continues continuously.
Compared with Western civilization, Lingjiatan has the most distinctive jade culture, and no jade has appeared in civilizations older than Lingjiatan.
Only the Mayan civilization in the West has some jade articles, but it is about a thousand years later than Lingjiatan.
Tourists visit the tomb sacrificial area of Lingjiatan National Archaeological Site Park.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Qiang
China News Service: What role does Chinese jade culture play in Sino-foreign exchanges?
Zhang Jingguo:
"Jade is the beauty of stone." As early as the late Paleolithic period nearly 10,000 years ago, the ancestors of the Chinese discovered and began to use jade.
Chinese jade also has a glorious history of nine thousand years.
The archaeological community believes that before China connected to the West through the Silk Road, there was still a jade road from western China to West Asia, all the way to Europe and Africa.
At that time, Westerners liked gold and diamonds, but did not like jade, so jade returned to the East.
Yumen Pass in Dunhuang City, Gansu Province was the "customs" at that time. Due to heavy wind and sand, Yumenguan buildings were constantly destroyed and buried, so the location of this "customs" was constantly changing.
The "Jade Road" that runs through the east and west is an important channel for early communication between Chinese and Western trade and cultural exchanges.
It is centered in Hotan, Xinjiang, and transports Hetian jade to the east and west wings, and gradually reaches the Central Plains eastward along the Hexi Corridor or the northern prairie.
The "Jade Road" has a history of seven or eight thousand years. The existing evidence confirms that this "Jade Road" is three thousand years earlier than the "Silk Road", which opened up the road for the bronze road and the Silk Road.
Nowadays, the exchange and cooperation activities of Chinese and foreign jade culture come one after another, and more and more foreigners like Chinese jade culture, which will definitely promote the Chinese civilization to the world.
The Chinese nation had such a splendid culture more than 5,000 years ago, and I believe that the Chinese nation's culture will be even more splendid in the future.
(Finish)
Interviewee Profile:
Zhang Jingguo, Librarian of the Anhui Provincial Government Culture and History Museum, Visiting Researcher of the Center for the Origin of Chinese Civilization, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Researcher of the Anhui Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, Visiting Researcher of the International Liangzhu Science Center of Zhejiang Academy of Social Sciences, the first and subsequent period of Lingjiatan Site He has served as 5 archaeological team leaders, part-time professor of Anhui University, and part-time professor of Shanghai Jiaotong University.
He has published more than 70 briefings, archaeological reports and papers, totaling more than 1.5 million words, edited and published "Lingjiatan Jade Ware", published "The Essence of Jade Unearthed in Anhui" as the executive deputy editor, and published "The Complete Works of Chinese Jade" as the deputy editor-in-chief of the Anhui volume.
Editor-in-chief of the publication of the archaeological report monograph "Lingjiatan" (Cultural Relics Publishing House), editor-in-chief and published "Lingjiatan Cultural Essays" (Cultural Relics Publishing House).