Chengtoushan ancient cultural site

Chengtoushan ancient cultural site is located in the middle of Liyang plain, in Nanyue village, Chexi Township, 10 kilometers northwest of Lixian County, covering an area of 150000 square meters (228 mu). From 1991 to 1999, experts from inside and outside the province organized by Hunan Provincial Institute of archaeology conducted nine scientific excavations on the site. It was confirmed that it was the oldest (about 6000 years ago), the most complete preserved and the most abundant ancient city site. There were residential area, pottery making area, tomb area and memorial hall area in the city. The design of Chengtoushan ancient city and the construction of the city wall are of great scale. The plane is round, with four gates in the East, South, West and North. The city wall covers an area of about 80000 square meters. The outer ring of the city wall is a moat 30-40 meters wide. The 100000 cubic meters of earth excavated from the river has been rammed to build a grand city wall with a length of more than 1000 meters, a bottom width of more than 30 meters, and a height of 4-5 meters. The city wall and moat cover an area of 150000 square meters. In the city, a large number of platform based buildings, pottery workshops with complete facilities, broad roads in the city, and dense and overlapping public tombs were excavated. The earliest ancient paddy field (6500 years) in the world has also been excavated on the north side of the east gate of the ancient city, which proves that the city is the earliest ancient city in China and "the first ancient city in China".

Chengtoushan ancient cultural site

Chengtoushan ancient cultural site, located in Lixian County, Changde City, Hunan Province, is the site from the prehistoric Daxi Culture to the Shijiahe culture in southern China. It is also the only ancient city site with the earliest discovery, the richest cultural relics and the most complete protection in China. It is known as "the earliest City in China".

In 1979, during the general survey of cultural relics in Hunan Province, archaeologists in Li County discovered Chengtoushan site for the first time. From 1991 to 2011, under the leadership of Hunan Provincial Institute of archaeology, 13 archaeological excavations were carried out in Lixian County, covering an area of nearly 9000 square meters. A large number of precious cultural relics, such as ancient city sites, clan tombs, large altars and paddy fields with complete irrigation facilities, were successively unearthed. Chengtoushan ancient cultural site represents the development height of the Neolithic ancient civilization in the Yangtze River Basin, which is of great significance to the study of the origin of human civilization, the establishment of early cities, and the emergence of class and state.

In 1996, the Chengtoushan ancient cultural site was approved as a national key cultural relic protection unit; in 2001, it was awarded as one of "China's 100 archaeological discoveries in the 20th century" and engraved on the bronze corridor of "China century altar".

Location context

Chengtoushan ancient cultural site is located in Chengtoushan village, Chexi Township, Lixian County, Hunan Province. It is located in the northwest of Liyang plain, 10km southeast of Lizhou ancient city (Lixian County), 112 ° east longitude and 29 ° north latitude. The total area is about 152000 square meters, and the excavated area is nearly 9000 square meters.

Cultural relics

ancient city

The ancient cultural site of Chengtoushan is located on a low hillock 2-4 meters above the surrounding plain. The excavation shows that human beings lived and engaged in production activities on this hillock 7000 years ago. About 5000 years ago, people built Heng as a city. As a defense, the existing walls are 25-37 meters wide and 2-4 meters high. The site is well preserved, with a circular plan, consisting of a moat, rammed earth wall and four gates in the East, West, South and North, covering an area of more than 76000 square meters (excluding the moat).

Four large-scale construction processes were found on the south wall of Shanxi Province in Chengtou City, which formed the corresponding four phases of the wall, which were successively raised from the bottom to the top, and each phase of the wall had accumulation layers on the inner and outer slopes. Among them, the first phase of the city wall is the oldest, about 6000 years ago. It was built directly on the original soil surface, without obvious ramming traces.

Nanmen is the land passage of the ancient city in the early period. The trench of Daxi Culture in the early period was excavated. On the outer slope of the trench, some solid slope protection facilities were found, such as wooden piles, reed mats, crossbars and bamboo strips, which were tightly tied into a fence. They are well preserved. A well-made and well preserved wooden pulp, boat and wooden bridge (collapsed) were also found in the trench.

private home

There are three houses of Qujialing culture period, which are well preserved, of high specifications and of large scale, and are concentrated near the center of the city. They are all built with loess platform foundation under four slopes, and then dig foundation trench on the platform foundation surface, trim the living surface, and then start construction. The plane shape is square or rectangular.

One is a small row room with a corridor in the middle and small rooms symmetrically distributed on both sides. The area of a single room is only 3-5 square meters, indicating the phenomenon of living in separate rooms. One is a suite with a dining room in front and a kitchen with four connected stoves in the back. The other is a large hall type building with an area of 63 square meters, which is presumed by experts to be ancestral temple. One of the characteristics of housing construction in this period was the structural differentiation due to different functions.

paddy

More than 170 kinds of seeds of cultivated and wild plants, such as rice and melon, and more than 20 kinds of bones of domestic and wild animals, such as pigs, sheep, dogs and deer, were unearthed in the silt of the moat in the south of the city, which is more than the Hemudu site discovered in Zhejiang Province in 1974. About 8000 years old cultivated rice was also found 1 km away from the Chengtoushan site, and about 8000 years old paddy field specimens were found more than 10 km away from the Chengtoushan site, of which 40% had traces of artificial cultivation and primitive irrigation systems such as puddles and ditches. It is the world's earliest paddy field with complete irrigation facilities.

Pottery kiln

At Chengtoushan site, 10 pottery kilns have been excavated, seven of which are located in the middle of the site, including red baked clay, ash pits and ash ditches. Experts speculate that they are the precursors of bricks. In addition, there are a number of simple sheds in the vicinity, with only column holes and no foundation trench. They form a complete pottery making area together with the adjacent pottery kilns, with large scale, complete facilities and complete preservation. These pottery kilns, ash pits, ash ditches and simple sheds belong to the same period, namely the third period of Daxi Culture.

In addition, the discovery of wine pouring pottery and wine storage pottery urn, pottery, pottery Gu and pottery hotpot indicates that drinking was quite common and particular in Chengtoushan and its surrounding areas 5000 years ago, and the development of wine culture has reached a considerable level. The discovery of Tao Wenguo proves that there have been wine shops (hotels or wine making workshops) in Chengtoushan, which greatly advanced the emergence of the wine industry.

altar

In the east gate of the Chengtoushan site, there is an existing building site made of yellow pure soil. The Loess platform is slightly oval, covering an area of about 250 square meters. It is piled and rammed on the flat ground. It is high in the middle and tilts to the edge. There are five round pits in the higher part, with enlarged pebbles in the pit. From the platform to the high point, there is a pit with a diameter of nearly 1m, a depth of 0.2m, a flat bottom, and a very regular round edge. In the pit, there is a large oval pebble. A large number of tombs of the early Daxi Culture were found in the eastern margin of the tomb. Outside the four corners of the tomb, there was a bent limb tomb without burial objects. The skeleton of one of the tombs was buried in a large round pit. In the pit, there were ox mandible bones and deer teeth, but there were no pottery and stone tools. Experts confirmed that the burial was a wizard.

What Chengtoushan discovered and exposed is the earliest complete altar and many sacrificial pits. It is a large altar engaged in sacrificial and religious activities in the early Daxi Culture. It is the largest, the most complete and the most clearly revealed place among all the discoveries in the same period.

Explore history

In July 1979, the Chengtoushan site was discovered in the provincial cultural relics survey.

In October 1991, the site of the city was measured for the first time, and the southwest city wall was dissected. The city was built in the middle period of Qujialing culture.

In November 1992, a number of housing sites from Daxi Culture to Shijiahe culture were exposed in the east city wall, and dozens of limb bending tombs and urn coffin tombs of Daxi Culture were cleared.

In November 1993, the moat of Daxi Culture period was found under the outer slope of the later city wall.

In November 1994, a tomb area from the late Daxi Culture to the late Qujialing culture was found in the northwest of the city. In the west of the center of the city, a pottery workshop area of Daxi Culture was exposed, including several pottery kilns, redundant soil collecting tunnels, numerous water storage pits, mud pits and workshops. In the excavation section of Daxi Culture moat under the south city wall, carbonized rice, dozens of plant seeds, bamboo and reed woven fabrics, wooden boat pulp and boatman were found.

In 1996, the stratigraphic relationship of four times of city building was revealed, and the ancient paddy fields under the early city walls were exposed in a small area.

In 1997, the ancient paddy fields were exposed in large areas, and the trench of the southwest city wall was widened and extended to the East and West. Four complete and accurate sections of the city were obtained.

In November 1998, the altar was exposed and the settlement remains of tangjiagang culture period before the founding of the city were found in the east gate.

In November 1999, the rice field remains of the first stage of Daxi Culture (before the construction of the city) were discovered.

In November 2000, the moats of the first and second phases of the city walls built during the Daxi Culture period were found in the northwest part of the city.

In 2001, a large hall or ancestral temple style building and nearly 100 sacrificial pits were found.

Site value

The discovery of Chengtoushan site shows that the Yangtze River Basin is also the cradle of Chinese civilization, which is of great significance to the study of the origin of human civilization and the origin of early cities

Chinese PinYin : Cheng Tou Shan Gu Wen Hua Yi Zhi