The ancient Shu civilization behind sanxingdui
In 1929, when a batch of jade stone tools flowed out of Guanghan, Sichuan, people began to diligently explore the ancient civilization of Sichuan diligently. Through the unremitting efforts of several generations of archaeologists, many important sites have been discovered, and a large number of precious cultural relics have been unearthed. The history of the ancient Shu kingdom, which is “the founding reason”, is gradually becoming clear.
At present, the archaeologists have basically clarify the evolution of the ancient shu civilization, namely represented by the Chengdu plain prehistoric city site group of treasure pier culture, to represented by sanxingdui site of sanxingdui culture, to represented by Chengdu jinsha site sands twelve bridge culture, finally to Chengdu street ship coffin, wooden coffin tombs of the warring states bronze culture, until 316 BC qin and bashu, brilliant ancient shu civilization become an important part of the Chinese civilization. It can be said that many archaeological discoveries show us the ancient Shu civilization like stars and the bright moon.
Baodun culture period
Since the 1990s, in order to explore the origin of Sanxingdui culture, archaeologists have carried out large-scale archaeological investigations and excavations in the Chengdu Plain, and discovered eight prehistoric ancient city sites, including Xinjin, such as Baodun, Dujiangyan Mang City, Chongzhou Shuanghe and Zizhu, the ancient city of Pixian County, Wenjiang Yufu and Dayi Mountain. These ancient cities have tall city walls, some have large building sites, production tools are mainly stone, but also a very small amount of jade, pottery industry developed, pottery combination for coron lace pottery, open circle, foot statue, horn high collar jar, wide edge flat land, etc. Because baodun site is the most representative, it is uniformly named “Baodun Culture”. Baodun culture is still in the gestation period of civilization, which can also be said to be the dawn of civilization. The Sanxingdui site has also found a large number of artifacts with the same characteristics of Baodun culture, and some experts believe that Baodun culture gave birth to the brilliant Sanxingdui culture.
Sanxingdui culture period
Sanxingdui culture is about 3700-3200 years ago, which is the first peak of the ancient Shu civilization. In addition to gold, copper, jade and ivory, stone tools were still used during this period. The pottery is a combination of small flat pot, bird head spoon and high-handled beans. It should be emphasized that the eight pits found in Sanxingdui all belong to the late period of Sanxingdui culture, dating back 3200-3000 years ago.
On one, two pit of archaeological excavation report, two pits of more than 1700 pieces of unearthed cultural relics, remove bronze big man, bronze god tree, gold masks, bronze head, such as strange modelling of cultural relics, most of the unearthed and the central plains, the Yangtze river region unearthed in the same or similar similar artifacts, such as bronze containers, food, jade in zhang, ge, jade, jade, axe, adzes, chisel jade tools. It can be said that Sanxingdui civilization is a unique archaeological culture gradually developed on the basis of Baodun culture and integrating the culture of the Central Plains region and the middle reaches of the Yangtze River. In this culture, religious sacrificial activities occupy an important position.
Jinsha culture period
About 3,000 years ago, Sanxingdui was gradually abandoned and became a general settlement site. The center of the ancient Shu civilization has moved to the hinterland of the Chengdu Plain, thus entering a new stage of development represented by the Jinsha site —— Jinsha culture period, which is about 3200-2600 years ago.
Since the 1980s, archaeologists have discovered dozens of sites from the Fuqin Community to the Western Zhou Dynasty, such as the Fuqin Community and the Twelfth Bridge, in downtown Chengdu. They, together with the Jinsha Site and the Yangzishan Tutai Site, have built another glory of the ancient Shu civilization. Among these sites, the Jinsha Site has the largest area and the highest level of unearthed cultural relics, which has become the center of these sites, and is another political, economic and cultural center after Sanxingdui. Archaeologists found large palace base sites, large cemeteries, special sacrificial areas, etc., pottery combinations include small flat bottom jars, circle foot jars, pointed cups, pointed cups, and so on. At the same time, a large number of cultural relics similar to or even the same as the Sanxingdui sacrificial pit were unearthed in the sacrificial area of Jinsha Site. Except for large special bronze wares, other artifacts such as jade, stone wares and gold wares are almost exactly the same. For example, the patterns on the Sanxingdui golden rod and Jinsha golden crown belt are composed of heads, arrows, birds and fish, and the gold masks, jade ge, jade zhang and other cultural relics found in the two places are highly consistent in shape and style.
Jinsha Site and Sanxingdui Site have highly similar groups of objects and burial methods. In terms of religious belief, city site layout and time continuation, it can be seen that Jinsha culture directly inherits the essence of Sanxingdui culture, and further develops and improves progress on this basis. The discovery of Jinsha site has greatly expanded the connotation and extension of the ancient Shu culture, which is of great significance to the study of the origin, development and decline of Shu culture, especially it has found strong evidence for solving the mystery of the sudden demise of Sanxingdui civilization.
Late Shu culture
Around the middle of the Spring and Autumn Period (around 600 BC), the Golden Sands kingdom had gradually declined, and its central position may have shifted. With the advent of a number of tombs of the Warring States Period, such as the large ship coffin burial in Chengdu Commercial Street, the large tomb of the New family, and Shuangyu Village in Qingbaijiang, people have witnessed the glory of the late Shu culture again. During this period, a large number of bronze weapons with common characteristics of Bashu region were unearthed in the tombs. These bronze weapons were mainly made of swords, swords and spears, with a large number and complicated types. Most of the weapons were also cast with exquisite patterns and difficult patterns, which injected new characteristics into the late Shu culture. In 316 BC, Qin and Bashu. During the period of Emperor Wudi in the middle Western Han Dynasty, Bashu culture was finally integrated into the Han culture.
From the perspective of archaeology, we call “Baodun culture” as the bud of Shu culture; Sanxingdui culture and Jinsha culture are the two peak stages of the early Shu culture development, also called the Sanxingdui culture period and the Jinsha Twelfth Bridge culture period; and the tombs represented by the large ship coffin burial in Chengdu commercial Street, Xindu Majia Tomb, and Qingbaijiang Shuangyang Village are attributed to the late Shu culture. These ancient cultural sites, like the stars in the sky, jointly construct the magnificent social and historical picture of the ancient Shu civilization.
unsolved mysteries
What exactly is the ivory being used for?
In Sanxingdui and Jinsha sites, a large number of ivory and ivory products were found. Different is, most of the ivory of Sanxingdui was burned, while the ivory of Jinsha site was directly buried in the earth without fire. The difference between the two may reflect different differences in using ivory at different periods. But the exact use is unknown.
Why do the masks appear so frequently?
Both Sanxingdui and Jinsha have masks found, but from the use of conditions, Sanxingdui use of masks more frequently and seriously. How much role did masks play in the sacrifice of the ancient Shu state? More research is still needed.
What does the bronze man hold in his hollow hands?
Sanxingdui and Jinsha each found a large and a small bronze figures, and they all made the same gesture. This similarity reflects the common original religious beliefs or similar religious ritual norms of the two sites, indicating the close inheritance relationship between the two sites. But what exactly do the hollow hands hold? Or is it just a state of ritual? It’s also a big puzzle right now.
Does the ancient Shu civilization have words?
Although we found obvious marks on the objects unearthed in Sanxingdui, they were only sporadic. In the Jinsha site, although there are bu jia unearthed, no obvious symbol marks were found. Therefore, no matter the Sanxingdui site or the Jinsha site, we have not found the exact evidence of words, whether the ancient Shu civilization has used words remains to be further excavated.
Whether it is Sanxingdui Site or Jinsha Site, the ancient Shu civilization brought us great surprises, enough to make us marvel at the wisdom of the ancients, and it also left us countless mysteries. It is believed that with the development of a new round of archaeological work in Sanxingdui, there will be more clues of the ancient Shu civilization shown one by one, which for us to break through the heavy fog lingering in front of the ancient Shu civilization.
(Author: Chengdu Jinsha Site Museum)