Social Complexity in North China during the Early Bronze Age: A Comparative Study of the Erlitou and Lower Xiajiadian Cultures

The archaeological record of two areas is examined: the Yuxi region of the Zhongyuan, where the Erlitou Culture is centered; and the Chifeng-Aohan region of Inner Mongolia, where lower Xiajiadian Culture sites are found. This comparison suggests that although the data from the Erlitou Culture can be interpreted as reflecting a polity that covered a somewhat larger area and was perhaps more centralized than polities of the lower Xiajiadian Culture, the social and political systems of these two areas were not fundamentally different. The chronology of these cultures as well as evidence for interaction between societies of the Zhongyuan and the Chifeng-Aohan area are used to challenge the traditional Chinese model that describes the emergence of social complexity as the result of political and cultural expansion from the Zhongyuan. Based on these data, several models are presented that, although not ignoring the importance of external outputs, emphasize the way these influences were played out at the local level as well as other local processes. KEYWORDS: Chinese archaeology, North China, Late Neolithic, Early Bronze Age, complex societies, pastoralism

Sedentism and plant cultivation in northeast China emerged during affluent conditions

The reasons and processes that led hunter-gatherers to transition into a sedentary and agricultural way of life are a fundamental unresolved question of human history. Here we present results of excavations of two single-occupation early Neolithic sites (dated to 7.9 and 7.4 ka) and two high-resolution archaeological surveys in northeast China, which capture the earliest stages of sedentism and millet cultivation in the second oldest center of domestication in the Old World. The transition to sedentism coincided with a significant transition to wetter conditions in north China, at 8.1–7.9 ka. We suggest that these wetter conditions were an empirical precondition that facilitated the complex transitional process to sedentism and eventually millet domestication in north China. Interestingly, sedentism and plant domestication followed different trajectories. The sedentary way of life and cultural norms evolved rapidly, within a few hundred years, we find complex sedentary villages inhabiting the landscape. However, the process of plant domestication, progressed slowly over several millennia. Our earliest evidence for the beginning of the domestication process appear in the context of an already complex sedentary village (late Xinglongwa culture), a half millennia after the onset of cultivation, and even in this phase domesticated plants and animals were rare, suggesting that the transition to domesticated (sensu stricto) plants in affluent areas might have not played a substantial role in the transition to sedentary societies

The Qiang and the Question of Human Sacrifice in the Late Shang Period

The character that many scholars read as Qiang appears in more than 800 known late Shang oracle bone inscriptions, most of which refer to the ritual sacrifice of Qiang people. More than half of all the human victims mentioned in the inscriptions are identified as Qiang, and among all the neighbors of Shang named in the inscriptions, only the Qiang are specifically mentioned as human sacrifices. Why were the Qiang so important and why were such large numbers of Qiang victims sacrificed during Shang court rituals? Contrary to the usual identification of the Qiang as a tribe of nomadic herdsmen, archaeological data point to a society that practiced a mixed economy, lived in permanent or semipermanent settlements, and had a developed social hierarchy. The Qiang were politically independent from the Shang and maintained a significantly different cultural and symbolic system. Comparison with known ethnographic examples of human sacrifice and analysis of the context in which these ceremonies were performed by the Shang suggest that sacrificing Qiang war captives was a mechanism by which the Shang elite legitimized their political power. Ethnographic comparisons suggest that human sacrifice was important for the Shang, as for other societies where social stratification is already very developed but where the system is not yet institutionalized or very stable. In this context, human sacrifice is viewed as part of a dynamic process that led to the development of social complexity. KEYWORDS: Shang, China, human sacrifice, oracle bone inscriptions

Insights from a Recent Workshop on Walls, Borders, and Frontier Zones in the Ancient and the Contemporary World

<p>This article reports on the 'Walls, Borders, and Frontier Zones in the Ancient and Contemporary World' workshop and its implications of transdisciplinary research for building comparative insights into the uses, meanings and experiences of border and wall constructions in the past and present <br> </p&gt

Insights from a Recent Workshop on Walls, Borders, and Frontier Zones in the Ancient and the Contemporary World

This article reports on the ‘Walls, Borders, and Frontier Zones in the Ancient and Contemporary World’ workshop and its implications of transdisciplinary research for building comparative insights into the uses, meanings and experiences of border and wall constructions in the past and present

Does extra-large equal extra-ordinary? The ‘Wall of Chinggis Khan’ from a multidimensional perspective

Abstract This paper focuses on a hitherto little-known long (or “Great”) wall that stretches along 737 km from northern Inner Mongolia in China, through Siberia into northeastern Mongolia. The wall was constructed during the late medieval period (10th to 13th century CE) but is commonly called the “Wall of Chinggis Khan” (or ‘Chingisiin Dalan’ in Mongolian). It includes, in addition to the long-wall itself, a ditch feature and numerous associated fortifications. By way of an analysis of this impressive construction we seek to better understand the concept of monumentality and in turn shed light on the wall’s structure, function and possible reasons for its erection. We pose the interesting question of whether any construction that is very large and labor intensive should be defined as a “monument”, and if so, what that definition of monumentality actually entails and whether such a concept is useful as a tool for research. Our discussion is relevant to the theme of this collection of papers in that it addresses the concept of the ‘extraordinary’ as conceived by archeologists. Following our analysis and discussion, we conclude that although size and expenditure of energy are important attributes of many monuments, monumentality (i.e., expression of the extraordinary) is not a binary “either-or” concept. Rather than ask whether the “Wall of Chinggis Khan” was or was not a monument per se, our analysis reveals aspects in which it was indeed monumental and extraordinary, and others in which it was not extraordinary, but rather an ordinary utilitarian artifact

Using the Maximal Entropy Modeling Approach to Analyze the Evolution of Sedentary Agricultural Societies in Northeast China

The emergence of agriculture and the evolution of sedentary societies are among the most important processes in human history. However, although archeologists and social scientists have long been studying these processes, our understanding of them is still limited. This article focuses on the Fuxin area in present-day Liaoning province in Northeast China. A systematic archeological survey we conducted in Fuxin in recent years located sites from five successive stages of the evolution of agricultural sedentary society. We used the principles of Maximal Entropy to study changes in settlement patterns during a long-term local trajectory, from the incipient steps toward a sedentary agricultural way of life to the emergence of complex societies. Based on the detailed data collected in the field, we developed a geo-statistical model based on Maximal Entropy (MaxEnt) that characterizes the locational choices of societies during different periods. This combination of high-resolution information on the location and density of archeological remains, along with a maximal entropy-based statistical model, enabled us to chart the long-term trajectory of the interactions between human societies and their natural environment and to better understand the different stages of the transition to developed sedentary agricultural society