DataSheet1_Livestock supply to an imperial sacrificial site of the early Chinese empires evidenced by strontium isotope ratios.docx

A newly excavated ritual site, Xuechi, exposed abundant sacrificial livestock, allowing to understand the supplies and managements of livestock during the early Chinese Qin-Han Empires. Here we reported animal enamel 87Sr/86Sr values from the Xuechi site that are obviously higher than those of local snails and surface water, as well as calcites of the Chinese Loess Plateau (CLP) where the site was located, strongly suggesting that these sacrificial animals were not raised in the vicinity of the site. The regional bioavailable 87Sr/86Sr isoscape further indicates that some livestock were probably derived more than one hundred kilometers away, suggesting a complex social network for recruiting and managing the sacrificial activities. In the context of other Neolithic-Bronze Age records on the CLP, an increasing trend in variation of faunal 87Sr/86Sr values shows a robust correlation to Chinese states’ trajectory, in concordance with the territorial expansion model for state formation.</p

Study sites and their ¹⁴C ages.

<p>Study sites and their ¹⁴C ages.</p

Stereoscan photographs of nut shells (suspected).

<p>These suspected fruit shells have radians and ornamentation on the surface. The shell remains were too fragile to be identified accurately; however, we could identify three relatively intact specimens: a. <i>Corylus</i>, Huoshiliang; b. <i>Pinus</i>, Huoshiliang; c. <i>Castanea</i>, Zhaimao.</p

ancient DNA of Chinese donkeys

Samples were collected from four archaeological sites in China. 17 samples (L1- L9 and L11-L18) were from the Yanjialiang site in Inner Mongolia, which dates to 800-600 yr BP, during the Yuan dynasty. Sample L10 was from the Jinsitai cave site in Inner Mongolia, which dates to 18,000-20,000 yr BP. L21 was from the Lantianxinjie site in Shaanxi province. The date of the sample was determined to be about 568 (+/-50) yr BP using C14 dating