| |
Chengdu ruins challenge
history
By Wen Chihua
CHENGDU, China - There should have been a
residential complex on this site in the western
outskirts of Chengdu. Instead, there is a huge hole in
the ground whose contents have experts scrambling to
rewrite ancient Chinese history.
Workers of a
local real-estate development firm accidentally
discovered what is now known as the Jinsha ruins more
than a year ago, while preparing the area for
construction. Since then, archeologists have been busy
unearthing one important artifact after another, all of
them indicating that there once was a civilization that
thrived here more than 3,500 years ago.
The
Jinsha site, as well as that of the Sanxingdui ruins
also found in this southwestern Chinese province, has
all but challenged the long-held notion that the Yellow
River valley was the only cradle of Chinese
civilization.
According to experts here,
everything they have found so far in Jinsha and
Sanxingdui suggest that a sophisticated bronze
civilization existed along the Yangtze River as early as
the better-known civilization in the Yellow River valley
to the north.
But Wang Yi, head of the
excavation team here, notes that one difference in the
artifacts they have unearthed here and those in Yellow
River valley kingdoms is the use of gold leaf by the
ancient southern Chinese. He says gold leaf was also
used by central Chinese peoples, while gold objects in
the north were all solid, most of them jewelry pieces.
The southern Chinese apparently glued the gold leaf on
to bronze or lacquer ware as enhancements or
decorations.
Archeologists here have found
several gold-leaf pieces, including a sun that is as
thin as 0.2 millimeter and with a diameter of 12.5
centimeters. It has 12 long "teeth" arranged in the
shape of a whirlpool, as well as four phoenixes hollowed
out of the piece. Experts say the image of birds around
the sun suggests that the ancient Jinsha state practiced
some form of totem worship. They add that sun worship
was practiced by the ancient people of the Chengdu
Plain.
Wang says one exceptional representative
piece of the bronze culture of the Chengdu Plain is a
mask with gold leaf that is about 3.74cm in height and
4.92cm in diameter. The mask has a big nose, crescent
brows and almond eyes. Its mouth is half-open in a
smile.
Similar masks have been found in
Sanxingdui, some 40 kilometers north of Chengdu. But
experts say gold masks such as the one in Jinsha have
never been found elsewhere in China. Wang says this is
probably because craftsmen elsewhere had not developed
sophisticated techniques to deal with gold during the
Shang and Zhou periods (16th century BC to 221 BC).
Experts say there are strong indications that
the Jinsha and Sanxingdui ruins are linked. Aside from
having gold pieces done with similar techniques, both
sites have been found to have jade sacrificial vessels
that also look similar.
The jade ornaments
recovered from Sanxingdui indicate that a civilization
flourished there about 3,700-5,000 years ago.
Archeologists think Sanxingdui could have served as the
capital for several kings of the state of Shu, which was
then a dominant power in southwestern China.
Yu
Weichao, a former curator of the Museum of Chinese
History, speculates that Jinsha may have been the
political and cultural center of the Shu state some
3,000 years ago, after the fall of the Sanxingdui
civilization. Yu says that given the way people
intermingled and tended to stay in one place, especially
when the place is as rich as the Chengdu Plain, the king
of Shu probably moved to Chengdu after the sudden
collapse of the Sanxingdui settlement.
Covering
four square kilometers, Jinsha includes an area for
holding sacrificial rites, a palace, and residences for
commoners.
"The former two are exclusive
premises for the noble class. It might belong to the
king of the ancient state of Shu. The capital of Sichuan
today, Chengdu, could be one of the capitals of Shu,
ancient name for Sichuan," says Wang, who is also
director of the Chengdu Archeology Institute.
He
says a tonne of whole elephant tusks, which were among
the 2,000 pieces of relics recovered so far from the
site, could have been brought to the state of Shu by
people from Yunnan to the south either as a tribute to
the king or for barter trade.
But other experts
note that unlike the Sanxingdui ruins, where there is
evidence of a city wall 2,600 meters long and at least
three meters high, no trace of a city wall has been
found at Jinsha. With the absence of such a wall,
whether or not Jinsha served as Shu's capital city is
open to question, say these experts.
Wang
theorizes, though, that the ancient city wall could have
been destroyed during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76).
In the meantime, experts say there is little
question that Jinsha had a close relationship as well
with civilizations that originated in the Yellow River
valley, judging from the artifacts it has yielded. These
include tortoise shells used to practice divination that
are similar to those found in the Yin ruins in central
China's Henan province in 1928. The Yin artifacts are
believed to date back to some 5,000 years.
Another Jinsha relic that indicates a connection
to the lower reaches of the Yangtze River is a jade
vessel whose engravings are almost identical to those on
vessels that appeared in the late period of the Liangchu
culture, which began 5,000 years ago in an area in
southeastern China. That area comprises today's Shanghai
and Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces along the lower
reaches of the Yangtze.
The Jinsha green jade
vessel is horizontally carved into 10 sections with nine
shallow grooves, bringing about 80 convex lines on the
whole piece. On these convex lines are engraved delicate
lines that appear to stand for human faces, with circles
and triangles symbolizing eyes and geometric figures
symbolizing mouths.
Also carved, in intaglio, on
the vessel is what appears to be a deity, albeit a bit
overweight and wearing a crown with accessories,
standing with arms and legs spread out. On each arm is a
feather ornament.
The vessel is round inside yet
square outside. Experts say this design complies with
ancient Chinese philosophical idea called tianyuan
difang, or "the sky is round and the earth is
square". In ancient times, such vessels were used for
sacrificial purposes.
Wang says this particular
vessel was probably used by its owner to worship the
heaven because of its green color. He explains that
yellow jade vessels were used to worship the earth.
(Inter Press Service)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
