Important Archaeological Findings of Yin Ruins in Anyang

Yin Ruins, the ruins of the capital city in the late Shang Dynasty, were discovered at the beginning of the 20th century, and excavation began at 1928. The excavation of Yin Ruins is the largest and longest-lasting archaeological excavation in China. The following are the important archaeological discoveries of Yin Ruins in Anyang compiled by me, hoping to help you.

main body

Yin Ruins, the ruins of the capital city in the late Shang Dynasty, were discovered at the beginning of the 20th century, and excavation began at 1928. Located on the Huan River in the northwest suburb of Anyang City, Henan Province, it covers an area of about 24 square kilometers. Since Pan Geng moved its capital to Zhou Wang (Di Xin) because of national subjugation, businessmen took it as their capital (from the end of14th century BC to 1 1 century ago), * * experienced eight generations and twelve kings in 273.

1899 Wang Xuezhong? Keel? There were inscriptions on the inscriptions, which were later verified as Shang Oracle bones by Luo Zhenyu and Wang Guowei and unearthed in Xiaotun Village, Anyang. 1928 10, Dong Zuobin presided over the trial excavation. In February, 65438+, the Institute of History and Linguistics of Academia Sinica set up an archaeological team to be responsible for the excavation of Yin Ruins. Dong Zuobin, Li Ji, Liang Siyong and Guo Baojun presided over the work successively. From June 1928 to June 1937, * * * excavated fifteen times. More than 1 1 tombs, 1 square pits, 1200 small tombs and sacrificial pits, and a large number of building foundations were excavated, and nearly 20,000 pieces of Oracle Bone Inscriptions and a large number of pottery, bronzes and jade articles were unearthed. After the founding of New China, the excavation of Yin Ruins quickly resumed and achieved fruitful results, mainly including: the excavation of the tomb of Wuguan Village and the sacrificial pit in Hougang, and the excavation of more than 4,000 pieces of Oracle Bone Inscriptions in Xiaotun South 1973; Discover large bronze casting sites in Shang Dynasty, women's tombs and so on. The excavation of Yin Ruins is the largest and longest-lasting archaeological excavation in China. The rich unearthed cultural relics here provide empirical data for solving a series of problems in the study of Shang history, which has attracted attention at home and abroad. 196 1 was announced by the State Council as a national key cultural relics protection unit.

Fu Shi (director of the Institute of History and Linguistics, Academia Sinica) organized and led the archaeological excavation of Nan 'an 15, which proved conclusively that Pan Geng, the capital of China who moved to Yin in the late Shang Dynasty, was here, with a history of about 3,300 years. This is the first time in the history of China that there are documents to be examined, which are relics such as strata, unearthed bronzes and jades. South of Huanshui, above Yin Ruins? For the record, another document says? North Mongolia? Also known as? Yin ruins? . Also known as Oracle Bone Inscriptions? Dayi businessman? 、? Shangyi? . ) The shape and Yin Ruins culture of this capital, represented by the unearthed Oracle Bone Inscriptions and bronzes, epitomizes that the ancient civilization of China has reached a fairly high level and occupies an extremely important and glorious position in the history of civilization in the East and even in the world.

As far as academic development is concerned, the excavation of 15 in Yin Ruins was entirely carried out by China scholars themselves, so Yin Ruins is also called the birthplace of modern archaeology in China.

geographical position

Yin Ruins is located around Xiaotun Village, Yindu District, Anyang City, Henan Province, with geographical coordinates of 1 14? 18? 50? e，36？ 07? 36? It is about 80 meters above sea level, 6 kilometers in length and width, with a total area of 36 square kilometers. The core area of the heritage reserve is 465,438+04 hectares and the buffer area is 720 hectares. The overall layout of Yin Ruins is rigorous, centering on the ruins of Yin Ruins Palace Ancestral Hall in Xiaotun Village, and distributed in a ring along the banks of Huan River. The existing relics mainly include the ancestral temple site of Yin ruins palace, the tomb site of Yin ruins, the shopping mall around the north, the Hougang site, the settlement site (clan town), the family cemetery group, the Oracle Bone Inscriptions pit, the bronze casting site, and the manual workshops.

cultural relic

The site of the Palace Temple is located in Xiaotun Village and Huayuanzhuang on the south bank of Huan River, with a length of 1.000 meters from north to south and a width of 650 meters from east to west, with a total area of 7 1.5 hectares. It is the place where Shang kings handled government affairs and life, and it is also the most important site and part of Yin Ruins, including more than 80 buildings such as palaces and ancestral temples. On the west and south sides of the ruins of the Palace Temple, there is an artificially excavated defensive trench, which surrounds the Palace Temple and plays a similar role to Miyagi.

And the tomb of Fu Hao, the wife of Shang Zhouwang Wu Ding. This is the only well-preserved tomb of members of the Shang royal family found so far, and it is also the only tomb of members of the Shang royal family that can contact Oracle Bone Inscriptions and determine the age, owner and identity of the tomb. There were/0/6 martyrs in the tomb and/0/928 unearthed objects, including 468 bronzes, 755 jades, 564 bones and nearly 7,000 seashells.

There are also a large number of Oracle bone pits in the ancestral temple area of Yin Ruins Palace, and about1.5000 pieces of Oracle bones have been unearthed.

The tomb site is located in the northern highlands of Houjiazhuang and Wuguan Village on the north bank of Huanhe River, with a length of about 450m from east to west and a width of about 250m from north to south, with a total area of about 1 1.3 hectares. Since 1934 and 13 tombs, more than 2,000 tombs, sacrificial pits and chariots and horses pits have been discovered here, and a large number of beautifully made bronzes, jade articles, stone tools and pottery have been unearthed, which is recognized by the academic circles as the location of Yin Shang tombs. Among them, there are a large number of sacrificial pits in the eastern area, which are arranged in an orderly manner, and there are many human and animal bones in the pits. It is a public sacrifice place for ancestors of the Yin royal family, and now it is the M260 exhibition hall.

In addition, Wu Dafang Ding, the stepmother unearthed in the east of the tomb, is the heaviest bronze ware ever discovered.

Huanbei Shopping Mall is located in Garden Village on the north bank of Huanbei River. The city site is generally square, with a width of 2. 15km from east to west and a length of 2.2km from north to south, with a total area of about 4.7km2 There are rammed earth walls around it. The discovery of the ruins of Huanbei Shopping Mall extended the historical time of Yin Shang Dynasty and the scope of Yin Ruins.

The site of Huanbei Shopping Mall is earlier than the late Shang culture of Yin Ruins in the traditional sense, and slightly later than the early Shang culture of Zhengzhou. It is probably the site of Du Yi in the middle and late Shang Dynasty.

201On May 3rd, July, it was reported that archaeologists discovered 18 Huns' tombs during archaeological excavations in the Yin Ruins Conservation Area. These Xiongnu tombs are arranged neatly and have the same shape. Judging from the unearthed artifacts, these tombs are later than the Yin Ruins, and their shapes and contents are also different from those of the Central Plains tombs. Its age should be from the late Eastern Han Dynasty to the Wei and Jin Dynasties, about 1800 years ago.

Explore evolution

According to documents such as Shangshu, Shiji and Zhushuzhi, there was a Shang Dynasty in the history of China as early as 3,000 years ago, which lasted for nearly 500 years, and it was the beginning of China's ancient history as a territorial country. Tang Ming, the first Shang king, lived in 65438 BC, at the beginning of the 6th century. Bo? After the founding of the People's Republic of China, it quickly conquered the surrounding forces and stabilized the political map of the Shang Dynasty. Succession to the throne in Shang Dynasty? Father dies and son follows? Or? Brothers and sisters? Method, there are 3 1 kings around * *.

The capital of Shang Dynasty moved several times, from Pan Geng in the 20th generation of Shang Dynasty, to Yin in 13 19, and then to national subjugation in 1046 BC, and experienced Pan Geng, filial piety, Wuding, Zujia, Xinxin, Kangding, Wuyi,. After the demise of the Shang Dynasty, it gradually became a ruin.

During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Li Daoyuan gave a more accurate description of the location of Yin Ruins in Notes to Water Classics. During the Song and Yuan Dynasties, many bronzes were unearthed in Anyang, which attracted people's attention, but it was considered as the first capital of the Shang King He Qijia.

Xiaotun is located on the Huan River in the western suburb of Anyang City. The terrain in this area is slightly higher. Since the Warring States Period, especially during the Sui and Tang Dynasties, it was once regarded as an ideal place to bury the dead. It was not until the Ming Dynasty that it became a residential area composed of several families. Since the late Qing Dynasty, residents of Xiaotun have often dug up broken bones from the fields during farming. /kloc-at the end of 0/9, it was rumored that broken bones, the so-called keel, could cure diseases, so the villagers collected them, or kept them for use or sold them to Chinese medicine shops. Since then,? Keel? Is constantly being dug out of the ground.

1899, Wang, a epigraphist, bought medicine because of illness, and found some very old characters engraved on the keel sold by Beijing Chinese medicine shop. Realizing that this is a very precious cultural relic, he began to spend a lot of money to buy it, and then verified it? Oracle Bone Inscriptions? what's up Yin people's knife and pen writing? . In A.D. 1900, when Eight-Nation Alliance captured Beijing, Wang was outraged and sold the collected keel from his son to scholars in the late Qing Dynasty. 1903, Liu E compiled and published his Oracle Bone Inscriptions, which became the first Oracle Bone Inscriptions recorded in Tieyun Hidden Turtle.

After the news of the discovery of Shang Oracle bones spread, the whole academic community was excited, and many scholars joined the ranks of collecting Oracle bones. From various Chinese medicine shops? Keel? It was worth a hundred times at that time. Because it is profitable to sell Oracle bones, antique dealers hide the unearthed place of Oracle bones. 1908 (first 19 10), Luo Zhenyu discovered the origin of Oracle bones after many explorations. What's the name of that small village by the sea? So he sent people there many times to buy Oracle Bone Inscriptions, and made some textual research on the above words. He believes that Xiaotun is the Yin Ruins mentioned in the literature, and at this point, the ruins of Yin Ruins were first known to the academic community. 19 17, Wang Guowei made textual research on the materials in Oracle bone inscriptions and sorted out Wang Shang's genealogy, further confirming that Xiaotun is the capital of Pan Geng.

Excavation process

1928, with the strong support of Fu Sinian, the first trial excavation of Yin Ruins began, which lasted 18 days.

And artifacts such as bronzes, pottery and bones. 1929 Spring, Li Ji presided over the formal excavation of Yin Ruins. By 1937, War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression broke out, and * * * carried out 15 scientific excavations, and found the palace area and tomb area of Shang Dynasty, which confirmed the records of Du Yi and Wang Di in the bamboo annals, making Du Yi, who was once in the late Shang Dynasty, an unshakable conclusion.

1950, the tomb of Wuguan Village was excavated, which became the first excavation of Yin Ruins in New China. 1976, Wu Ding's spouse was found in the northwest of Xiaotun. Good woman? The grave. By 1986, more than 20 excavations have been carried out at more than ten points, and about150,000 pieces of Oracle Bone Inscriptions have been obtained. 1999 65438+ 10, a large-scale mall site was discovered about 2 meters underground in the northeast of Yin Ruins. The age of this city site is slightly earlier than the traditional concept of being a capital city in the late Shang Dynasty? Yin ruins? , distributed with the old one? Yin ruins? The scope slightly overlaps, but the whole area is on the north bank of He Huan River, which the academic circles call it? Huanbei Mall? .

With the continuous enrichment of archaeological discoveries, the research scope of Yin Ruins is getting wider and wider, from the cultural stage of Yin Ruins to the environment (such as geography, landforms, vegetation, resources, animals and plants). From race, population and family organization to architecture and handicrafts (such as casting copper, jade, pottery and bones); From agriculture to funeral system and sacrifice system; From writing to art to the nature of society in the late Shang Dynasty, the Shang Dynasty gradually became a history of faith. [ 15]

Website value

Oracle Bone Inscriptions is the predecessor of Chinese characters and one of the three oldest writing systems in the world. It not only proved the independent origin of ancient Chinese characters, but also provided independent writing rules in ancient China, which had a fundamental impact on China culture since 3000 years ago. The discovery of Oracle Bone Inscriptions in Yin Ruins not only advanced the credible recorded history of China to Shang Dynasty, but also was called the earliest Oracle Bone Inscriptions of China and even human beings because of its rich content, involving politics, economy, culture and thoughts of Yin and Shang Dynasties. Archives? . Oracle Bone Inscriptions's research has also produced a new discipline? Oracle Bone Inscriptions [16]

Products, works of art, etc. , and Ding, Hu, Gui, Jue, etc. Musical instruments include cymbals, bells, pheasants, etc. , weapons are ge, spear, shovel, knife, arrow, etc. And the tools are cymbals, chisels and axes. The rich and varied shapes and mysterious patterns reflect the unique religious feelings and aesthetic concepts of the ancestors of Shang Dynasty, which reached the peak of the development of China Bronze Age and occupied an important position in the history of ancient civilization in China.

The characters (inscriptions) cast on bronzes, especially the long inscriptions, are the reflection of people's real life at that time, and retain the true features at that time, so they have high research value.

There are four or five thousand bronzes unearthed in Yin Ruins. According to statistics, among the bronzes unearthed in 1930s, 170 pieces of ritual vessels and 1340 pieces of weapons, tools and other miscellaneous utensils. From 1950 to 1986, more than 650 sacrificial vessels and 1400 weapons, some tools, artworks and miscellaneous vessels were excavated. After 1986, many bronzes were found. Bronzes are mainly unearthed in large and medium-sized tombs, of which the most well-preserved tomb No.5 is the most unearthed? There are as many as 468 female good tombs with various types.

The most exquisite casting technique in bronze ware is the ritual vessel. There are not only many kinds of ritual vessels unearthed in Yin Ruins, but also various shapes, which are round, flat and square, among which round is the main one. The biggest and heaviest is the stepmother Wu Da Fang Ding unearthed from the tomb of Wuguan Village. Height 133 cm, length 1 10 cm, width 78 cm and weight 875 kg. It is the largest ancient bronze found in the world so far and the peak of bronze civilization. In addition, Niu Ding, Lu Ding unearthed from Tomb M 1004 in the northwest of Houjiazhuang, and two mousse new Dafang Ding unearthed from Muhao Tomb are also heavy-duty ritual vessels.

architectural feature

The architecture of Shang Dynasty, represented by the palace ancestral temple and the tomb, is solemn, simple and elegant, which embodies the unique sense of balance, order and aesthetic taste of ancient Chinese architecture, the palace architectural pattern, architectural art, architectural method and architectural technology in Yin and Shang Dynasties, and represents the advanced level of early ancient Chinese palace architecture. Yinxu Huanbei Shopping Mall, with tall walls and magnificent palaces, is particularly strict? Central axis? For thousands of years, layout has become a feature of China city.

Value at purchase price

The excavation of Yin Ruins almost completely changed the historical features of the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties in the traditional historical view, truly established the scientific status of Yin Shang society as a letter history, established a reliable chronological foundation for Shang and Zhou archaeology, and played an important role in tracing back the early Shang and Xia cultures.

Basic point function; It fills the gap between the early Shang culture represented by Erligang in Zhengzhou and the late Shang culture represented by Yin Ruins, thus perfecting the chronological framework of the Shang Dynasty.

The cultural relics of Yin Ruins, represented by bronzes and jades, show that the handicraft industry of Yin Ruins is unprecedentedly developed, with complete categories and extremely high technological level. Some major handicraft production departments, such as bronze smelting and casting, jade making, pottery making, bone making, automobile manufacturing and textile manufacturing, have reached a considerable scale. White pottery and primitive porcelain in this period occupy an important position in the history of China ceramics. The Shang Dynasty wagons unearthed in Yin Ruins used a large number of bronze components, two sets of two wheels on a single shaft, and the structure was exquisite and complex, which embodied superb composite technologies such as machinery and bronze casting.

The burial system, distribution pattern, burial methods and sacrificial ceremonies of Yin Ruins reflect the social organization, class status, hierarchy and kinship in the late Shang Dynasty, and represent the highest level of early ancient tomb architecture in China, which was followed by successive dynasties in China and gradually formed a unique mausoleum system in China. At the same time, the funeral customs of Yin Ruins are represented by human sacrifices, human sacrifices, chariots and horses sacrifices and animal sacrifices. It highlights the ritual system with hierarchy as the core in Yin Ruins and embodies the funeral custom at that time. [ 16]

Archaeological influence

The excavation of Yin Ruins is the product of the combination of traditional epigraphy in China and western field archaeology, and it is the symbol of the rise of modern archaeology in China. [ 19]

The excavation of palaces and tombs in Yin Ruins and the discovery of a large number of precious cultural relics such as bronzes and jades have attracted the attention of Chinese and foreign academic circles and established the international status of China archaeology.

Anyang Hougang Site 193 1 Liang Siyong? Triple superposition? The relative chronological relationship among Yangshao culture, Longshan culture and Shang culture was divided from stratigraphy for the first time, which laid the foundation for the formation of archaeological stratigraphy in China.

The excavation site of Yin Ruins has become the cradle of cultivating archaeological talents in China, and the first generation of China archaeologists such as Dong Zuobin, Shi, Gao Quxun, Liang Siyong, Xia Nai and Hu Houxuan have emerged.

The excavation of Yin Ruins positively responded to the ideological trend of doubting the ancient times prevailing in China academic circles since the early 20th century. With the archaeological confirmation of the existence of Shang Dynasty, Chinese academic circles have been able to carry out research in relevant documents. Xia dynasty? The exploration of.

evaluate

Domestic evaluation

Guo Moruo: ①? Central Plains culture was founded. Is it better to read this than to read ancient books? . ②? Huanshui Anyang is worthy of the name. Was it the imperial capital three thousand years ago? . ③? The discovery of Yin Ruins is the beginning of new historiography. ?

Chen Yunhe:? Oracle Bone Inscriptions is happy to jump out of Yin Ruins, and bronzes are happy to jump out of Yin Ruins and see the light of day again. Is that really a great pleasure in Xiaotun Village, Anyang? .

Chennai: ①? Yin ruins are not only rich in cultural relics, but also of high academic value, and the treasures are far from exhausted. ? ②? Yin ruins culture in Shang Dynasty is indeed a splendid civilization, which has three elements: city, writing and bronze ware. And it is a splendid Chinese civilization. China civilization has its own personality, unique style and characteristics. Among the above three elements, China color has its own particularity. In other aspects, such as jade carvings, horse-drawn carts, carved white pottery and primitive porcelain, Oracle Bone Inscriptions's divination also has its own characteristics. The art of Yin Ruins also has its own style. ?

Jin bingmo:? Generally speaking, the value of Yin ruins is very important, and the protection and display of the ruins are also very good. YH 127 Oracle Bone Inscriptions Pit in Yin Ruins is the earliest file in the East. The tomb site is comparable to the pyramids of ancient Egypt and is the second ancient Egypt. ?

Jiang Zemin:? This place is very knowledgeable and promising. ?

transmarine

At the 30th World Heritage Conference held in Lithuania in 2006, the World Heritage Committee held that Yin Ruins? It has outstanding universal value. , made the following evaluation:

Two. As the capital of Shang Dynasty, Yin Ruins showed the peak of ancient bronze culture in China, including the writing system.

Three. The cultural relics of Yin Ruins provide extraordinary evidence for the cultural traditions in the late Shang Dynasty, including rich scientific inventions and technological achievements, such as astronomical calendars based on the observation of the sun and the moon, and the earliest inscriptions on bones and tortoise shells in China.

Four. The ruins of the palace ancestral temple and the tombs of the Yin ruins have left outstanding examples of ancient Chinese architecture and laid the initial form of the ancient palace system and cemetery system in China, which is of great significance.

The archaeological discovery of the intransitive verb Yin Ruins left material evidence for China's language, ancient beliefs, social system and some major historical events. [