"Where did the tin ore used for bronze smelting in the pre-Qin period in the Central Plains come from? This has become a difficult problem in metallurgical archaeological research. " Professor Li Yanxiang from the Institute of Science and Technology History of University of Science and Technology Beijing told the Science and Technology Daily reporter.
The logic and arguments cited in the theory of finding tin in the Central Plains are questioned.
In order to find out the source of pre-Qin tin, scholars first turned their attention to the Central Plains. They think that the tin materials used for smelting bronzes in the Central Plains at that time were all made from local materials. Amano Sukeyoshi of Japan and Shi, an archaeologist in China, used documents to search for tin deposits in the Central Plains.
Amano Gennosuke takes Anyang (Yin Ruins Site) as the center, divides the Central Plains into different regions according to the different linear distances from Anyang, and draws the copper and tin deposits in the Central Plains recorded in historical documents in the pre-Qin period within the corresponding regions. Shi also adopted the same method, but with a wider range of choices. At the same time, he thinks that if the straight-line distance exceeds 500 kilometers, transportation will be a problem. Therefore, it is speculated that the sources of copper-tin deposits may all be on the north bank of the Yellow River, as far away as Jinnan and other places.
In the early 1980s, researcher Wen Guang from the Institute of Geology of the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences further put forward the theory of tin prospecting in the Central Plains. He believed that the main tin mines in modern China were located outside the territory of Shang Dynasty and Western Zhou Dynasty, which led some scholars to advocate the theory that tin was imported. He published a series of articles, which proved that there were many tin mines in the core area of Shang and Zhou Dynasties through ancient documents and inscriptions.
In this regard, archaeologist Tong refuted it from the perspective of logic and argument. Tong believes that on the one hand, the article mainly refers to historical documents after the Han Dynasty, which cannot prove that tin mines in the documents have been used in the Shang Dynasty; On the other hand, through textual research, it is found that more than half of the historical materials used to prove the existence of tin in the Central Plains indicate that the origin of tin is in the south, one tenth indicates that the origin of tin is in Liao Yan, and the other part has nothing to do with the origin of tin, or does not indicate the origin.
During the period of 1987, researcher Jin of the Institute of World Religions of China Academy of Social Sciences questioned the theory that there was tin in the Central Plains. He said that after the founding of New China, the relevant departments had organized a general survey of geology and mineral resources in the Central Plains. The results show that there are no tin mines in Henan, and many tin mines recorded in ancient literature seem to be lead mines. At the same time, if there is no tin mine in the Central Plains, the tin materials needed for large-scale copper casting in Shang Dynasty must come from other regions. On the contrary, even if a new deposit was discovered in the Central Plains, it may not have been mined in the Shang Dynasty. Even if it is mined, the possibility of importing tin from other areas cannot be ruled out.
The "southern theory" lacks evidence of tin smelting sites in the south.
If the tin used for bronze smelting in the Central Plains comes from other regions, which regions may be its suppliers? Xia, an archaeologist and expert in geological history, believes that most of the bronze raw materials in the pre-Qin period came from the south. Li Ji believes that the raw materials of Yin Ruins bronzes come from the south, and Wuxi Mine is in the Yellow River Basin, which is already