There is a very famous Neolithic site on the southern edge of Ningshaoping Plain in Hangzhou Bay, namely Hemudu. Hemudu site is at the foot of the winding Siming Mountain in the south, flat land in the north and Yaojiang River in the southwest. Hemudu people lived, lived and multiplied in such a place near mountains and rivers seven thousand years ago, creating a splendid agricultural civilization. Then Hemudu suddenly disappeared, and it was not until the amazing discovery of 1973 that Hemudu came into our sight.
Archaeological discovery process
Many important discoveries in the world are discovered by accident, and Hemudu site is no exception.
During the period of 1973, China was in the period of Cultural Revolution, and put forward the slogan of developing agriculture with grain as the key link. Luojiang commune, where Hemudu village is located, is low-lying and has frequent floods. In order to ensure the low-lying paddy fields in China to keep their harvest stable and high-yield, the village decided to transform an old drainage station near Yaojiang River.
The drainage station needs to install a high-power water pump, so the foundation must be dug into the raw soil layer. The project started in late June and is scheduled to be put into use in September. Within a few days of construction, the digger met with difficulties because the soil was mixed with many stones, tiles and even bones. When Luo Chunhua, the head of Luojiang Commune, went to the construction site to check the progress of the project, the workers reported the situation to him.
Luo Chunhua studied in Zhejiang University and has a certain understanding of cultural relics. He carefully looked at the broken pots and broken plates dug out, realized that these were probably the cultural relics patched by China of the ancient Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, and soon reported the situation to the county cultural station. In order to avoid the loss of cultural relics, Luo Chunhua also left the scattered cultural relics to the workers.
After investigation, the staff decided that this is a very rich and ancient cultural site, and immediately requested to suspend construction and protect the site.
On the third day, Wang, a staff member of Zhejiang Cultural Management Association, came to the construction site and was immediately stunned by the exquisite cultural relics unearthed. Wang thought it was the oldest Neolithic site in Zhejiang, and immediately returned to Hangzhou with many physical specimens and animal bones for a report. On the fourth day, the provincial museum sent an expert group to Hemudu for rescue excavation and trial excavation. This is how a world-famous site was discovered.
From 1973 1 1 to 1974 1, Hemudu site was officially excavated, and major discoveries were released one after another. First of all, the staff found some wood in the exploration, which had traces of artificial processing. Experts infer that this is the derrick of a water well. After further excavation, the correctness of the inference is verified, and the depth of the water well is determined to be1.4m. ..
In the bronze inscriptions of Shang and Zhou Dynasties, there was a point in the middle of the well, which was very similar to the structure of the well. Four rows of wood intersect to form a derrick, and the middle point is where the water is pumped. Because of the appearance of this well, archaeologists speculate that this area is probably a village where ancient people lived.
Then, archaeologists excavated 1 1 tombs and three ash pits, as well as a large number of pottery fragments and stone tools. Most of the pottery unearthed in this cultural layer is gray-black pottery with sand and carbon. These pottery are rough in texture, and the traces left on the surface are judged by experts to be processed around 6000 years.
When the archaeologists dug to a depth of 3 meters above the ground, some small golden particles flashed in the dark brown soil layer, but they soon became the color of the soil. Archaeologists can hardly believe their eyes: these things are actually carbonized rice! The rice kept the original color of Huang Cancan before it came into contact with the air. Did Hemudu people in Neolithic age start to grow rice?
The staff compared the rice unearthed in Hemudu with cultivated rice and wild rice. The results show that the rice grains of wild rice are thin and long, and the rice grains of cultivated rice are nearly twice as wide as those of wild rice, while the rice grains unearthed in Hemudu are closer to those of cultivated rice.
Rice is constantly being excavated, and such a large amount of hoarding provides important evidence for archaeologists. The ancient humans who lived here 6000 years ago have mastered rice planting technology. So how do they grow rice? Archaeologists found many things made of bones in the soil, which revealed the mystery. This is the production tool of Hemudu people-bones. The excavation of a large number of bones presents a fact to people today: Hemudu people more than 6,000 years ago have left the slash-and-burn farming mode and entered the stage of ploughing agriculture.
The next discovery is even more puzzling. Archaeologists not only excavated a large number of stone tools, bone implements, wood products and pottery, but also found many wooden boards and stakes. According to local legend, it used to be a bay, so these boards and stakes are probably wooden boats of that year. The results of geological exploration also prove that in ancient times, it was indeed a bay. But are these boards the wooden boats of the past? So why are there a lot of rice hoarded next to these boards? And how to explain the surrounding tombs?