"Yu Hang?"

Chen Han shouted in surprise: "Are we going to the Liangzhu site?" ”

Kong Jianwen nodded with a smile: "Liangzhu has also discovered a lot of new ruins in this year's excavation season, and the most important thing is that the ruins of the capital city or the palace have been discovered, and we have to go to support and help excavate!" ”

The Liangzhu civilization is a regional ancient civilization around the Taihu Lake about 5300-4300 years ago.

Archaeologically it is generally classified as Late Neolithic.

Because the first discovery and typical ruins are in Yuhang Liangzhu, it is called Liangzhu culture.

As early as 1936, Shi Xin investigated and excavated the Liangzhu site, and found a large number of black pottery and stone tools, which were considered to be a branch of the Longshan culture that spread to the southeast under the background that the Yangshao culture and Longshan culture had been established in the Yellow River basin at that time.

In 1959, Xia Nai proposed the name of the Liangzhu culture to distinguish it from the relics of the Longshan period in other places.

In 1973, for the first time, the burial of large jade ritual vessels such as jade cong and jade bi was discovered in the straw shoes mountain of Wuxian County, and the jade of Liangzhu culture began to be gradually recognized.

Previously, similar heirlooms have been regarded as relics of the Zhou and Han dynasties, and the discovery of jade ritual vessels of Liangzhu culture has suddenly pulled the Chinese jade ritual culture from the Shang and Zhou dynasties to three generations ago!

From the late 80s to the early 90s, the high-level cemeteries of the Liangzhu culture were discovered in Antishan, Yaoshan and Huiguan Mountains, and the altars of Liangzhu were confirmed for the first time, and a huge artificial earthen platform was discovered in Mojiao Mountain.

So far, the status of the Liangzhu ruins in the Liangzhu culture and even the entire Chinese prehistoric culture has been established, and it has become an important object of discussion in the study of the origin of Chinese civilization.

Subsequently, in 2006-2007, the important Liangzhu city site was discovered.

From 2009 to 2014, it was confirmed that the long terraces distributed in the north, east and south of the periphery of Liangzhu Ancient City constituted Waiguo City, with a total area of 6.3 square kilometers.

In this way, more than 100 sites discovered in the past are organically combined into a whole.

After connecting many of these sites between the three towns of Liangzhu, Bottle Kiln and Anxi, which are widely distributed in modern Yuhang County, they are connected.

The academic community has a relatively comprehensive understanding of the connotation of Liangzhu culture, and many scholars believe that its social development level can be summarized by civilization or country.

The Yuhang area of Hangzhou where the Liangzhu site is located, from the geographical environment, is surrounded by the remaining veins of Tianmu Mountain on the north, west and south sides, and is a "C" shaped basin of about 1,000 square kilometers with an area of about 20 kilometers from north to south and 40 kilometers from east to west, and the open Hangjiahu Plain to the east.

The location can be said to be unique.

Around 7,000 years ago, human activity began in this area.

The known Neolithic cultural sequence is: Majiabang culture, Songze culture, Liangzhu culture, and Qianshanyang culture.

However, there were only a few ruins here during the Majiabang and Songze periods, and it was not until about 5,300 years ago, when the Songze culture developed into the Liangzhu culture, that the number of ruins suddenly increased to more than 100.

If you think about it carefully, it should be in the era of recklessness 5,000 years ago, surrounded by mountains on three sides in the center of the Great Plains, which is especially suitable for civilization and reproduction.

It is especially suitable for Liangzhu, a civilization that has developed an agricultural culture.

During the Liangzhu culture period, rice farming had made considerable progress.

Rice is divided into indica and japonica rice, and stone ploughs and stone sickles are commonly used.

Liangzhu cultural handicraft industry has also achieved high achievements, jade production, pottery, wood making, bamboo weaving, silk and linen weaving have reached a high level.

In particular, the number of jade objects, the richness of varieties, and the exquisiteness of carving, have reached the peak of prehistoric jade.

The ornamental theme on the jade is the embodiment and belief of the concept of "the unity of heaven and man" of the ancestors of Liangzhu, and has gradually become the core of traditional Chinese culture.

There are also many carved symbols on jade and pottery, which are close to the characters of the Shang and Zhou dynasties in shape, and are an important symbol of the Liangzhu culture entering the civilization era.

Zhejiang archaeologists have successively discovered the cemeteries of the dignitaries of the anti-mountain in the Liangzhu and Bottle kilns, the altars and cemeteries of Yaoshan and Huiguanshan, the foundation site of the giant building in Mojiao Mountain, the "earthen wall" of Tangshan and other large-scale ruins, as well as a large number of village ruins and cemeteries in the Liangzhu period.

At present, 135 sites of various types have been discovered, which together constitute a densely distributed, multi-type, and high-standard site community.

Scholars call it the "Liangzhu Site", which is the center of the entire Liangzhu culture, and is a "holy place" to explore the origin of Chinese civilization and prove the 5,000-year-old Chinese civilization.

From the evolution of civilization, it can be determined that Liangzhu represents the beginning of rice farming civilization in southern China, especially in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River.

This is different from the civilization produced in the Central Plains and most parts of the world under the economic model dominated by dry farming, and it is unique.

As we all know, the early Chinese civilization in the north planted chestnut millet and other dry farming, and later changed to wheat, which has always been the food culture in the north.

In the south, rice is grown, and it also began to develop very early.

In the past, the archaeological community has never been clear when the southern Chinese people first developed the rice culture.

Now I know that it is the Liangzhu culture more than 5,000 years ago.

This, of course, refers to the development of a mature rice culture.

What is a mature rice culture?

Of course, it is the development of farming, rice seeds, and agricultural tools that can be regarded as a complete farming culture.

If we only take the discovery of "rice" as the standard, we can indeed find carbonized rice 7,000 years ago, or even earlier.

However, this can only prove that the Chinese ancestors have eaten rice for a long time, but it cannot prove that a mature rice farming system has been developed at that time.

Because in the era of recklessness 5,000 years ago, or even 10,000 years ago, even if the ancient ancestors did not master rice cultivation, they could completely rely on collecting all kinds of wild rice in the wild to live.

That is, to live by gathering and hunting.

This is also a common human way of life in the Paleolithic and early and middle Neolithic periods.

It was not until the late Neolithic period that the true agrarian culture began to develop, and humans began to farm their own fields, harvest them regularly, and gather them regularly.

The Liangzhu civilization is the beginning of the Chinese wetland rice farming civilization!

It was the first Chinese civilization to discover mature rice fields and agricultural tools!

Since the period of Hemudu and Majiabang cultures, this area has gradually formed a composite economy using freshwater resources, including rice as a single crop, fish as a source of protein, and the use of water chestnut, gourd, melon and other horticultural economy.

In the Liangzhu stage, the agricultural form of "rice, soup and fish" in this area further reached the level of intensive cultivation through the establishment of agricultural tools system and the development of paddy field system.

Liangzhu culture unique stone plough, earth breaker, sickle, knife (spike harvesting tools) and other mature stone tools and agricultural tools.

The scale of the paddy field system and the water management system revealed by the excavation of the Maoshan site on the east side of the site group.

These can be directly compared with the traditional paddy field economy in historical periods and even in modern times.

From this level, the achievements of Liangzhu culture in rice agriculture are unique and advanced in the Chinese Neolithic Age and even in the same period culture around the world!

It can be said that the Liangzhu civilization was already the world's leading civilization 5,000 years ago!

The fact that the Chinese civilization is 4,700 years ahead of the world is indeed true!

(End of chapter)