Daxinzhuang

Daxinzhuang
Traditional Chinese	大辛莊
Simplified Chinese	大辛庄
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Dàxīnzhuāng Bopomofo ㄉㄚˋ ㄒㄧㄣ ㄓㄨㄤ

Daxinzhuang is a Chinese archaeological site located in Licheng, Jinan, Shandong. Although early occupation has been dated to the Neolithic Yueshi and Longshan cultures, the site became a major urban center during the Erligang and the Anyang period, possibly emerging as the first Shang expansion into Shandong.

Archaeology

Fredrick S. Drake, a professor at Cheeloo University in Jinan, discovered the Daxinzhuang site in 1935, following archaeological surveys along the Qingdao–Jinan railway. He recorded various features in a series of four research reports published in 1939 and 1940, noting bronzes, bone artifacts, stone tools, and pottery.

Shandong University and the Shandong Provincial Committee of Cultural Resource Management conducted a series of surveys and small-scale excavations at Daxinzhuang from the 1950s to 1980s. A 1955 test excavation found artifacts identified with the Erligang culture, the first pre-Anyang period artifacts associated with the Shang dynasty in Shandong. In 1984, a team comprising Shandong University, Jinan Museum, and the Shandong Provincial Institute of Antiquity and Archaeology excavated a variety of structural foundations, graves, wells, a well containing a number of human skulls, and over a hundred oracle bone fragments. A time-span stretching over the late Erligang and Anyang periods was established by Zou Heng in 1964, based off the stylistic attributes of collected ceramics. Periodization was refined over the course of the 1990s with increased stratigraphic data as well as analyses of li tripods and oracle bones from the site. A large scale regional survey begun in 2002 identified limited earlier occupation at the site, dating to the Yueshi and Longshan cultures, alongside later use during the Zhou and Han dynasties.

Website

The Daxinzhuang site is located in a farming field adjacent to the Qingdao–Jinan railway, south of the modern village of Daxinzhuang in Licheng, Jinan. It sits on the southern slopes of the Zhongnan Mountain foothills, slightly under 3 kilometers south of the Xiaoqing River. A number of seasonal streams, draining into the Xiaoqing, run through the area; one of these was dammed by early 20th century railway construction, creating the Xiezigou or "Scorpion ditch", which runs through much of the site. Erosion and sediment buildup from farming has filled and widened the Xiezigou, exposing Shang era sherds and creating a channel about one meter deep, 500 meters long, and 120 meters wide at its thickest. No notable surface fields such as mounds distinguish the site from the surrounding farmland.

History

Daxinzhuang is the type site of a cluster of contemporary sites labeled the Daxinzhuang type, situated along the Ji River valley in northwestern Shandong. Daxinzhuang type, alongside Qianzhangda and its associated sites along the Xue River in Tengzhou, are the earliest known outposts of the Erligang state in Shandong. These clusters grew and proliferated during a period of instability in the Erligang heartland of Henan.

Bronzes produced by the Daxinzhuang type are similar to those from Zhengzhou. Ceramics of the subculture are divided into two types, stylistically associated with the Erligang and native Yueshi culture respectively; the latter type was steadily assimilated into the Erligang style and ceased to exist as a distinct type during the Anyang period. Due to its proximity to the Ji River, the settlement sat along a major trade to northern Shandong, procuring grain and metal for the heartland, alongside exotic goods such as pearls and shells.

Daxinzhuang as the Erligang transitioned into the Late Shang. Although major Shang cities such as Anyang were over ten times larger, the settlement became one of the largest outside of the Central Plain. The Late Shang period saw the emergence of extensive saltworks along Bohai Bay. Daxinzhuang, due to its advantageous position along the Ji River, likely connected the salt trade to the heartland.

Writing

Alongside Zhengzhou, Zhouyuan, and Anyang, Daxinzhuang is one of four primary sites where Shang-era oracle bones—the first attested examples of written Chinese—have been discovered. While the vast majority of inscriptions have been found at Anyang, there is considerable evidence for Daxinhuang having a local variety of the Shang script and its own tradition of literacy. In March 2003, a turtle plastron was found at Daxinzhuang featuring inscriptions in a regional variant of the oracle bone script, likely dating to the Yinxu II or early Yinxu III subperiods (c. 12th century BCE). Like other examples, bones were subject to pyromancy—where early forms of Chinese characters were carved into them to ask questions, and then interpret their answers in the cracks formed upon exposing the bones to fire. Initially divided into seven fragments, four of the Daxinhuang pieces were reconnected by archaeologist Fang Hui. Analysis of finds at the site since then support the notion that some direct form of Shang royal influence extended as far east as Daxinhuang, as the inscriptions seem to have been created in a similar context as those in Anyang, which suggests communication between local populations of diviners and scribes. Some aspects of Daxinhuang inscriptions are unique to the site, including the preparation of materials, the layout of characters on the bones, and occurrence of certain vocabulary and sentence structures.

References

Bibliography

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• Takashima, Ken-ichi (2011). "Literacy to the South and the East of Anyang in Shang China: Zhengzhou and Daxinzhuang". In Li, Feng; Branner, David Prager (eds.). Writing and Literacy in Early China: Studies from the Columbia Early China Seminar. Seattle: University of Washington Press. ISBN 9780295804507.
• Li, Min (2008). Conquest, Concord, and Consumption: Becoming Shang in Eastern China (PhD thesis). University of Michigan.
• Thorp, Robert L. (2006). China in the Early Bronze Age: Shang Civilization. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 9780812203615.
• Oriental Archaeology Research Center of Shandong University and Jinan Municipal Institute of Archaeology (2004). "Inscribed Oracle Bones of the Shang Period Unearthed from the Daxinzhuang Site in Jinan City". Chinese Archaeology. 4 (1). doi:10.1515/CHAR.2004.4.1.29.
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