Ruins of 3,000-year-old Village Unearthed in Central China

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, July 18, 2003

Ruins of 3,000-year-old Village Unearthed in Central China

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Chinese archaeologists have discovered the ruins of a complete ancient village on the western edge of Yinxu, an important archaeological excavation site dating back more than 3,000 years, in central China's Henan province.

Archaeologists from the Archaeological Research Institute under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences CASS) and Henan Provincial Cultural Heritage and Archaeological Research Institute unearthed 27 homes (or suites) with 70 rooms during their excavations at Yinxu.

The village has the first houses inhabited by ordinary people to be found at Yinxu.

"This is the first time that semi-subterranean residences half built into the ground have ever been found at Yinxu or among ruins from the Xia (2100 BC-1600 BC), Shang (1600 BC-1100 BC) and Zhou (1100 BC-771 BC) Dynasties," said Wang Xuerong, an associate research fellow with the Archaeological Research Institute under the CASS.

"Although the unearthed rooms are small compared with the foundations of palaces and temples unearthed at Yinxu, they reflect the vivid and colorful lives of ancient common people who lived in areas adjacent to the city proper," Wang said.

The discovery provided completely new materials for the study of society during the Shang Dynasty (1600 BC-1100 BC).

The ruins of Yin (Yinxu) were discovered an 1899 in Anyang, capital of the Shang Dynasty. Yin was the ancient name for the Shang Dynasty.

Excavations at Yinxu ruins have revealed tombs, foundations of palaces and temples, bronzes, jade carvings, lacquer, white carved ceramics, and high-fired, green-glazed ware, and oracle bones.

One of the major discoveries of Yinxu is the inscribed animal bones and tortoise shells, known as the oracle bones. The bones and shells, used for divination by Shang kings, carry the earliest known examples of Chinese characters.

The discovery of the ancient village enriched the study of Yinxu culture, according to Wang.

The newly-excavated houses were concentrated and laid out on north-south lines. The houses were properly spaced for ventilation and all the rooms were connected by "halls" and "living rooms", similar to modern buildings.

Earthen platforms found in some rooms were used as "beds", experts believe.

Judging from the number of rooms and beds, the population of this ancient village was estimated to be around 100 to 150, Wang said.

The buildings included one-room, one-bed room and one-living room, two-bed room and one-living room, and three-bed room and one-living room apartments, indicating the different social status of the villagers.

Archaeologists confirmed that these houses were built over several decades around 1200 BC.

Intact cooking ranges were also found at the ancient village.

Archaeologists with the Archaeological Research Institute under the CASS and Henan Provincial Cultural Heritage and Archaeological Research Institute have been excavating an area of 23,000 squares meters at Yinxu since April this year.

They excavated 380 tombs of different historical periods from the Shang Dynasty to Song Dynasty (960-1279), from which several thousand gold, bronze, iron, jade, stone, pottery, porcelain, bone, shell, lead and lacquer items were unearthed.

Also excavated from the tombs were 150 bronze weapons of the Shang Dynasty, including daggers, spears, swords, axes and arrowheads.

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