Page 522 - The Golden Age of Chinese Archaeology: Celebrated Discoveries from the People’s Republic of China

the relationship and chronology of Neolithic cultures in five regions of China, which were
raised by Professor Su Bingqi.

1. In the area of the Huashan Mountains and the Wei River (including regions southwest
of Shanxi province and northwest of Henan province), the sequence of Neolithic cultures is
as follows:
Laoguantai -> Banpo -> Xiyin -> Phase IV of Banpo -> Phase II of Quanhu ->
/ Keshengzhuang
Phase II of Miaodigou ,
* Sanliqiao
Objects in the exhibition from the Yangshao culture comprise pottery of the Banpo cul-
ture, the Xiyin culture, or a period of transition between the two (cats. 1-4). The Xiyin culture
(c. 4000-3400 BCE), the cultural apogee of this sequence, occupied a region bounded by the
present-day province of Qinghai in the west, the bend of the Yellow River in the north, Hebei
province in the east, and the northwestern part of Hubei province to the south, but its influ-
ence radiated beyond these borders. The Xiyin culture comprised several regional subcultures:

around 3300-3200 BCE, in its core area, it developed into what is known as Phase IV of the
Banpo culture; in other areas, working from west to east, it developed into the Majiayao culture,
the culture represented by the Caiyanzi site, the Miaodigou culture (cat. 5), the Yijing culture,
the Qinwangzai culture, the Dasikong culture, and several other cultures. These, in turn, spun
off into distinct cultures of their own: the Majiayao culture, for example, developed into the
Banshan culture and then into the Manchang culture; the culture of the Caiyuanzi site devel-
oped into the Qijia culture.
2. In the areas of the lower reaches of the Yellow River and the Huang-Huai Plain, the
sequence of Neolithic cultures is as follows:
Houli -> Beixin -*• Phase I of Hougang -*• Dawenkou -> Longshan
Several objects in this exhibition are associated with this sequence. The pottery zun urn (cat.
23) is representative of the Dawenkou culture; the Shandong Longshan culture is represented
by a jade hair ornament from Zhufeng (cat. 24). Six artifacts from Taosi in Shanxi province
(cats. 25-28) represent Phase II of the Miaodigou culture, which constitutes the earlier of two
phases of the culture that inhabited Taosi; objects from the later phase are difficult to match
with those of any known culture.
The Dawenkou culture falls into three phases, the Liulin phase, the Huating phase, and
the Xixiahou phase, the dates of which correspond roughly to those of the Xiyin culture, Phase
IV of the Banpo culture and Phase II of the Quanhu culture, and Phase II of the Miaodigou

culture, respectively. Phase I of the Hougang culture grew out of the Houli-Beixin cultures and
probably the Cishan culture as well, and was roughly contemporaneous with the Banpo culture.
At its peak, Phase I of the Hougang culture was widely distributed in the Huabei Plain of north-
ern China, and penetrated as far as the bend of the Yellow River and the Danjiang River area in

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