Page 80 - The Golden Age of Chinese Archaeology: Celebrated Discoveries from the People’s Republic of China

Aerial view of the female
spirit temple at Niuheliang,
Jianping, Liaoning province;
Hongshan culture.

numerous stone tombs and a few stone altars. The three other localities comprise the female
spirit temple, a pyramid-shaped artificial hill (constructed of pounded earth and covered with
stone) that occupies a surface area of 10,000 square meters, and a stone structure foundation.
Excavations at four of the localities (2, 3, 5, and 16) have brought to light sixty-one tombs

constructed of stone and covered by stone mounds; these comprise five basic types: large cen-
tral tombs, stepped tombs, Type A tombs, Type B tombs, and auxiliary tombs. They are distin-
guished by their form, their size, their placement above or below ground, and by the presence
(or absence) of artifacts made of particular materials—principally jade and pottery. Type B
tombs and auxiliary tombs generally contain no artifacts; large central tombs and stepped
tombs do not include pottery objects. Of the tombs excavated thus far, thirty-one contained
burial objects, and the specific material of the artifacts assigned to the graves seems to have
had a particular, albeit unknown, significance. Most often, the burial objects were jade (twenty-
six graves); one grave contained jades and objects made of stone, three graves contained pot-
tery alone, and only one grave contained both jades and pottery. 11
Stone artifacts used by the Hongshan people reveal aspects of their economic life. Tools
fall into three categories defined by the manufacturing technique: chipped and unpolished
tools, microlithic pieces, and polished implements; the types normally reflect the developmen-
tal sequence, although they were produced and employed by the Hongshan people concur-
rently. Agricultural implements were large and simple, suited to basic farming; tools for hunting
were carefully manufactured. 12
Relatively thin deposits of cultural remains suggest that the Hongshan people moved

more frequently than would a community whose economic basis was entirely agricultural, and
the abundance of wild and domestic animal bones recovered from Hongshan sites strengthens
this inference. They were not, however, a wholly transient community: six kilns have been found
thus far, yielding various types of painted and unpainted pottery that the reflect influence of
13
northeastern Chinese and Asian cultures as well as the Yangshao culture. The Hongshan cul-
ture was based in a region that falls between steppe and agricultural zones; it was a transitional
society, poised between steppe and farming cultures. By the late period, the Hongshan culture

79 H O N C S H A N C U L T U R E