Subsequently, archaeologists unearthed a large number of relics and relics on this site with a total area of only 6.5438+0.4 million square meters. For a time, this small mountain village, which was originally silent and nameless, became the most concerned place in the cultural relics field of the whole country and even the world. In the repeated excavation for more than 20 years, a large number of precious cultural relics and relics have been unearthed one after another.
In the Museum of Cishan Ruins, there are many pits, round, oval and rectangular. Archaeologists say that these seemingly ordinary pits are not dug by people at will, and some pits are "ash pits", where ancestors dumped garbage; Some pits have steps and hard surfaces at the bottom, which are the foundation of semi-crypt thatched houses; And those rectangular pits as deep as several meters are the "pits" for ancestors to store food.
According to the data, since the excavation of the Cishan site, more than 4,000 relics such as stone tools, pottery and bones have been excavated. Among these relics, there are mainly stone mills used to peel grain and stone sticks similar to stone mallets, as well as pottery pots and brackets used for cooking. Among them, the surface of the stone mill was smooth, and after beating or polishing, some of them had enough foundation, so the workmanship at that time was very fine.
Archaeological research shows that the site of Cishan is the remains of human beings entering the Neolithic Age, about 7000 years ago. At that time, the ancestors had ended their nomadic life of "living on aquatic plants" and settled down relatively stably, forming a lifestyle mainly based on planting millet, supplemented by gathering, fishing and hunting. The ancestors of this period could make stone grinders and handmade pottery, and their bone needles were not much bigger than steel needles. In this "primitive village", there are not only domestic pigs and dogs, but also domestic chickens and walnuts.
Cishan site represents the cultural outlook after the early and middle Neolithic period, and fills a blank in the cultural research of Neolithic period in China. Because of its typical representative significance, it was defined as "magnetic mountain culture" by the archaeological community, and was designated as a national key cultural relics protection unit in 1988. During the excavation, a strange phenomenon puzzled many archaeologists. On such a small website, there are dozens of "combinations" that regularly put labor tools together. These "compositions" are mostly composed of stone mills, stone sticks, stone shovels, stone axes, clay pots and supports. Generally, there are four pieces in each group, and they are placed in groups according to the production tools (stone shovels, axes, etc.). ), threshing tools (stone mill, etc. ) and cookware (clay pot bracket, etc.). ), and the order is very obvious. This is very rare in other Neolithic sites in China.
At first, some experts speculated that the site might be the tomb of ancestors, and this "composition" was a funerary object. However, after several years of exploration, trial excavation and investigation on the periphery of the site, no traces of human bones and funeral were found. Instead, a large number of bird bones, animal bones and even small fish bones were found.
Some experts think it may be a primitive residential area or a food processing place according to the characteristics of "composition". But they also failed to find the corresponding evidence, because no so-called residential area was found here, only two houses were excavated. In addition, if it is a grain processing place or a production and labor place, each pit should have corresponding activity space, but in fact, the area occupied by each group of "composition" is very small, and some are less than two square meters.
With the passage of time, some experts and scholars boldly put forward the possibility that these "components" are relics deliberately piled up by our ancestors according to certain thought and habit formats, which are specially used to "sacrifice" the soul or sacrifice.
"In any case, they didn't find sufficient and accurate evidence for their views." Han Lintai, a local archaeologist, believed that the site of Cishan should have been a primitive village at that time. On March 20 10, the staff of magnetic mountain culture Museum found some white massive objects with plant particles attached to their surfaces from a collapsed cultural layer, which experts thought might be ancient "flour". China Academy of Sciences is making further identification of this strange substance.
Are these strange white things millet, millet flour, starch or white ash? Through the inspection and analysis of the surface attachments and their cultural layers, the cultural relics department believes that the white blocky objects are found for the first time and well preserved, which is probably starch substances thousands of years ago, that is, the earliest flour of human beings.
After collection and arrangement, magnetic mountain culture Museum collected about 250 grams of white blocky objects. On March 4th, 20 10, the staff bagged and sealed all these items, mailed some samples to the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and invited relevant experts to do further tests through laboratory tests. Cishan is the birthplace of millet. In the past world agricultural history, millet has always been thought to have spread from Egypt and India. However, with the discovery of the Cishan site, this "conclusion" was rewritten.
Archaeologists agree through scientific appraisal that as early as 7000 years ago, Cishan ancestors began to plant drought-tolerant crops, millet, and achieved quite high yield.
Archaeologists found 189 "pits" for grain storage at the site of Cishan. These "granaries" are shaped like bags, and the diameter of pits is mostly 1-2 meters, with different depths. The shallowest is only 0.85 meters, and the deepest is 5 meters. A local archaeologist lamented that the local soil is extremely sticky, which can be said to be "wet and hard, and it can't be dug without being wet and dry". The ancestors dug so many pits several meters deep with only polished stone axes and shovels, and their perseverance and labor intensity were unimaginable.
Han Lintai, an archaeologist who participated in the excavation at that time, told reporters that when the "pit" was presented to the world, people couldn't help but be surprised: there were a lot of "millet ashes" piled up inside. At first, they were gray-green, but after a while they turned into white ashes. In some decaying ash fragments, the carbonized round millet can be directly seen by the naked eye.
In order to identify the composition of these grains, the digger went to Beijing twice, but could not find a suitable preservation method, and the specimens magically turned into dust after arriving at the destination. Finally, archaeologists in Beijing identified the specimens by the "gray image method" and thought that the people in Cishan at that time ate "millet", which was the earliest discovery in the history of artificially planting millet today.
While the archaeologists are rejoicing, a rather puzzling problem is also in front of them. Because the "millet ash" in these pits is generally 0.2-2 meters thick, with 10 even reaching more than 2 meters. According to the specific gravity and volume, this 189 granary should store at least 50,000 kilograms of millet. Under the crude production conditions at that time, it was almost unimaginable to have so much food left.
For a time, experts put forward various speculations about this large-scale "granary": it may be that agricultural production at that time had reached a high level, and there was some surplus besides enough food; Maybe it's a grain seed stored by a tribe. Before sowing, a major natural disaster happened, and all the people fled their homes.
Some people think that this place may be the place where ancestors sacrificed to the "Five Grains God". In order to pray for a bumper harvest, they offered the best grain to the gods. At the same time, some scholars questioned whether the cellar after the experiment was a "granary". They think that some "pits" are extremely narrow and it is difficult for people to enter, so how did those ancestors take and put grain?
In the face of external confusion, local villagers have their own explanations. They believe that this is the place where the legendary "Shennong" lived, and hundreds of caves were the "Shennong granary" at that time. In the site of Cishan, in addition to finding a large number of stone tools, pottery and accumulated "millet ash", archaeologists also unearthed more bird bones. Whether these bird bones came from domesticated early domestic chickens is also considered as an important mystery in magnetic mountain culture.
According to tradition, domestic chickens originated in India around 2000 BC. However, experts compared the bird bones in the Cishan site with the modern bird bones in beijing museum of natural history, and found that they were different from the modern chicken bones. Bones are similar in shape and size. Therefore, they think that the bird bones unearthed in Cishan are most likely to belong to chickens, or they may be domesticated early domestic chickens.
Experts who support this statement also put forward the following facts: First, at that time, agriculture in Cishan had made great progress, and there was a surplus of grain, which provided certain material conditions for raising poultry; Secondly, according to the research of modern zoologists, domestic chickens were domesticated from original chickens, and the distribution of ancient original chickens in China has included the northern and central plains regions.
However, some experts and scholars have put forward different views on this. They think that similarity does not mean the same.
In addition, when studying the bird bone specimens in Cishan, we also found a very interesting question: What is the tarsal structure of Cishan "domestic chicken"? Bones are all men except one woman.
What does the emergence of a large number of male "domestic chickens" represent? Did the ancestors deliberately choose the rooster because of the need of some religious ceremony? Did our ancestors, like modern people, leave only the chickens that laid eggs and kill all the extra cocks? Is it the hunter's selective killing of pheasants? At present, no one can find relevant clues and evidence.
However, if the bird bones found in Cishan are indeed the bones of domestic chickens, then the domestication of domestic chickens in China can be traced back to 5400 BC, more than 3000 years earlier than that in India. The history and culture of any period should have its background. As the only archaeological culture named after the place names of our province, "magnetic mountain culture" is called mysterious culture because of its origin and why those ancestors suddenly "vanished", which still puzzles many experts and scholars.
For this problem, some experts believe that because there is no Neolithic cultural site in the Central Plains earlier than the Cishan site, the origin of this culture will certainly be difficult to trace back. Yangshao culture, which was discovered before, is separated from magnetic mountain culture for thousands of years. So far, the archaeological community has not found the inevitable connection and connection between them.
Qiao, director of Handan Cultural Relics Protection Institute and an archaeological expert, said: "The main reason for many questions is that people's lifestyles, folk customs and the shape and structure of houses were very different from those of today, so it is difficult for people to imagine and find conclusive evidence to verify their authenticity." . He believes that with the continuous development of archaeological work, these "mysteries" will find reasonable answers.
According to the latest news, Mr. Guo Xiaoliang, an international industrial group of Hong Kong Shennong (Yan Di), pointed out through the study of the invasion era that some ancestors of farming civilization in Cishan, Hebei Province, went to Taihang Mountain in the west after being destroyed by the invasion, merged with local aborigines, and began to grow grains and taste medicinal materials in Taihang Mountain area. Pottery is an invention of China people and a great contribution to world civilization. Most of the pottery unearthed from Cishan site is sand pottery, and a few are clay, all of which are handmade and mainly plain. Among the unearthed pottery, there are round-bottomed pots, three-legged pots and almsgiving-shaped ding. Among them, the pottery group composed of pottery pots and pottery brackets is unique and most representative. Stone tools unearthed from the site include hammering stone tools, grinding stone tools and grinding stone tools. The main shapes are millstones, grinding rods, axes, shovels, chisels, hoes and sickles. Among them, millstones and grinding rods are food processing tools, which have great archaeological value.
The pottery of Cishan site is mainly red pottery with sand, with low temperature, rough texture and simple surface. Pottery is mostly made of clay strips with irregular shapes. There are rope patterns, weave patterns, grate patterns and breast nail patterns on the surface of pottery. There are oval clay pots, shoe-shaped brackets, pots, bowls and so on.
Judging from the specimens and a large number of artifacts unearthed from the Cishan site, as early as 7000 years ago, there was a relatively developed agriculture in the eastern foot of Taihang Mountain in southern Hebei Province. At that time, the level of productivity had been divorced from the primary stage of agricultural economy, and quite a few people had engaged in special manual labor. Primitive manual labor has become an important part of primitive agriculture, fishing and hunting, gathering, production and life. The rich connotation of magnetic mountain culture site provides a new important link for studying and exploring the early Neolithic culture in China.