Traveling through 9,000 years, the distant "bone" flute plays the stars and sparks of civilization

"What sound does this flute make when it is played?" Recently, the reporter went to the Jiahu Site Museum in Wuyang County, Luohe City. When someone tried to play a flute-shaped cultural creation, the sound of the flute seemed to be telling a grand ceremony more than 8,000 years ago. In the silence, the tribe leader pressed the seventh hole of the bone flute. The sounds of wind, water, reeds and cranes all worked together. The high-pitched music cut through the night sky. The tortoise shell bells rang with the rhythm of the dance. The tribesmen prayed for the protection of the gods and for a good harvest...

Today, let us walk into this paradise where the sound of flutes can be heard, and see how the spark of Chinese civilization was ignited on this land over a period of 1,500 years, between 9,000 and 7,500 years ago.

Eleven "world's best" ignites literary fire

Speaking of Jiahu, the first thing that comes to many people’s mind is the Jiahu bone flute.

Perhaps in order to imitate the cry of a crane and attract prey, or perhaps to pray to the heavens and express their inner thoughts, the ancestors of Jiahu took the crane's ulna, sawed it, drilled it, and trimmed it into an artifact, completing a bold attempt and an amazing creation.

Jiahu bone flute.

"Nearly 50 bone flutes have been unearthed from the Jiahu site, most of which have seven holes. Some of them can play a complete seven-tone scale. Before that, people generally believed that China only had a pentatonic scale in the pre-Qin period." Zhang Juzhong, a professor at the University of Science and Technology of China, has presided over the excavation of the Jiahu site seven times. In 1986, he personally witnessed the discovery of the first bone flute. "The discovery of the Jiahu bone flute has effectively overturned the Chinese 'theory that the flute originated in the West' and the 'theory that the seven-tone scale originated from abroad'. It is also recognized as the world's earliest musical instrument that can play the seven-tone scale."

There is a huge world inside this small bone flute, which has rewritten the history of Chinese and world music.

But the "best" of Jiahu is far more than just the bone flute.

Eleven "world's best" created by Jiahu culture.

During the interview, Kang Guotao, the tour guide of the Jiahu Site Museum, enumerated the eleven "world's best" created by the Jiahu culture: the earliest artificial fish breeding behavior, one of the earliest livestock domestication sites, one of the earliest origins of rice farming, the earliest "wine", one of the earliest origins of the textile industry, the earliest tripod-shaped vessel, the earliest seven-tone musical instrument, one of the earliest origins of primitive religion and divination, one of the earliest prototypes of writing - engraved symbols, the earliest turquoise ornaments, and the earliest origin of artificially cultivated soybeans.

Kang Guotao said, "These 'world's best' provide rare archaeological evidence in the study of the social form, culture and art, production level, ecological environment, agricultural and animal husbandry development, and civilization development level in the early Neolithic period of the origin of China's civilization."

The creators of Jiahu culture were not only excellent hunters, fishermen and craftsmen, the earliest farmers in China, but also excellent musicians. Jiahu culture is the first cultural relic with a definite period of record in the long history of the Chinese nation, and it is also the first threshold for mankind to move from ignorance to civilization.

Today, we can still feel the warmth of the lives of the ancestors of Jiahu and see the stumbling steps of mankind's childhood.

9,000 years have passed, but the life we ​​yearn for is the same

"What is the picture of the life of the people of Jiahu? How do they fill their stomachs? What do they keep company with?" In the words of Kang Guotao, the word "abundant" is enough to describe it.

In the exhibition area, you can see various types of pottery.

In Jiahu Village, you can see all kinds of pottery inlaid on the walls everywhere, such as tripods, cauldrons, steamers, pots, bowls, etc. They seem to still be emitting the heat of life. The ancestors stored the rice, fruits, honey and other foods they could not finish eating in pottery pots and placed them in the cool tree holes. After the baptism of time and temperature, the earliest wine in the world was born, intoxicating day after day.

"The site is the key to our understanding of the past," said Kang Guotao. Archaeologists used flotation to find thousands of carbonized rice grains in some house foundations and ash pit fill samples at the Jiahu site, and more than 80% of them are clearly different from wild rice. In addition, agricultural production tools such as stone shovels for turning the soil, stone sickles for harvesting, stone millstones and stone millstones for processing were also unearthed at the Jiahu site, forming a complete chain of physical evidence from farming to harvesting to grain processing.

During the long period of 1,500 years, the ancestors of Jiahu built houses, hunted and gathered, domesticated livestock, made pottery, cultivated rice, made nets to catch fish, spun yarn and wove cloth, and brewed fine wine... It was precisely because of the surplus of grain and the abundant resources that the ancestors of Jiahu turned this land into a contented "land of fish and rice".

"The emergence of primitive farming and animal husbandry has rewritten the relationship between humans and nature. Humans have shifted from completely relying on and adapting to nature to trying to utilize and transform nature, and the livelihood economy has gradually begun to transform from an extractive economy to a production economy." Kang Guotao said that the Jiahu area is low-lying and has abundant water resources. Large tracts of wetlands, vast grasslands, and naturally grown wild rice provide an excellent environmental foundation for the development of farming and animal husbandry. This marks that the ancestors of Jiahu have taken an extremely important step in the historical process of transition from the fishing and hunting era to the farming era.

On the land that the ancestors of Jiahu once cultivated, sorghum is facing the breeze and waiting for the harvest season, growing new hope. Even though 9,000 years have passed, we can still see the sunrise and sunset, sowing and harvesting at that time.

The carved symbols record the childhood philosophical thoughts of mankind about the world

"Why do the sun, moon and stars rise and fall? Why are wind, frost and lightning so unpredictable?" Faced with the ever-changing nature, humans learn to explore the mysteries of the world in awe and awe. The smart Jiahu ancestors observed everything they came into contact with, and developed the concept that all things have spirits, a sense of primitive worship, and engraved the surprises they gained into the strokes of "one" and "two".

"Various archaeological evidences show that based on rich material life, the ancestors of Jiahu have built a colorful spiritual culture." Kang Guotao said that with music, decorations, engraved symbols and religious sacrifices, the life of the ancestors of Jiahu was not at all a poor and boring primitive scene.

"Tombs are the most direct path to the spiritual world of the Jiahu ancestors." According to reports, 17 carved symbols were found on tortoise shells, bone tools, stone tools, pottery and other artifacts unearthed from the Jiahu site. Carbon-14 dating shows that they are about 8,000 years old, more than 4,000 years earlier than the oracle bone inscriptions of Yinxu, and are one of the earliest known prototypes of writing. Kang Guotao said, "The sun pattern symbols among these carved symbols reflect the observation, cognition and primitive worship of the sun by the Jiahu ancestors."

"In the process of observing the world, the ancestors of Jiahu accumulated a lot of experience and acquired preliminary scientific knowledge, which not only provided rich resources for their production and life, but also elevated their understanding of the objective world to a new level." Kang Guotao said that as one of the "100 Major Archaeological Discoveries in China in the 20th Century" and one of the "Top 100 Archaeological Discoveries in China in the Past 100 Years", the Jiahu site fully displays the highest achievements of material and spiritual culture during the transition period from hunting and gathering to stable agricultural production between 9,000 and 7,500 years ago.

Aerial view of the Jiahu Ruins Museum.

Looking down at the Jiahu Ruins Museum from the air, one can see a series of unique circular buildings arranged in an orderly manner and connected by corridors, resembling a drop of water falling into the dust. 9,000 years of culture continues here, echoing the times.