Unsolved mystery! This ancient Chinese city 4,000 years ago was built with jade walls?

On the loess ridge of Mao (mǎo) on the north bank of the Tuwei River, a first-level tributary of the Yellow River, in Gaojiabao Town, Shenmu City, Shaanxi Province, stands a large-scale stone city called Shimao , which is about 4,000 years old.

Before the official archaeological excavation of Shimao, there was a saying that the jade artifacts of Shimao were sandwiched in the cracks of the city wall . Many people who had only seen the jade artifacts unearthed in Shimao were skeptical, because the jade artifacts there were only one or two millimeters thin. Wouldn't such thin jade be crushed if it was sandwiched in the wall?

Why hide the jade in the wall?

However, the facts are beyond doubt. Archaeologists discovered a jade shovel "inserted" parallel to the cracks in the stone in the wall of the outer urn city of Shimao. The space between it and the stone walls on both sides was filled with grass mixed with mud. In other words, this jade artifact was intentionally pressed into the wall during the construction of the outer urn wall. Moreover, this jade shovel is not an isolated case. In subsequent archaeological excavations, a large number of jade artifacts found in the city wall also confirmed this.

Image source: Shimao Museum

Archaeologists named this phenomenon "hiding jade in the wall". You can see it with your own eyes in the newly opened Shimao National Archaeological Site Park, and there is also a special section in the Shimao Museum to introduce this phenomenon in Shimao culture.

In the eyes of experts, the phenomenon of "hiding jade in the wall" is extremely special.

First of all, the concept and practice of using jade in Shimao is very different from other regions. Due to the rarity of high-quality jade materials, jade has always been a top luxury item in ancient times. For example, in the Liangzhu culture, which was earlier than Shimao, jade occupied a unique and prominent historical position, integrating divine power, royal power, and military power. The Liangzhu ancestors designed a jade ritual system centered on cong, bi, and yue to distinguish classes, identify identities, and reflect levels around the worship of gods.

After the outer city wall of Shimao was washed away by rain, a jade axe in very good condition was exposed.

In contrast, it is very rare to find jade in the city walls of Shimao. Jade is mostly found in sacrifices and high-ranking noble tombs. Jade is not necessarily found in the tombs of many ordinary people in later generations, but the Shimao people 4,000 years ago actually used it extensively in city construction.

Secondly, the Shimao people would repeatedly modify jade . From the jade excavated from the Shimao wall, archaeologists also found that modifying jade was a common phenomenon here, which led to the complexity of the Shimao jade system. A typical example is a jade shovel collected by the Shaanxi History Museum. The jade shovel is flat and long, with many inscribed lines on both sides, which is very similar to the multi-section jade cong of the Liangzhu culture. It is obviously modified from the jade cong.

Jade shovel from Shimao culture

The jade cong is a typical artifact of the Liangzhu culture in the prehistoric area around Taihu Lake. It was regarded as a belief by the Liangzhu people and used to worship heaven and earth. Such a heavy artifact was cut into thin slices in Shimao. The Shimao people only took the outer side of the jade cong, removed the inner curved part, changed it into a slice, and pressed it into the wall.

If these modified jade congs are really from Liangzhu, it would be very interesting. Jade congs have been unearthed in many places outside the Liangzhu cultural center, but only a few have been found in Shimao. Liangzhu culture and Shimao culture are two civilizations that have grown and declined. Did the Shimao people do this to violently destroy the beliefs of other ethnic groups, or was it just out of their preference for sheet jade?

Third, the source and processing technology of these jades are also quite noteworthy . The area of ​​Shimao archaeological excavation is only the tip of the iceberg of the entire Shimao city, and thousands of jade artifacts have been unearthed. It is conceivable that the amount of jade required for the construction of the entire Shimao city is extraordinary. You know, mass production of jade is either local or imported. But so far, no local jade mine resources have been found in northern Shaanxi.

Liangzhu culture jade cong-shaped tube. Source: Shimao Museum

If it was imported from other places, luxury goods production, material mining, trade, transportation, processing and other matters would be a huge project in prehistoric times. The "hiding jade in the wall" not only shows the strong power of the Shimao Kingdom, but also implies the frequency and smoothness of the prehistoric cultural exchange network.

In addition, the processing technology of jade artifacts at the Shimao site is far beyond the imagination of modern people . The thinnest part of the re-cut jade artifact is only 0.03 cm. From the cross-section, it is speculated that the ancients used slice cutting technology, which is still time-consuming and laborious even now. Many large artifacts at Shimao are also very thin, which is related to the lack of jade materials and is closely related to the advanced jade processing technology at that time. It is a pity that no jade processing tools have been found in the archaeological excavation of the Shimao site.

Yumen Yaotai, a pile of sacred objects?

The phenomenon of "hiding jade in the wall" is puzzling. What is the profound meaning of the Shimao people doing this?

At this point, we must mention two other features of the Shimao Kingdom: one is the recognizable large stone sculptures on the city walls, and the other is the discovery of human heads laying the foundation at the base of the walls and under the city gates. These three features, plus the unattainable layout of the royal city with layers of protection, show that the people of Shimao had a spiritual expectation for their city walls .

Head Pit

Some ancient Chinese tribes worshipped jade as a sacred object, and the Shimao people may have been one of them. In ancient Chinese mythology, "Yaotai" is the residence of the gods, and "Yumen" is the gate for the gods to enter and exit, both of which are built with beautiful jade.

It is recorded in the historical book "Bamboo Annals" that Xia Jie, the last ruler of the Xia Dynasty, once imitated the treatment of gods by "building the Qing Palace, decorating the Yaotai, making the Qiongshi, and setting up the Yumen". However, the so-called jade buildings in the real world are not made entirely of jade. Instead, jade objects can only be built into buildings like Shimao in the hope of warding off evil spirits and enemies.

In addition to the jade pieces, there are also a large number of broken sheep bones in the walls of Shimao. Could they be just carriers of witchcraft to protect the walls? We don't know. Further conclusions need more evidence to support them.

Shimao Stone Sculpture

Another possibility is that it was influenced by the culture of northern nomadic peoples, who had the habit of building sacred objects of small tribes into city walls as spiritual sustenance.

Scholars have conducted physical anthropological analysis on 104 skulls unearthed from the sacrificial pit at the east gate of the outer city of Shimao and the Houyangwan site. The skulls in the sacrificial pit at the east gate of the outer city are mostly of middle-aged people, and their racial characteristics are highly consistent with the indigenous residents along the Great Wall of Inner Mongolia. The trauma on these skulls indicates that the Shimao people may have fought frequently with the people in the area for resources, and this is just a small window to peek into the Shimao Kingdom being "surrounded by wolves". Shimao may have completed cultural exchange and integration in frequent wars.

The long history of jade culture

Chinese jade culture has a long history, and Shimao culture occupies a unique historical position. We cannot view jade artifacts in prehistoric times with today's concept of "jade and jadeite". In that period, jade artifacts were the material carrier and symbol of Chinese spiritual civilization and even institutional civilization , playing a multi-faceted role in beautifying the body, connecting heaven and earth, building order, worshiping people and gods, symbolizing power, showing status, representing wealth, and containing ideas.
"Jade is also a divine object, and it was used by a holy ruler." The general meaning is that jade, which was regarded as a divine object, was used by a holy person like Huangdi to show his ruling power. In the Liangzhu culture, jade was a symbol of divine power, royal power and military power, and this meaning was widely spread for a long time; in the Shimao culture, "hiding jade in the wall" added a spiritual barrier or other different cultural connotations to jade; in later generations, jade came down from the altar, walked out of the royal family, entered the homes of ordinary people, and became the spiritual symbol of the Chinese people.

Imperial City Terrace

With the continuous efforts of archaeologists, the meaning of jade has become more vivid and real. As the famous Chinese sociologist Fei Xiaotong said: Our archaeological community is using the study of jade as a starting point to explain the meaning of jade in Chinese culture from a deeper level, and deeply combining the study of archaeology with the study of spiritual civilization.

References

[1]Xu Feng. Preliminary comparison of archaeological discoveries in Shimao and Taosi[J]. Cultural and Museum Studies, 2014(01):18-22+69.

[2] CCTV News. "Exploring Ancient China" Jade Records: Jade Shines in the Ancient Country

[3] Sun Zhouyong: The 4,000-year-old Shimao Ancient City, a shining star in the literary sky on the eve of the Xia Dynasty

[4] Chen Liang, Xiong Jianxue, Shao Jing, et al. Study on skulls unearthed from the sacrificial pit of Shimao City Site in Shenmu, Shaanxi Province [J]. Archaeology and Cultural Relics, 2016(04):134-142

[5] Sun Zhouyong, Shao Jing, Di Nan. A review of archaeological discoveries and research at the Shimao site[J]. Central Plains Cultural Relics, 2020(01):39-62

Planning and production

This article is a work of Science Popularization China-Starry Sky Project

Produced by: Science Popularization Department of China Association for Science and Technology

Producer: China Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd., Beijing Zhongke Xinghe Culture Media Co., Ltd.

Author: Yong Qian, Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology (Shaanxi Archaeological Museum)

Reviewer: Wang Hongzhi, Associate Professor, School of Humanities, Shanghai Normal University

Planning丨Xu Lai

Editor: Cao Ruiyinuo