The Pengtoushan culture was a
Neolithic
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several pa ...
culture located around the central
Yangtze River
The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest river in Asia, the third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains (Tibetan Plateau) and flows ...
region in northwestern
Hunan
Hunan (, ; ) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the South Central China region. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangx ...
province,
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...
. It dates to around 7500–6100 BC, and was roughly contemporaneous with the
Peiligang culture
The Peiligang culture was a Neolithic culture in the Yi-Luo river basin (in modern Henan Province, China) that existed from 7000 to 5000 BC. Over 100 sites have been identified with the Peiligang culture, nearly all of them in a fairly comp ...
to the north. It is named after the
type site
In archaeology, a type site is the site used to define a particular archaeological culture or other typological unit, which is often named after it. For example, discoveries at La Tène and Hallstatt led scholars to divide the European Iron A ...
at Pengtoushan.
Sites
Pengtoushan, located in
Li County, Hunan
Li County, or Lixian () is a county in Hunan Province, China, it is under the administration of the prefecture-level city of Changde. The County is located on the north in Hunan Province, it borders to the north by Songzi City and Gong'an Count ...
, is the type site for the Pengtoushan culture. Excavated in 1988, Pengtoushan has been difficult to date accurately, with a large variability in dates ranging from 9000 BC to 5500 BC.
Cord-marked pottery
Cord-marked pottery or Cordmarked pottery is an early form of a simple earthenware pottery made in precontact villages. It allowed food to be stored and cooked over fire. Cord-marked pottery varied slightly around the world, depending upon the cla ...
was discovered among the burial goods.
Another important site is
Bashidang
Bashidang () was the site of a Neolithic Yangtze River settlement in Lixian County, Hunan, China. Bashidang is considered to be a very late site of the Pengtoushan culture. The site is the earliest in China to feature both a wall and a ditch; th ...
, also in Li County, belonging to the late stage of the Pengtoushan culture. It features a wall and a ditch, as well as a star-shaped platform.
Rice cultivation
Rice residues at Pengtoushan have been
carbon dated
Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon.
The method was dev ...
to 8200–7800 BC, showing that rice had been domesticated by this time. At later stages, pots containing grains of rice were also dated to approximately 5800 BC. By 4000 BC, evidence of rice domestication in the region is abundant in the form of bone and wooden spades, as well as pottery. The rice grains at Pengtoushan are larger than naturally occurring
wild rice
Wild rice, also called manoomin, Canada rice, Indian rice, or water oats, is any of four species of grasses that form the genus ''Zizania'', and the grain that can be harvested from them. The grain was historically gathered and eaten in both ...
. Large amounts of rice grains have also been found at Bashidang.
Gallery
File:Bone spade. Bashidang site. Hunan Museum.jpg, Remains of a bone spade from the Bashidang
Bashidang () was the site of a Neolithic Yangtze River settlement in Lixian County, Hunan, China. Bashidang is considered to be a very late site of the Pengtoushan culture. The site is the earliest in China to feature both a wall and a ditch; th ...
site
File:Guan jar. Pengtoushan culture. Hunan Provincial Museum.jpg, Reconstructed vessel
File:Support. Pengtoushan culture. Hunan Provincial Museum.jpg, Reconstructed leg of a vessel
See also
*
List of Neolithic cultures of China
This is a list of Neolithic cultures of China that have been unearthed by archaeologists. They are sorted in chronological order from earliest to latest and are followed by a schematic visualization of these cultures.
It would seem that the def ...
*
Daxi culture
The Daxi culture (5000–3300 BC) was a Neolithic culture centered in the Three Gorges region around the middle Yangtze, China. The culture ranged from western Hubei to eastern Sichuan and the Pearl River Delta. The site at Daxi, located in the Qut ...
*
Qujialing culture
The Qujialing culture (3400–2600 BC) was a Neolithic civilisation centered primarily on the middle Yangtze River region in Hubei and Hunan, China. The culture succeeded the Daxi culture and reached southern Shaanxi, northern Jiangxi and southwes ...
*
Nanzhuangtou
Nanzhuangtou (, ''Nánzhuāngtóu''), dated to 12,600–11,300 cal BPKuzmin, Yaroslav V"Chronology of the earliest pottery in East Asia: progress and pitfalls" ANTIQUITY-OXFORD- 80, no. 308 (2006): 362. or 11,500–11,000 cal BP,Xiaoyan Yang, Zhiwe ...
Footnotes
References
*
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pengtoushan
History of Hunan
Neolithic cultures of China
Major National Historical and Cultural Sites in Hunan
8th-millennium BC establishments