The Ancient City Wall of the Chengtoushan Ruin

Chengtoushan () was a

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

settlement located on the northwestern edge of

Dongting Lake Dongting Lake () is a large, shallow lake in northeastern Hunan Province, China. It is a flood basin of the Yangtze River, so its volume depends on the season. The provinces of Hubei and Hunan are named after their location relative to the la ...

in Li County,

Hunan Hunan is an inland Provinces of China, province in Central China. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the Administrative divisions of China, province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangxi to the east, Gu ...

, China. The site is at the village of Chengtoushan, Chengtoushan Town, Li County, it is about northwest of the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...

and north of the Li River. The Front Gate of The Chengtoushan Ruin

The site contains one of the earliest dated

rice Rice is a cereal grain and in its Domestication, domesticated form is the staple food of over half of the world's population, particularly in Asia and Africa. Rice is the seed of the grass species ''Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice)—or, much l ...

paddies in the world (dating from 4500 to 3000 BC). The settlement spanned three separate cultures: the

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 Qu ...

, the Qujialing culture and the Shijiahe culture. The site was abandoned around the middle period of the Shijiahe culture. Chengtoushan was a round settlement surrounded by a

moat A moat is a deep, broad ditch dug around a castle, fortification, building, or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. Moats can be dry or filled with water. In some places, moats evolved into more extensive water d ...

and

rammed earth Rammed earth is a technique for construction, constructing foundations, floors, and walls using compacted natural raw materials such as soil, earth, chalk, Lime (material), lime, or gravel. It is an ancient method that has been revived recently ...

wall A wall is a structure and a surface that defines an area; carries a load; provides security, shelter, or soundproofing; or serves a decorative purpose. There are various types of walls, including border barriers between countries, brick wal ...

, which was first built during the

. The remains of human sacrifices were discovered under the foundation of the wall. The remains of a gravel road, a river bridge and a river-control gate were also discovered at Chengtoushan. It is possibly one of the oldest walled sites in China, with the walls and moat built around 4000 BC, where it existed for two millennia. The earliest known examples of fired

bricks A brick is a type of construction material used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a unit primarily composed of clay. But is now also used informally to denote building u ...

were discovered at Chengtoushan, dating to around 4400 BC. These bricks were made of red clay, which was obtained by digging into the

loess A loess (, ; from ) is a clastic rock, clastic, predominantly silt-sized sediment that is formed by the accumulation of wind-blown dust. Ten percent of Earth's land area is covered by loesses or similar deposition (geology), deposits. A loess ...

strata. They were fired on all sides to above 600 °C, and used as flooring for houses. By the Qujialing period (3300 BC), fired bricks were being used to pave roads and as building foundations at Chengtoushan.

Notes

References

* Allan, Sarah (ed.), ''The Formation of Chinese Civilization: An Archaeological Perspective'', * Higham, Charles, ''The Bronze Age of Southeast Asia'', * Stark, Miriam T. (ed.), ''Archaeology of Asia'', 2006, {{DEFAULTSORT:Chengtoushan Li County, Hunan National archaeological parks of China Former populated places in China Major National Historical and Cultural Sites in Hunan 1979 archaeological discoveries