Jiangzhai is a large early Yangshao (Neolithic) village located in Lingtong District, about four kilometers (2.5 miles) from Xi'an and the famous (and much later) Tomb of Shihuangdi. Jiangzhai is the most extensively excavated and reported early Yangshao settlement to date.
The village was situated on a low terrace above the Lin River, providing the residents with ready access to favorable agriculture and some protection from floods. The site covers an area of approximately 1.7 hectares (4 acres), with five phases of prehistoric occupation. Middle Neolithic Yangshao sequences between 5000-2800 BC. Early )5000-4000 BC), Middle (4000-3500 BC) and Late (3500-2800 BC) occupations are all in evidence at the site.
Radiocarbon dates from the oldest phase (called Banpo) securely date this occupation between 4994 and 4451 calendar years BC (cal BC).
Site Features
The central part of the site consists of an open plaza containing two animal pens and two likely manure sheds. A constructed road surface runs through the central plaza. The next ring out from the center is a residential zone consisting of semi-subterranean above-ground structures, all of which open towards the center. The third ring is a ditch with gaps between the segments for passageway. Outside the ditch are three discrete cemeteries, with pit and urn burials, traditional in Banpo sites. Population estimates for the village are between 100 and 300.
Jiangzhai's Banpo occupation includes a total of at least 100 structures arranged around a central plaza in a pattern of concentric circles. The houses are timber-framed and insulated by wattle and daub, with thatched roofs supported by wooden columns: some support columns were placed atop stone foundations. All of the structures were single-story, one-room buildings: low earthen platforms were constructed within the largest buildings, presumably as benches or beds. Most houses have an internal hearth.
Almost 300 storage pits, some with evidence of having been reused to dispose trash, have been identified, and a large number of outdoor hearths were located between the houses. Five clusters of buildings appear to represent residential sectors, each sector marked by a single large structure surrounded by between 10 and 20 smaller ones, possibly clan or family groups.
Living at Jiangzhai
Jiangzhai's residents cultivated foxtail millet, and kept domestic pigs, chickens and dogs. It is apparent from stable isotope investigations that millet was also part of the diet of the pigs and chickens. Stone tools include a large number of axes, which suggests to excavators that they were shifting (or slash-and-burn) horticulturalists.
Workshops for bone, horn, ceramic and shell tools, leather working, wood working and textile manufacture have been identified at the site. Nearly 1,000 intact or nearly intact pottery vessels and over 1 million pottery sherds were recovered during the excavations.
Four Banpo-phase pottery kilns were identified outside the village to the northeast, and two more within residential sectors. Many of the vessels were decorated with painted abstract signs before they were fired. Similar signs have been found at other Banpo sites such as Banpo. Scholars are divided as to the meaning of these signs, whether they represent clan emblems or potter signatures.
Two formal cemeteries were located to the east of the residential area, separated from the village by a shallow, narrow ditch. Approximately 175 pit burials have been excavated from this cemetery, most containing a single adult interment. Another 200 urn burials are of infants and young children, buried within the formal cemetery or found interspersed within the residential area.
Archaeology
Extensive excavations at Jiangzhai were conducted between 1972 and 1979 under the supervision of the Xi'an Banpo museum. Yun K. Lee's 2007 article on Jiangzhai is a fascinating study of the concentric rings and possible connections to the social organization of the society.
Sources
This glossary entry is a part of the About.com guide to the Neolithic, and the Dictionary of Archaeology.
Lee YK. 2007. Centripetal settlement and segmentary social formation of the Banpo tradition. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 26:630–675.
Pechenkina EA, Ambrose SH, Xiaolin M, and Benfer J, Robert A. 2005. Reconstructing northern Chinese Neolithic subsistence practices by isotopic analysis. Journal of Archaeological Science 32(8):1176-1189.
Peterson CE, and Shelach G. 2012. Jiangzhai: Social and economic organization of a Middle Neolithic Chinese village. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 31(3):265-301.
Yang, X. 2002. Banpo Site at Xi'an and Jiangzhai Site at Lintong, Shaanxi Province. Chinese Archaeology in the Twentieth Century: New Perspectives on China's Past. Volume 2: 51-52.
