After the evidence of the Beringian hunter-gatherer culture to the north, there is some archaeological evidence that indicates that there were some glimmerings of a primitive agricultural culture in China in the late Paleolithic time period. By about 5000 BC they appear to have domesticated the pig and begun making coarse pottery. (The Arts of China, Munsterberg, 1972, p20) This distinct agri-culture most likely originated independently from Mesopotamia although it followed it by over a millennium. (Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia, 1997: China, history of) Different types of agriculture emerged in the northwest and southeast of China about the same time. (Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia, 1997: China, history of) Although the southeast was developing in its own way, it is to the northwest of China that historians look for the development of classical Chinese history.
ÒThen suddenly, at the very end of the Neolithic, É the hitherto seemingly empty land becomes teeming with busy life. Hundreds, not to say thousands of these villages occupy the terraces overlooking the valley bottoms. Many of these villages were surprisingly large and must have harbored a considerable population. Their inhabitants were hunters and stock raisers but at the same time agriculturists, .... The men were skilled carpenters and their women folk were clever at weaving and needlework. Their excellent ceramics, with few or no equals at that time, indicate that the then inhabitants of Honan and Kansu had developed a generally high standard of civilization. There must have been, by some means or other —new inventions or the introduction of new ideas from abroad – a rather sudden impetus that allowed the rapid spread of a fast growing population.Ó (JG Andersson, Researches into the Prehistory of the Chinese, 1943, Quoted from Encyclopedia Britannica: China 5-515c)
They call this culture the Yangshao Painted Pottery Culture after one of the early archaeological sites. The Yangshao culture of the Upper Yellow River in China reached its peak about 3000 BC. The dates of this first phase of the northern Chinese Neolithic period are roughly set at 5000-2500 BC, although the culture continued in isolated areas for thousands of years after their decline.
ÒThese early farmers employed primitive techniques of cultivation, shifted their villages as the soils became exhausted, and lived in semi-subterranean houses É Their hand-crafted, painted pottery occasionally bears a single incised sign that may be a forerunner of Chinese writing.Ó (Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia, 1997: China, history of)
Where does this Upper Yellow River culture come from? Overall Chinese historians prefer to see all of their development as indigenous, as uninfluenced by the ÔbarbarianÕ territories outside their perimeter. This supports their cultural view that China is the center of civilization. Many early European historians have postulated an early European influence, which supported their cultural bias that Europe was the center of civilization. The truth is probably in between. Let us look at some intriguing facts.
What does archaeology tell us? The Yangshao culture produced beautiful painted pottery, which was similar in design and motif to that of a distinct pottery culture spread throughout the Eurasian continent for 2000 years. The similarities of the pottery motifs to a Eurasian pottery culture, specifically Iran, make it seem as if the painted pottery was inspired from the outside the area rather than emerging locally from long held traditions.
ÒBoth the painted Yangshao and the black Longshan ceramics appear to have come to China from the west, where possible prototypes of similar shapes, ornamentation and techniques are widespread. In the case of the painted pottery, moreover, an apparent want of archaic forerunners, hence the phenomenon of sudden unfolding, make it almost necessary to think of outside stimuli. These may have come from Iran, where similar shapes of tripods, urns, and steamers occur É.Ó (Encyclopedia Britannica: China 5-516d)
Also
ÒBoth in shape and decoration these pots bear a striking resemblance to others found across the Eurasian land mass and as far away as the Crimea in the south of Russia and this indicates that people or at least ideas were free to travel across these enormous distances during Neolithic times.Ó (Chinese Art, MacKenzie, 1961 p23)
While the designs of the pottery are similar the inhabitants arenÕt. The inhabitants of the Yangshao culture of the upper Yellow River Valley are of Mongoloid stock (A Short History of Chinese Art, 1949, Hugh Munsterberg, Michigan State College Press, p.18), which rules out a direct European migration. While this supports the idea of indigenous development it doesnÕt explain the cultural similarities.
The Yangshao culture had many features that were common to the other Neolithic cultures that were spread throughout Eurasia.
ÒSome of the features of this Neolithic culture [the Yangshao] are common to all early civilizations and belong to a culture-complex that extends from the Nile Valley to Mesopotamia from the Indus Valley to the Tarim Basin, linked to China by the ÔCorridor of the SteppesÕ, a natural migration-route. In all these areas they developed the use of polished stone tools and of the bow and arrow, and the domestication of animals.Ó (The Arts of China by Michael Sullivan, University of California Press, 1973, p. 16)
On a more specific level, the similarities of this Ôculture complexÕ included painted pottery with similar designs. Because this pottery Ôculture complexÕ extended over such a wide area, it is thought that Neolithic communications must have been more widespread than would be expected by their more primitive forms of transportation.
ÒIt may be said, however, that an intercourse must have existed between these prehistoric pottery cultures, and that the trade and cultural contacts between Europe, the Near and the Far East must have been far closer than historical research had believed until recently.Ó (A Short History of Chinese Art, p. 7)
It has been speculated that these pottery cultures, which flourished all over the Eurasian continent from 4000 BC to 2000 BC could have had an earlier common source.
ÒWhat is more likely and just as plausible is that the prehistoric pottery cultures which flourished from the shores of the Black Sea to the Pacific Ocean during the 4th, 3rd, and 2nd millennium were derived from a common, earlier source. This theory would then explain the similar decorative motives as a common heritage of magic symbols which the various branches of the pottery culture were continuing with their own modifications.Ó (A Short History of Chinese Art, 1949, Hugh Munsterberg, Michigan State College Press, pp. 6-7)
The common source for all these pottery cultures was probably the Old European Culture found in Mesopotamia and Iran that preceded the Yangshao culture of China by 2000 years.
ÒCertainly, the early pottery culture of China owes much to that of the more ancient Mesopotamian and Iranian cultures. Highly developed by the fifth millennium BC, these cultures used forms and decorative motifs markedly similar to those found in Yangshao pieces of two thousand years later.Ó (The Arts of China, by Hugh Munsterberg, Charles E. Tuttle Company 1972, pp. 20-21)
ÒIn point of technique, shape and even to some extent in the motifs themselves, the Yangshao pottery may be remotely influenced by the art of western Asia, for the very similar painted red ware found at Anau in Russian Turkestan is at least one thousand to two thousand years older.Ó (The Arts of China, Sullivan, p 17)
ÒMany of these painted pots [of the Yangshao], in their designs, appear to be similar to the painted pottery of the Black Earth region north of the Black Sea. It has been suggested that the techniques and designs of this Chinese painted pottery were imported from the West to the plateau in China, and this is not impossible, as the pottery of the Anau region in the Black Earth belt is very much like that found in Northwest China.Ó (A History of Far Eastern Art, Sherman E. Lee, Prentise Hall Abrams, 1973, p. 24)
What features did this early culture have? According to Marija Gimbutas, a University of California archaeologist, the Old European Culture flourished between 7000 BCE - 3500 BCE. Based upon the wide number of feminine fertility figures found, it has been assumed that they worshipped Nature as a Mother in her feminine manifestation. It was a peaceful society based upon crafts, cooperation, and agriculture. The worship because of its tolerance had many different forms. This fertile time saw the domestication of animals, the development of weaving and pottery, and the development of larger communities. They settled around river valleys because of the fertile soils needed for agriculture. (Eisler, p 13)
Around 4000 BCE came the first of three waves of Kurgan invasions that destroyed this idyllic Goddess based society. The Kurgans were warlike herders coming from the mountainous areas on the fringes of these agricultural valleys, the Arid Band mentioned above. The citizens of these agricultural societies were either enslaved, became Kurganized, i.e. adopted a military mentality as a defense, or migrated. It was the migratory groups that we are concerned with because they were spreading the pottery culture into other geographical regions.
Speculations: Because of the invasions of nomadic invaders, the pottery culture was conquered and dispersed. Around 3500 BCE one group migrated west to the British Isles. (See paper on Scottish Ancestry II for the development of this theme and for a more in depth analysis of the Kurgan-Goddess dichotomy.) At the same time we will postulate that other groups moved east.
Until just recently the connection between the Near East of the Fertile Crescent and the Far East of China was minimized because of the lack of migratory evidence. But as of late they have found Caucasoid remains in the Tarim Basin that provides the missing link.
ÒRecent finds in the Tarim Basin of well-preserved corpses of Caucasoid people dating back 2,400 to 4,000 years suggest that Indo-Europeans were the earliest inhabitants of the region. They may have played a role in early transcontinental trade.Ó (1997 Grolier Interactive Inc.)
Furthermore evidence has been found showing that the route that connects China with the cultures of the Mediterranean via the grasslands of the Arid Band, i.e. the steppes of Central Asia, has been used relatively continuously since 10,000 BC. The Tarim Basin on the western end of this route is a logical stopping place for migratory groups from the west. This route is called the Silk Road because of its heavy use in transporting silk from China to Europe in historic times.
ÒThe Silk Road served both as a commercial bridge between East and West and as a conveyer of heterogeneous political, social, artistic, and religious customs and convictions, including Buddhism.Ó (Grolier Interactive: Silk Road, 1997)
Thus these inhabitants of the Old European Agri-culture migrated eastwards along the time-honored path to the east, settling finally in the Tarim Basin. From here their influence probably spread slowly eastward via the westernmost province of Kansu.
ÒIt appears more and more, as the evidence accumulates, that stimulus diffusion was carried on by one small area interacting with another small area. Areas had their center in points where water and soil resources provided ample sustenance for farming, and there were probably many such areas stretching in a broad belt from the borders of Turkestan to the Yellow River Basin. Southern Kansu was just one of these areas which balanced cultural growth with material resources and shaped a cultural form derived from older and neighboring cultures, which in turn stimulated the advancement of new traits farther to the east. É Taken as a whole there is no question that the Yangshao of Honan is an offshoot of Kansu and very likely of the phase represented at Ma Chia Yao. This is the only stage where Kansu and Honan can be correlated in so fine a fashion.Ó (The Origins of Oriental Civilization by Walter A Fairservis, Jr., The New American Library, 1959, pp. 109-110)
Hence it is likely that the Yangshao culture of the Honan province in the Upper Yellow River Valley, although Chinese, was influenced from settlements in the western province of Kansu, who were in turn perhaps influenced by Caucasoid cultures to their west, who were perhaps migrating eastward from Turkestan to escape the Kurgan invasion from the north.
While no evidence supports a European migration, it is possible that the Yangshao culture migrated in from the Mongolian plateau judging by the shape of their early dwellings, which seemed to be based upon the design of a nomadic tent.
ÒThe earliest inhabitants lived in round wattle-and-daub huts, each with reed roof and plaster floor and an oven in the center, the design perhaps copied from an earlier tent or yurt.Ó (The Arts of China, Sullivan, p16)
The Chinese throughout their long history have borrowed liberally from exterior cultures. While they have always preferred Chinese culture, insulating themselves from without, they have regularly copied foreign items, making them uniquely Chinese. The Yangshao culture could have been catalyzed by an external influence, which could have been merely an exposure, rather than either an invasion or migration. Hence the development could have occurred internally while being influenced externally.
Whether the upper Yellow River Valley agri-culture, the Yangshao, emerged from Chinese antecedents or came from the outside, doesnÕt matter. Whichever theory of origination is adopted is secondary to the fact that an agri-culture developed on terraced land above the upper Yellow River Valley in the northeast, the Pass, the Edge of Chaos. While probably catalyzed by influences from the west, their culture was further stimulated by the challenges of the Yellow River, combined with the challenges of living on the Edge of the nomadic zone.
They had many of the classical features of the Old European Culture. They seemed to be an egalitarian agricultural society with no evidence of social stratification. The society was based upon agriculture, not herding. Crafts and trade, not war and weapons, is the emphasis of this early Chinese culture.
Ò[In this Neolithic period in China] There is little evidence of warfare and there are indications of very far-ranging communications, for they shared their design motifs with other Neolithic peoples spread all across the Eurasian land mass, and they possessed cowrie shells which had come from some far distant southern seashore.Ó (Chinese Art, Finlay MacKenzie, Paul Hamlyn Ltd. 1961, p. 7)
The existence of the cowrie shells further connects the Yangshao with the Mediterranean cultures. The cowrie shell is not indigenous to Northern China but is to the Mediterranean. Further, as we shall see, it was used by many Neolithic cultures as a source of exchange. WeÕll return to these cowrie shells when we talk about symbolism.
Before moving on to the unique aspects of Yangshao culture, that differentiate it from other Neolithic culture and those that make it uniquely Chinese, we would like to discuss the specific pottery motifs that are universal to the Neolithic Eurasian pottery culture.
ÒThe decorative motives in question, such as the spiral, the triangle, the square, the lozenge, the cowry shell, dots resembling eyes, zig zags and wavy lines are not only common to all these early pottery cultures, but may be found on even later works such as the geometric pottery of Greece or the Chinese bronzes of Shang and Chou times.Ó (A Short History of Chinese Art, p. 7)
Hence these decorative motifs not only are universal to the pottery cultures of the Neolithic but also extend into historical times of the Shang and Chou dynasties of early China as well as the geometric pottery of the Greeks. This conglomerate of patterns connects these Neolithic cultures in an intimate way, as we shall see.
ÒBeatrice Goff, in her book on symbols of prehistoric Mesopotamia, shows many figures —wavy lines, circles, spirals, triangles, dots, crosses, plants, birds, fish, and weeping human faces— each having exact equivalents in the Neolithic ceramics of China. In short little doubt remains but that the prehistoric pottery culture of China is heavily indebted to the far more ancient civilization of Mesopotamia.Ó (The Arts of China, by Hugh Munsterberg, p. 21)
These Eurasian Neolithic Pottery cultures were separated by thousands of years and miles, but have similar cultures and pottery motifs. Why?
One explanation of the similarity in motifs of the pottery cultures in Eurasia is that they were simply coincidental. A second similar explanation would be that these patterns have universal human elements, which emerge from the human independent of outside influence. Because of the similarities of the motif complex, no historical account that was read presented either of these views. They all overwhelmingly affirmed that a cultural complex must have existed which produced similarities of the design motives in these pottery cultures of Eurasia.
Beginning with the widely accepted theory that there was some cultural connection in these pottery cultures, there are a few questions that need to be answered. How did the pottery culture spread? From where and to where did it spread? What similar design elements did they have? Were these design elements purely ornamental or did they have meaning? If they had meaning, what was it? How was this conclusion derived? And finally what does it tell us about the culture?
We have already posed answers to some of the questions. We suggested the pottery culture spread in a catalyzing fashion rather than as migratory wave. The early cultures were probably transformed by example rather than by foreign peoples. The agricultural pottery culture seems to have begun in Eastern Europe in Anatolia. This culture was dispersed eastward and westward due to nomadic invasions from the Great Arid Zone. We just mentioned the similar motifs.
Now we get to the heart of the matter. Were these motifs just pretty patterns or did they have a more symbolic meaning. It is unlikely that a motif complex would be maintained over 2000 years if it were just a pretty pattern. It seems more likely that these patterns have some kind of religious significance. This is confirmed by the fact that certain types of patterns, i.e. red bands flanked by small triangles, called the Ôdeath patternÕ by one scientist, were only found at burial sites (The Arts of China, by Hugh Munsterberg, p23), while others would only be found elsewhere. Because of the agricultural nature of the pottery cultures, it has been suggested that these motifs had to do with fertility.
Additionally and probably more significantly these patterns have connections with early Chinese ideographs. For example, the ancient Chinese ideograph for water employs the same wavy lines found on the pottery. (Munsterberg 1972, p 22) It is thought that the square may have represented the earth because the early Chinese character for a tilled field is in the form of a cross within a square. (A Short History of Chinese Art, p 14A) The spiral form is given a name in later Chinese art and is called the thunder pattern.
ÒFound also in later Chinese art, the spiral is known as the lei wen, or thunder pattern. Again, the character for thunder in archaic Chinese script resembles this spiral, Standing for thunder, storm clouds and rain, it also represents fertility.Ó (Munsterberg, p 23)
Thus in the give and take, the ancient Chinese ideographs give us the idea of what these symbols might have meant to the Neolithic pottery culture and we also realize that these patterns and motifs were one of the forerunners of written language. Hence we see that the Neolithic probably planted the seeds for written language in their pottery motifs. These motifs were not just pretty patterns but instead were symbolic in nature, reflecting an agricultural culture based around fertility.
It is thought that the triangle represents woman because it is used in the stick figures of women and is used as the symbol for woman in many widespread cultures. This universal use of the triangle to represent the woman in unrelated cultures contributes to the possible independent emergence theory, but it is only one motif of a complex. Take the two dots appearing together. It is not known what they mean but by visual appearance alone they seem to represent the watchful eyes of their god or goddess. This is not a universal symbol.
Another symbol that is not a universal symbol to the globe, but finds a universalism in the Eurasian continent is the cowrie shell and its connected representations.
ÒOf these motives the one which even the most skeptical archaeologists have accepted as symbolic in nature is the cowry shell which we know was used as money in those early civilizations. Reproductions of such shells have been found in graves of prehistoric China suggesting beyond any doubt that they had a special significance, and both realistic and quite abstract representations have been found on Yangshao pottery, sometimes filling a prominent position on the side of the vessel, and sometimes appearing as one of several motives, The symbolism of this shell may well have been twofold, for not only was it a symbol of material wealth due to its use as currency, but it might also have indicated fertility because of its resemblance to the vulva. This latter interpretation seems even more likely when we consider that phallic symbols of black pottery were found at prehistoric grave sites.Ó (A Short History of Chinese Art, 1949, Hugh Munsterberg, Michigan State College Press, p 8)
Connected with the cowrie shell was the lozenge shape, which was also prevalent.
ÒThe lozenge-shaped forms enclosing the water symbols are another symbolic motif, sometimes said to represent the cowry shell and sometimes the female vulva. These were symbols of the related concepts of abundance and fecundity.Ó (Munsterberg, p 23)
The Old European pottery culture, which seems to be the source for the rest, seems to have been a fertility oriented society based upon the abundance of female fertility figures discovered there. Although we find no fertility figures in China we do find these cowrie shells, which are common to these fertility-oriented societies[1]. In addition to finding representations of them on urns at Yangshao sites we have also found cowrie shells themselves.
ÒOn many urns there are simplified representations of cowrie shells which have been found in the sites of the Yangshao culture.Ó (A History of Far Eastern Art, Sherman E. Lee, Prentise Hall Abrams, 1973 p24)). Cowrie shells are not native to the Yellow River but Òcome from some far distant southern seashore.Ó (Chinese Art, Finlay MacKenzie, Paul Hamlyn Ltd. 1961, p. 7) Let it be pointed out that these cowrie shells had such cultural durability that they are also found into the historical Shang culture of China, which existed a few thousand years later. (A Short History of Chinese Art, 1949, Hugh Munsterberg, Michigan State College Press, p.18)
Let us now look a little more carefully at the Yangshao culture. We will attempt to differentiate out its specifically Chinese elements from its more universal Neolithic elements.
ÒMany of hundreds of similar communities sprang up in the loess country and in adjoining regions to the south and east; from the name of one of the villages, these people later came to be known collectively as the Yangshao culture. For all their similarities, these communities nevertheless enjoyed a certain amount of individualization. Styles of pottery, and perhaps local customs, varied considerably from place to place. É Yet a common framework sustained them all: an agriculture based on millet and swine and a settled way of life on upland terraces overlooking the valley of the Yellow River and its tributary streams.Ó(TimeFrame 3000-1500 BC, The Age of God-Kings, Time-Life Books, 1987, p. 147)
This unique Neolithic culture was based around millet and swine. Like the Khorat culture to the south, there was not a centralized government, no temples, and a great amount of individualization.
Banpo, located on a tributary of the Yellow River, was somewhat typical.
ÒOne well- known Yangshao Neolithic site, is Banpo (Pan-p'o), a village east of Xi'an (Sian) with four levels of Neolithic society (6080-5600 BC)É the villagers of Banpo raised millet, hunted, fished, kept pigs and domesticated dogs, adorned their pottery with fish, animal, and plant designs, and used bone needles, weaving shuttles, and small-stone spinning wheels. Their partially sunken mud-brick houses were grouped in clusters suggesting kinship units.Ó (Grolier Interactive Inc., Chinese archaeology: Neolithic in China ©1997)
And:
ÒThe village covered about twelve acres on a terrace overlooking the river. The houses were bunched together in a central compound of a 12 acre area, surrounded with a large ditch—for drainage, defense, or both.Ó (The Age of God Kings, p 146)
A few features of Chinese society are already in evidence at this early date. The small villages were centered around a common gathering spot.[2] This centrally located town hall eventually became a Taoist temple. This was a feature of Chinese villages up until the 20th century, when the Communists dismantled these community centers as a threat to their centralization of society. How sad.
The second feature is that of insulating themselves from the outside world. The defensive aspect of these ditches makes sense, in that there is evidence that certain of these villages were destroyed, presumably by nomadic outsiders. There is no evidence of weaponry in the Yangshao communities, except the normal agricultural implements, which could be used in defense in the case of an attack.
One other feature of this society worth noting was the building of houses below the ground level. This was probably quite easy in soft loess, providing some shelter from the elements. This style of house is seen in the peasantry of Northern China up until modern times. (The Arts of China, by Michael Sullivan, University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1973, p 27)
Remember that the Yangshao culture was an individualized, egalitarian agricultural society based around millet and swine with lots of beautiful painted pottery and small centralized villages. We have spent a lot of words setting up this society in order to provide a contrast with the cultures to come.
After this flowering of culture, it goes through a decline based upon the painted pottery. First it is good, then it degenerates, and finally disappears.
ÒField observations made in the upper Wei valley by WC PÕei in 1947 tended to show that the ceramic wares in the many prehistoric sites of the at area – the main route from Kansu to Honan– suggest three stages, early, middle, and late characterized by painted pottery first of good style, then of degenerate style and finally by the utter decay and disappearance of the painted pottery.Ó (Encyclopedia Britannica: China 5-515c)
This is a classic pattern that also occurred in Europe a few thousand years before – a flowering of culture based upon the crafts in an agricultural society followed by the degeneration of their crafts. This degeneration of craft culture occurs subsequent to invasions from nomadic cultures living on the perimeter of the agri-culture. This is confirmed by the fact that this decline of the Yangshao culture occurred simultaneously with the rise of the following cultures.
ÒThe third and last phase of Yangshao pottery culture É the vessels are coarser and the forms and designs are less attractive. The symbols are generally the same but have lost something of the earlier expressive power. Later phases of pottery culture followed this last phase of the Yangshao, but these were uninteresting as art works. The forms of these wares are weak. The painted designs are carelessly executed and no longer related to surface contours. Certainly by this time the superior bronze culture of the Shang dynasty had displaced Neolithic ceramic culture in all but the outlying backward regions.Ó (Munsterberg, Charles E. Tuttle Company 1972, p 24)
Which invading culture dominated the Yangshao, causing its decline?
[1]Let us point out that although a Goddess was probably worshipped in these Eurasian pottery cultures, this did not mean that women were in charge. There is very little indication of social stratification. In fact, when stratification occurs, it almost always puts the male in charge. This seems to be a universal theme worldwide.
[2]This type of village arrangement was similar to the ones found in western Scotland in Neolithic times. Coincidence or not? Who knows?