The Shang ÔMiddle KingdomÕ was centered between the two Neolithic cultures that preceded it. We find remains of the Shang directly on top of the Longshan and Yangshao cultures, as if these indigenous cultures were supplanted by conquering.[1] If the Shang came conquering, they stayed and did not return home. If they were just a dominant local ruling house, then they built their structures on top of the locations of the preceding cultures.
Where did this Shang culture come from? As we shall see, there are so many similarities between the bronze cultures of the Fertile Crescent and the Shang dynasty, which came later, that initially it was thought that branches of the nomadic chariot and bronze cultures of the Near East had somehow crossed the Arid Band to conquer China. Following is a typical example of this scenario.
ÒSome time about 1700 BC É the armies of Shang burst over the horizons of this peaceful [Yangshao] Neolithic world. The great lords rode in clanking horse-drawn chariots armed and armored with bronze. The warriors were equipped with bronze dagger-axes, battle axes and spears and with the powerful compound bow reinforced with horn.Ó[2]
The evidence seemed overwhelming. The early Shang finds, at a later stage in their development, showed striking similarities with the Middle Eastern cultures. They had the same bronze military technology based upon chariots and bronze weaponry.
Furthermore many of the symbols were the same. Although there is much dispute, especially from the Chinese archaeologists, regarding the origination of the animal motifs, there is one motif, the intertwined serpents, which is found in tombs at Anyang of the Shang dynasty, which seems certainly of Mesopotamian origin.
ÒOne of the motifs which the Chinese archaeologist, Li Chi, points out as being particularly significant in this context is that of intertwined snakes, like the caduceus of Mercury. É This device, which we find at Ur and Lagash in Mesopotamia, is found at An-yang in the tombs of the Shang kings and is interpreted by Li Chi as an importation.Ó[3]
Besides the aforementioned bronze military technology, possibly the patriarchy, tumulus graves and the worship of heavenly bodies also came from the nomadic cultures of Central Asia.
ÒBy the second millennium BC [the Chinese] were being influenced by the north-western Ôproto-turkicÕ peoples, who bridged the huge empty spaces between them and the cultures of Central and Western Asia, and who brought to China itself a patriarchal nomadism, horses and horse-sacrifice, the worship of the heavenly bodies, tumulus graves, and the use of earthen drums.Ó[4]
The Shang also brought both the patriarchal empire with a warrior king at the top and sacrifice to the gods.
The political organization of the Shang Kingdom started with the emperor at the top of the hierarchical pyramid, similar to the other military cultures of Western Asia. His role was similar to the leader of a tribe. He was responsible for the welfare of his subjects. His performance of the ceremonies supposedly insured the assistance of the ancestors in the day-to-day lives of the subjects. He, at the pinnacle of political power, was responsible for the fertility of the fields and the race.
ÒThe type of political organization employed by the Shang people was monarchy in which the king also served as a high priest whose function it was to placate and accommodate the spirits and thereby to insure the fertility of the field and the fecundity of the race. The feudal system of the Chou period had probably not yet developed to its full extent.Ó[5]
It was the leaders who spoke to the gods and ancestors through their own medium for the good of the tribe. The sacrificial ceremonies were to catch the attention of oneÕs ancestor so that he would help out in oneÕs day-to day affairs
Shang Ti, the Supreme Ancestor of the Shang, also had to be appeased by elaborate sacrificial rites.[6] These elaborate sacrificial rites were only for the royal family at first. Eventually the clans began participating in elaborate ritual ceremonies for their own ancestors, possibly in emulation of the imperial government, or maybe an extension of the ancestor worship of the Longshan.
Their supreme god, Shang Ti, presumably needed ritual sacrifice to appease his needs, as did many of the ancient gods, especially those associated with the Middle East. It is possible that Ti, as a supreme god, was imported into China from the Near East and then given a Chinese context by being turned into the Supreme Ancestor. This was another reason that foreign invasion was suspected.
The Chinese have a history of importing foreign gods and religions and then making them their own. This includes Buddhism, which becomes Zen under the influence of Taoism. Also Kuan Yin. In historical times Kuan Yin started out in India as a male Bodhisattva of Compassion in Buddhist mythology. The Chinese merged this compassionate Bodhisattva with their fertility goddess and turned him into a her, Kuan Yin.
Also, the oracle bones revealed that the Shang would request that their ancestors intercede upon their behalf with Shang Ti. Their ancestors who had been their protectors for so long were now summoned as Ôliaison withÕ or Ôprotector againstÕ the invading Shang god.
ÒAided by a priestly class, the Shang kings prayed to their ancestral spirits to intercede on their behalf with the most powerful of the Shang gods, Shangdi (Shang-ti), to bring rain for good crops and other blessings. Records of these priestly divinations have survived in the form of oracle bones.Ó[7]
It was typical of conquering cultures to reserve leadership for their own kind. Normally they would institutionalize their leadership through a patriarchal dynastic succession. This occurred all over the Eurasiafrican land mass, from Egypt to England to China and in-between. As usual throughout the Eurasian continent the craft oriented earth goddess based Neolithic culture was supplanted by the warlike sky god based Bronze Age culture. The fine pottery of the Neolithic is replaced by bronze weaponry. As weÕve seen, population pressures upon the different cultures resulted in the militarization of culture. This created a military society, which glorified the Warrior at the expense of the Artist and Craftsperson.
While the egalitarian agri-cultures were supplanted by the patriarchal military cultures, the Neolithic cultures did not become extinct as is so often suggested but instead went underground to be passed around in mystery cults, for fear of persecution by the warlike establishment.
One of the themes of this book is that Taoism has its roots in the fertility cults of the forest and agri-cultures that preceded the militarization of culture that accompanies the formation of civilization. This is exhibited by both the imagery and intention of Taoism. Later in this paper we will examine the content of Taoism connecting it with the nature-worshipping fertility cultures that preceded the militaristic warrior cultures.
While Imperial China from Shang times on participated in the culture of the warrior aristocracy, the subculture of the populace was rooted in the preceding fertility-based cultures. As an example of this type of melding, the European farming populace still celebrates rites that hark back to their Neolithic agri-cultures. Similarly the Chinese also had a bi-polar culture. This bi-polar culture developed during the Shang.
The Shang dynasty had the same bronze military technology that was used in the Middle East to dominate Neolithic agricultures. They had many of the same rituals and symbols, as did the West Asian cultures. The Shang accomplishments seemed to spring full-blown without development and followed similar trends in the west by centuries. All the preliminary evidence pointed to the theory that a Bronze Age culture to the west had invaded China and been absorbed by her. Certainly there are historical precedents for this. The Mongols in this millennium conquered China, ruled her for a few centuries, and were deposed, leaving few traces.
Nobody holds the view that the Shang was a Bronze Age civilization invading from the West anymore. For one the Shang did not acquire the military technology that included the chariot and bronze weaponry until a few hundred years into their reign. While there is an incredible similarity between the Shang and the cultures of the Near East, there is also contrary evidence indicating an indigenous origination of the Shang.
For one the Shang peoples were the same racial stock as the Neolithic cultures that they supposedly conquered.
ÒThe earliest evidence yet discovered shows them to be a group of bronze owning aristocrats living off the agricultural labors of their serfs and slaves. É They spent their time in hunting, warfare and elaborate ceremonial. É Their skeletal remains show that the Shang were not racially different from the Neolithic tribes people whom they conquered and enslaved.Ó[8]
Racially the Shang were Mongoloids, like the preceding Yangshao and Longshan cultures. The Shang bones are indistinguishable from the Longshan. The Shang were not invaders from the Middle East. In addition to racial similarities, the Shang also shared cultural similarities with the Yangshao and Longshan cultures.
ÒAs even the earliest inhabitants of China belonged to the Mongolian race, we may assume that the Shang people who were also Mongolians were racially akin to the people of the Prehistoric pottery cultures. In addition to that, the Shang civilization shows many common cultural traits such as the use of cowry shellsÓ[9]
As we saw the Shang were probably in many ways a continuation of the Longshan culture, with many cultural traits in common, including divination from bone cracks, ancestor worship, and a patriarchy. Additionally one of the primary Chinese shapes, the empty legged tripod, the li, the Shang share with both the Yangshao and Longshan cultures.
ÒThe li tripod found in all three native cultures, testifies to their close relationships and is of some significance in the development of later Chinese Bronze Age culture.Ó[10]
The li tripod is also found in southern Manchuria, indicating the close relation between the Chinese and areas to the north. As an opposition, the li tripod is also found in southern China, but without the hollow legs, which make it such a useful design. It seems as if the form might have been copied without an awareness of the function.
Additional similarities are found in the use of the rectangular or semi-lunar knife, which is unique to the Mongoloid peoples by both the Longshan and Shang. Finally the Longshan and Shang both used pounded earth for construction.
Further both Yangshao and Longshan culture continue in the borderlands of the empire even unto the later centuries of the Chou dynasty.
ÒThe persistence of older cultures in isolated enclaves and in the border regions, the survival of the gray pottery, the continued use of Yangshao and Longshan shapes for vessels, and of oracle bones and jade ritual artifacts all suggest a large measure of continuity between the prehistoric culture and that of Shang China.Ó[11]
The continuity of culture between the Shang and the earlier cultures of China negates the possibility of a large-scale invasion from the West via Central Asia. Nobody holds the theory of western invasion anymore.
ÒThe last Neolithic culture of North China was the direct ancestor of the Shang dynasty (c.1600-c.1027 BC), which in part also drew upon the Neolithic cultures of western and eastern China. The Shang dynasty did not arise, it now seems, as a result of contact with the ancient Near East, as some scholars have contended. Known from several sites, most importantly Anyang and Zhengzhou (Cheng-chou), the emergence of the Shang civilization marked the first appearance of writing, bronze metallurgy, monumental architecture, and a genuinely urban way of life in China.Ó[12]
What are the implications of an indigenous origination? Sketching a rough scenario: first the Yangshao emerged in the upper Yellow River with their craft-oriented egalitarian agri-culture. A little later the Longshan culture emerges on the lower Yellow River with a distinctly different culture based upon herding animals, fortified cities, evidence of social stratification, warfare and ancestor worship. From between these two cultures, the middle of the Yellow River, i.e. the Middle Kingdom, emerges a third culture, the Shang. The Shang culture evolves from the Longshan and Yangshao cultures into the first Chinese civilization, developing all sorts of great things, including writing and cities, and some other things.
This view tends to validate the process of artistic Neolithic to the military Bronze as an emergent sequence. In other words the implication is that humans as they populate and progress ÔnaturallyÕ evolve into a hierarchical social form with the male-warrior at the top and the female-mother at the bottom.
As we saw in our previous discussion this transition, while indeed universal, seems to be external rather than internal. The internal pressures of increasing population and wealth in an egalitarian agri-culture do not inevitably lead to a military aristocracy based upon war. Instead the external pressures of warlike cultures militarize and stratify the agri-cultures to resist domination or extermination. If indeed the Shang emerged from the Longshan, which emerged from the Yangshao, it would be one of the only examples of a Bronze Age culture emerging from a Neolithic culture, internally. Neither the Sumerian, nor the Indian, nor the Egyptian cultures, emerged internally from agri-cultures. Instead these cultures stratified in combat with foreign cultures. The stratified society only evolved as an effective social strategy after a relatively peaceful agri-culture had been dominated, conquered or threatened by nomadic cultures on their boundaries.
External, internal? WhatÕs the difference? The result is the same, a stratified military culture. It seems that the difference is slight, but the implications are huge. If warrior cultures are indeed a natural emergent phenomenon resulting from expanding populations and resource shortages, then the human race is in bad shape because population pressures and resource shortages are a given. If however warrior cultures are instead a result of cultural wars then there is hope.
If we perceive ourselves as part of the collective human race, rather than black, yellow, red, or brown race; if we view ourselves as Earthlings, rather than as Americans, Europeans, Africans or Asians; if we collectively have respect for the diversity of manifestation of the divinity, rather than being Jew, Christian, Moslem, Buddhist, or Taoist; if we perceive ourselves as belonging to the same class, rather than upper, middle, or lower class, aristocracy, bourgeois, proletariat, or literati; if we perceive ourselves as human beings rather than male or female; then and only then can the militarization of society with its inherent social stratification ever be defused. And only if this military dominator mentality is diminished is there any hope for long-term survival upon the planet Earth by our species. The chances are slim either way.
One of the similarities that was shared between the Longshan and Shang cultures was ancestor worship. While there is evidence that both cultures practiced ancestor worship, there was a great difference in its manifestation culturally which was to have long-term effects. Further this difference was probably an internal emergent process rather than of external influence. Let us talk a little about the difference between the Longshan and the Shang in their ancestor worship. We have no written evidence of what was really going on during the Longshan. Thus again we are speculating in order to set up an important differentiation.
During the idealized Longshan, the country had broken up into a clan structure. Each family was centered in a certain area, not unlike Scotland in medieval times. Presumably these clans might have a loose allegiance to other clans, but all in all their first allegiance was to their own clan. Like the Scottish clans, these clans were continually at war with each other. It is easy to imagine the beginnings of ancestor worship in this smaller clan structure. This ancestor worship would bind the clan together and inspire the living members to superhuman feats to honor their ancestors.
These clans, loosely bond and constantly fighting, would not have been able to effectively consolidate to deal with the constant flooding of the Yellow River. Thus under the indigenous origination theory, one of the clans would have risen to prominence and leadership in order to deal with this collective problem. This marked the beginning of the Chinese state.
Because of the prominence of this clan, over the centuries their clan would achieve prominence. Their supreme ancestor would come to be worshipped as a god. The Shang called this supreme ancestor Shang Ti.
There was a big difference between Shang Ti and the individual ancestors of the local clans. While the power of the individual ancestors primarily lay within the individual clan and their dealings, Shang Ti was the supreme ancestor of the Imperial dynasty. Thus ancestor worship under the Shang was transformed into state worship instead of family worship.
As in Scotland so in China clan loyalties led to problems down the line. The First Emperor in the third century BC, as we shall see, attempted to destroy these family clans as a hindrance to the unity of the state just as did the King of England attempt to destroy the clan structure in Scotland in the 18th century as a threat to internal security of England.
Thus while there was a certain continuity between the ancestor worship of the Longshan and Shang, it manifested in quite different ways. In the Longshan it stayed focused upon individual families, while in the Shang the ancestor worship transformed into the beginning of state worship. This emphasis upon honoring ancestry with ceremonies, eventually led to an obsession with history, i.e. family, city, state history that is typically Chinese.
WeÕve seen that there is much evidence that suggests that the Shang emerged from the pre-existing Neolithic agri-cultures especially the ÔBlack PotteryÕ Longshan culture. Furthermore weÕve seen that while ancestor worship linked the Longshan and Shang culturally that they manifested very differently. While the Longshan ancestor worship was localized in individual family clans, the Shang ancestor worship became linked with the Imperial government. Family and government while linked had fundamentally different goals.
[1]A Short History of Chinese Art, 1949, Hugh Munsterberg, Michigan State College Press p18
[2] Chinese Art, MacKenzie, 1961 p 8
[3] A History of Far Eastern Art, p 28
[4] The Arts of China by Michael Sullivan, University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1973, p 24
[5] A Short History of Chinese Art, Munsterberg, p22
[6] The Arts of China by Michael Sullivan p26
[7]©1997 Grolier Interactive Inc. China, History of: Shang Dynasty
[8] Chinese Art, MacKenzie, 1961 p.8
[9]A Short History of Chinese Art, 1949, Hugh Munsterberg, Michigan State College Press, p.18
[10] A History of Far Eastern Art, Sherman E. Lee, Prentise Hall Abrams, 1973 p 25
[11] Munsterberg, 1972 p 38
[12]Grolier 1997 Chinese archaeology: Bronze Age China