Liangzhu Cultural Ruins

Liangzhu Cultural Ruins

The Liangzhu Cultural Ruins are a National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

Distributed across Liangzhu, Anxi, and Pingyao towns in Yuhang County, on the northern outskirts of Hangzhou.

In 1936 (the 25th year of the Republic of China), Shi Xingeng from the West Lake Museum first discovered the ruins in Liangzhu Town and authored and published the book *Liangzhu*. In 1955, the Zhejiang Provincial Cultural Relics Management Committee unearthed a large number of black pottery artifacts near Zhucun Village in Liangzhu Town; in 1956, excavations at the Qianshanyang site in Wuxing achieved breakthroughs in stratigraphy. In 1959, archaeologist Xia Nai formally proposed the naming of the “Liangzhu Culture” at the Yangtze River Cultural Relics and Archaeology Team Leaders Meeting. Carbon-14 dating indicates it dates back approximately 4,000–5,000 years. This is an important ancient culture of the late Neolithic period in the Taihu Lake Basin of the lower Yangtze River in China. Excavations in the 1960s at Qiucheng in Wuxing, Shuitianfan in Hangzhou, Songze and Maqiao in Qingpu County, Shanghai, Fulin in Songjiang, Yuecheng in Jiangsu, and Meiyang in Wujiang, among other sites, confirmed that the Liangzhu Culture was mainly distributed in the lower Yangtze region and the Taihu Lake Basin, extending eastward to the coast and northwest to areas such as Zhenjiang and Changzhou in Jiangsu. The Liangzhu Culture evolved from the Majiabang Culture through the development of the Songze Culture. A defining feature of the Liangzhu Culture is its primitive agrarian society centered around rice cultivation. The production tools of the time were primarily finely polished stone axes, stone adzes, stone chisels, stone sickles, stone plows, and soil-breaking implements, with agriculture already quite advanced—mainly rice cultivation, which had evolved from hoe farming to plow farming. Fishing and hunting played a secondary role, alongside mulberry and hemp cultivation, sericulture, lacquerware production, jade craftsmanship, and relatively developed water transport. Early household vessels were mainly gray pottery, while black-glazed pottery became prevalent in later periods. These were wheel-thrown, with surfaces either polished smooth or adorned with carved decorative patterns. Major vessel types included tripods, pots, jars, and beans, with distinctive features seen in tripod cauldrons with fish-fin, conical, or T-shaped feet made of sandy clay, as well as ring-handled pots and bamboo-jointed, perforated black-glazed pottery beans. Jade artifact production techniques reached an extremely high level, with a wide variety of forms and pioneering innovations in ancient Chinese jade culture. The late Liangzhu Culture period marked the transition from primitive society to a class-based society, holding immense value for the study of Chinese civilization.

In the mid-1980s, 11 large Liangzhu Culture tombs were excavated at Fanshan in Pingyao, unearthing 1,226 funerary objects (sets), serving as a burial ground exclusively for nobility of the time. The grave goods were abundant and exquisitely crafted, featuring numerous intricately carved jade artifacts, unprecedented and drawing worldwide attention. The jades were divided into ritual jades, primarily including cong, bi, and yue, as well as decorative jades for wearing, such as rings, tubes, pendants, beads, belt hooks, and three-pronged, crown-shaped, or plaque ornaments. All surfaces were polished, with some featuring shallow relief, semi-round carving, or openwork to create intricate or simple patterns. The compositions were rigorous, harmoniously symmetrical, and rich in symbolism. Tomb 12 yielded a 6.5-kilogram "King of Cong," with minute carvings on the four vertical slots depicting composite human-deity faces wearing feathered headdresses, hands on hips, and legs bent in a crouching posture. The image is majestic and solemn, with lines as fine as hair, representing the “divine emblem” worshipped by the Liangzhu people. Later, 12 large tombs and one altar were discovered on Yao Mountain in Anxi Town, unearthing 1,052 precious cultural relics (sets). The altar remains are located atop Yao Mountain, roughly square-shaped with sides about 20 meters long, consisting of a red earth platform, gray earth moat, and stone ridges. Twelve rectangular vertical pit tombs aligned north-south were found on the northern and southern sides of the altar, cutting through the red earth platform, gray earth moat, and gravel surface, indicating their use as a communal burial site after the altar was abandoned. The grave goods can be broadly divided into four categories: pottery, lacquerware, stoneware, and jade, with jade accounting for over 90%, especially notable for various ritual and decorative jades. The types and levels of complexity of deity-animal face motifs largely match those found in the Fanshan Liangzhu Culture tombs. Among them, the jade dragon-headed bracelets, huang ornaments, and vermilion-lacquered jade-inlaid tall-stemmed cups are rare finds in the world. The Yao Mountain altar was a sacred site for the Liangzhu people to pray for blessings and ward off disasters, while the tomb area served as the burial place for nobles or shamans.

In April 1981, the Zhejiang Provincial People’s Government designated the site as a Provincial-Level Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

Liangzhu Subdistrict: Liangzhu, with its long history and remarkable talent, is the birthplace of the “Liangzhu Culture,” hailed as the “Dawn of Chinese Civilization.” The Liangzhu Culture is a late Neolithic culture distributed around the Taihu Lake Basin, represented by black pottery and polished jade artifacts. It was named after its first discovery in Liangzhu in 1936 and dates back 5,300–4,000 years. The dawn of Chinese civilization rose from Liangzhu, making it a sacred site of the Chinese nation and Eastern civilization. The National Cultural Heritage Administration has officially included it in the tentative list for the *World Heritage List*. Liangzhu is situated in the picturesque international tourist city by the West Lake… More details about Liangzhu Subdistrict++

Further Reading:

· Fourth Batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units