Han Tomb Cluster of Laolongwan

Han Tomb Cluster of Laolongwan

The Han Tomb Cluster of Laolongwan is a cultural heritage site protected at the Hebei Province level.

Laolongwan, formerly known as Funongyao, is located about two kilometers northeast of Beishacheng in Wanquan County. On the north bank of the confluence of the Dongyang River and Nanyang River near the village lies a flat area formed over the years by river alluvium. This area hosts a key cultural relic site under provincial protection — the Han Tomb Cluster of Laolongwan, also referred to as the Han Tomb Cluster of Beishacheng. It is a highly significant historical and cultural site for studying how our Chinese ancestors lived, thrived, and multiplied here, as well as a treasure trove of relics.

These Han tombs, with their large burial mounds (approximately six meters high and twenty meters in diameter), closely resemble ancient war-time grain storage pits. As a result, locals have long referred to them as "fake grain piles." It is said that in the past, along the north bank of the Yanghe River, from Yangmenbao in the east to Beishacheng in the west, there were nearly a hundred such Han tomb mounds. However, due to weathering, erosion by the river, and human damage, by 1940 only thirteen remained. By the time the Hebei Provincial Cultural Relics Management Office erected a monument in 1982 and officially designated the site as a “provincial-level protected cultural relic,” only seven Han tombs were left.

Although the Han Tomb Cluster of Beishacheng has lain dormant for thousands of years, it remained largely unknown for many years due to the region’s former lack of cultural development. In 1929, several tombs near the Yanghe River were eroded by water, exposing a bronze basin and a bronze jar. Some believed these were remnants from the Northern and Southern Dynasties when Tan Daoji campaigned against the Northern Wei; others thought they were funerary objects from the Liao or Jin dynasties. It wasn’t until 1941, after the Japanese “East Asia Archaeological Society” conducted exploitative excavations and research on the tombs, that people learned these were ancient Han Dynasty tombs.

The excavation and research of the Beishachenghan Tomb Cluster by the “Japanese archaeological team” took place under a profound political backdrop. At that time, Huai’an and Wanquan counties were merged into Wuan County under the jurisdiction of the puppet Mengjiang Government, which was occupied by Japanese forces. Under the banner of the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere,” the Japanese not only ruthlessly plundered the material wealth of our county but also brazenly looted its cultural treasures. In the spring of 1941, with funding from the puppet Mengjiang Government and under the direction and commission of the Japanese-run Shiwu Preservation Association in Datong, the East Asia Archaeological Society of Japan personally carried out so-called “excavation and research” on the Han Tomb Cluster of Beishacheng in our county. Japanese participants in the excavation included members of the East Asia Culture Research Institute: Mizuno Seiichi, Nagahiro Toshio, Kitano Masao, Hanyakari, and Okazaki Umehiko. Also involved were Ono Katsutoshi from the North China Transportation Company in Beijing under the Japanese-controlled regime, Kobayashi Tomoo and Ino Noritaro from the Japanese puppet government in Zhangjiakou, the top advisor to the puppet Mengjiang Government Kimura Shoji, Sasaki Keisuke from the Shiwu Preservation Association, and Ueda Tsutomu, an adviser to Wuan County, who also arrived at the excavation site after it began.

On September 25, the Japanese archaeological team arrived at Laolongwan with all necessary supplies. Personnel from various parties gradually gathered. The Japanese set up camp in a new house belonging to the He family in the center of Laolongwan Village, with Liu from Zhangjiakou serving as the cook. Before excavation, the Japanese team conducted an on-site survey and designed an excavation plan. Formal digging began on September 29.

The excavation took place on a terrace about ten meters wide on the north bank of the Yanghe River, south of the Beijing-Baotou Railway. There were thirteen visible mound-shaped ancient tombs in total. The tombs were spaced four to five meters apart, and the mounds were generally square-diamond shaped. Of the remaining thirteen tombs, most had been damaged over the years by wind erosion, rain, and water scouring. Only a few remained relatively intact. The Japanese team chose the more complete Tombs No. 5, 6, and 7 for excavation. Mizuno Seiichi was responsible for Tomb No. 5, Kobayashi Ino for Tomb No. 6, and Ono for Tomb No. 7. From October 4 to October 7, work on the three tombs successively approached the burial artifacts. Hanyakari, Nagahiro Toshio, and Kitano Masao assisted in the excavation and measurement. By the end of October, the excavation of the three tombs and the inventory of unearthed artifacts were completed. The entire process lasted thirty-eight days. On average, the Japanese team forced around thirty local farmers to dig each day (sometimes fifty, sometimes ten), totaling five hundred person-days. That same day, Hanyakari from the Japanese team photographed the site. On November 1, the team began backfilling the tombs. Daily labor involved eighty workers, and the refilling was completed on November 3. Coinciding with Japan’s Meiji Festival, Taoist priests were invited to perform a soil-thanking ceremony in front of the tombs to ensure peace after the excavation.

During the excavation of the tombs, the “Japanese archaeological team” also investigated the settlement terrace at the site of the old Beishacheng.<今北沙城东)，做了简单的实地考查。测量出土城壁南北长二百米，高约四、五米。东西城壁因河水冲蚀已损坏不全。并庄古城址附近，被昔日几易河道的洋河水冲刷的断崖上，一米厚的包含层中，找到了一部分与汉墓文物大至同期的古文物。

During this Han tomb excavation, the Japanese team unearthed a large number of precious historical artifacts. These included a bronze phoenix-turtle-legged Boshan incense burner, a ring-handled bronze tripod, a bronze basin, a washbasin, a beast-ring bronze fang, a bird-beak ladle, a steamer-cauldron, a bronze comb; a lidded flat pot, a copper plate, lacquerware boxes and mirrors, double-ringed lighting mirrors, star-cloud-patterned mirrors with peak knobs, tomb guardians, round-bottomed pots, shallow steam bowls, blue ear handles, glassware. There were also rope-patterned jade tiles, coarse unpatterned gray pottery round-bottomed pots, ear-handle tile pots, iron knives, fragments of iron shovels. Additionally, some abandoned Han Dynasty storage pits for wild vegetables and grains, used to store the deceased's belongings, were found.

Among the unearthed ancient artifacts from the site of old Beishacheng were a bowl, a deep bowl, a tall cup, and concentric circle-patterned roof tiles.

Furthermore, within the vertical shaft fill layers of the Han tombs, historical artifacts of great significance for studying the prehistoric period of our county — including the living and residential culture of ancient humans — were discovered. These included red pottery shards, stone chips, axes, stone knives, and shell-made cutting tools from the Neolithic Age.

Based on the records in the 1941 book Wan’an Beishacheng, published by the East Asia Archaeological Association of Japan, the aforementioned ancient artifacts can be roughly divided into three categories: first, burial objects from the Han tombs; second, gray pottery artifacts from the ancient city settlement site; third, Neolithic Age red pottery artifacts and stone tools unearthed alongside them.

By analyzing the cultural and historical characteristics of these three types of artifacts from different periods, we can trace the cultural history of our county before the Han Dynasty. As early as the prehistoric period, on the north bank of the Yanshui River (now the north bank of the Yanghe River), this ancient land was already home to Han Chinese red pottery culture people who had migrated from the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River and settled here. These red pottery culture people had just evolved from the painted pottery culture. Several hundred years later, during the Qin and Han periods, the Han Chinese red pottery culture people gradually evolved into gray pottery culture people, with more developed production techniques and higher cultural standards. The descendants of these Han culture people continued to live, thrive, and multiply here until the Xianbei and Wuhuan, two ethnic minorities primarily engaged in herding during the primitive society, submitted to the Han Dynasty and settled here. Gradually, the area became under the control of these two groups, leading the Han farmers to retreat inside the Great Wall. As a result, this once bustling borderland gradually declined.

The red pottery culture people in this area displayed clear characteristics of the late painted pottery culture, as evidenced by the colored-patterned pottery, stone, and shell tools found in the vertical shaft layers of the Han tombs, as well as the construction of pit-house dwellings. They lived here for approximately a thousand years.

The bronze ware, ironware, animal bones, gray pottery, wuzhu coins, and storage pits for wild vegetables and grains unearthed from the Han tombs all indicate that the tomb owners belonged to the gray pottery culture people, who likely lived during the Warring States, Qin, and Han periods. They led a settled life of handicrafts and farming. They planted grains and raised poultry and livestock. Their housing transitioned from underground pit-dwellings to above-ground structures. Various tools for different purposes appeared in their lives — such as containers like basins, bowls, dou, hu, and amphorae made of gray pottery; cooking utensils like steamers and cauldrons; cosmetic and dressing tools like lacquered mirrors; farming implements like iron shovels and knives. This indicates that the gray pottery culture people had entered the Iron Age. Pottery-making was also quite advanced, with mastered techniques and kiln equipment. Chinese characters were widely used, and commodity-based monetary exchange emerged, forming the rudiments of a primitive industrial and commercial economy. All this proves that during the Qin and Han periods, these Han culture people lived here for at least several hundred years.

Judging from the burial objects, the construction style, and the scale of the tombs, it can also be seen that the tomb owners were individuals associated with county or prefectural governments and held relatively high social status. To ensure they could live as comfortably and joyfully in death as in life, the funerals were extremely luxurious. The wooden coffins and burial objects were all carefully arranged according to the tomb owners’ living habits. This illustrates the prevalence of lavish burial customs, feudal hierarchy, and the influence of Han Dynasty prefectural politics at the time.

Additionally, it can be inferred that the city site where Yan people and the Qin Dynasty Chancellor Cai Ze (also known as Gangcheng Jun) lived during the Warring States Period, as mentioned in Li Daoyuan’s Commentary on the Water Classic, is likely the now-discovered site of old Beishacheng, which largely aligns with historical records. This also proves that the cultural history of this area never ceased before the Han Dynasty.

Although the exploitative excavation of our county’s ancient Han tomb cluster by the Japanese archaeological team caused an unprecedented disaster to our cultural relics, in a sense, it also brought these precious relics, which had slept underground for thousands of years, to light earlier and documented them in detail. This has undeniable positive significance. Not only can we understand the true nature of these ancient tombs through the records in Japanese archaeological publications, but we can also find traces of ancient human habitation and development, sensing the pulse of life of our Chinese ancestors here. It is of great importance for broadening future generations’ horizons, inspiring hope, and filling the gaps in our county’s historical studies. Although most of the unearthed relics have disappeared, we can still appreciate their artistic and cultural value through some photos in the Japanese-published book Wan’an Beishacheng.