Carp Mouth Site

Carp Mouth Site

The Carp Mouth Site is a National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

The Carp Mouth Site is located under a rock shelter at the northeast of Dalongtan (Big Dragon Pool), on the southern foothill of Longshan (Dragon Mountain), within Dalongtan Park in the southern part of Liuzhou city proper, Guangxi. It lies about 3 kilometers north of the Liujiang River.

The site covers an area of approximately 200 square meters. In early 1980, Luo Xiuying from the Liuzhou Museum and Tan Fasheng from the Guilin Cultural Relics Management Committee discovered the site while conducting a survey of cliff inscriptions around Dalongtan, and collected a small number of sand-tempered pottery shards. The Liuzhou Museum and the Cultural Relics Work Team of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region excavated the site, covering a total area of 56 square meters. However, apart from a part of the southern section of T1, most areas were not excavated to the bottom. The excavation yielded relatively rich remains and artifacts, including six burials; and over a thousand pieces of pottery shards, stone tools, bone tools, shell tools, as well as a large number of aquatic and terrestrial animal remains (see *Acta Archaeologica Sinica*, No. 9, 1983). After the findings were published, they attracted academic attention, making the site an important one for studying the early Neolithic culture of Liuzhou, Guangxi, and even South China. From October to November 2003, the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the Cultural Relics Work Team of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, the Liuzhou Cultural Relics and Archaeology Team, and the Liuzhou Museum jointly carried out a second excavation of the Liuzhou Carp Mouth Rock Shelter Shell Midden Site in Guangxi. The excavation covered a total area of about 8 square meters and uncovered over a thousand pieces of pottery shards, stone tools, bone tools, as well as stone cores and waste flakes, achieving significant academic results.

In 2006, the Carp Mouth Site, as an ancient site dating from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic period, was included in the sixth batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units by the State Council.

Further Reading:

· Sixth Batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units