Xiachuan Site

Xiachuan Site

Xiachuan Site is a Shanxi Provincial Cultural Heritage Protection Unit.

Xiachuan Site

Xiachuan Site (Second Batch Provincial-Level Protected Site)

Period: Paleolithic Age

Location: Xiachuan Township, 70 kilometers west of Qinshui County

The site is mainly distributed across an area of 20–30 kilometers spanning the connected regions of Yuanqu, Qinshui, and Yangcheng counties at the eastern end of the Zhongtiao Mountain range. The cultural remains are most concentrated in the Xiachuan Basin. The basin is located on the eastern foothills of Mount Li, the main peak of the Zhongtiao Mountains, stretching narrowly about 4.5 kilometers from north to south and reaching a maximum width of 2 kilometers from east to west, at an elevation of 1,550 meters. The bedrock beneath the basin and the surrounding mountains consist of Cambrian and Ordovician limestone. At the southern end of the basin, there is a narrow valley with a steep slope where water flows out.

The Xiachuan region has well-preserved strata and the richest collection of remains, hence the name Xiachuan Site. Carbon-14 dating indicates it dates back from 23,000 to 16,000 years ago. It was discovered and excavated in the 1970s.

The Xiachuan Culture is represented primarily by stone tools, which fall into two major categories: one is large, coarse stone tools made from sandstone, quartzite, and vein quartz, accounting for 4.7% of the total stone artifacts; the other is microlithic tools, mainly made from flint. The small, fine stone tools are the most representative artifacts of the Xiachuan Culture, including typical microblade cores and microblades, round scrapers (fingernail-shaped), core scrapers, burins, backed knives, various types of points, awls, and stone arrowheads. In addition to the fine tools, the Xiachuan Culture also includes a certain number of larger, coarse stone tools such as points, scrapers, choppers, stone hammers, and grinding plates, among which the flake scrapers are particularly distinctive.

The Xiachuan Culture is a typical example of the microlithic tradition, featuring a wide variety of microlithic core types with clear characteristics, well-defined stratigraphy, and an early chronology. It holds significant importance for exploring the origin and evolution of the same technological tradition of microlithic tools, which are widely distributed across China, Mongolia, Siberia (former Soviet Union), Korea, Japan, and Alaska in North America.

Further Reading:

· Second Batch of Shanxi Provincial Cultural Heritage Protection Units