Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site

Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site

The Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site is a cultural tourism attraction.

The Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site in Yun County, Lincang, Yunnan, mainly consists of the Jiujidi Site and the Mangan Site, named after their discovery in Manghuai, Yun County. The Jiujidi Site is located two kilometers from Manghuai Town, Yun County. Exploration and excavation by the Cultural Relics Work Team of the Yunnan Provincial Museum in 1974 at the Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site in Yun County, Lincang, Yunnan, showed that the Neolithic culture of the middle Lancang River region, represented by Manghuai, is a newly identified cultural type in Yunnan Province. This cultural type is widely distributed in the Lincang area of the middle Lancang River, with numerous findings also in the upper regions of Baoshan and Nujiang, as well as the lower region of Xishuangbanna. The Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site in Yun County, Lincang, Yunnan, is mainly characterized by shoulder-bladed stone axes (also called double-shouldered stone axes, double-shouldered stone spades, stone yue axes, or tenon-equipped stone tools) made from flaked river cobbles. The Jiujidi Site is approximately 130 meters long from east to west and 120 meters wide from north to south, covering an area of about 15,600 square meters. At the Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site in Yun County, Lincang, Yunnan, archaeologists excavated artifacts such as stone axes, stone net sinkers, stamps, pottery shards, and stone anvils within a cultural layer about one meter thick. The stone tools were all made from pebbles into yue-shaped or boot-shaped shoulder-bladed stone axes; the pottery mainly consisted of jars, including sandy gray pottery and sandy red pottery.

The decorative patterns on the pottery include plain, cord-marked, and bosses. The Mangan Site is located in Xiaomangan Village, Mangan Village Committee, Lishu Township, southeastern Yun County. The terrain of the site is relatively flat, sloping from north to south within the Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site in Yun County, Lincang, Yunnan, covering an area of 4,000 square meters. The unearthed artifacts are mainly flaked shoulder-bladed stone axes, all made from natural river cobbles. There are also some ground strip-shaped stone axes, which were processed and polished on both sides, making them relatively refined. A small number of stone knives were found, shaped like crescents, with slightly modified blades but no defined cutting edges. Pottery is scarce, mainly featuring three types of decorations: stamped patterns, incised patterns, and cord-marked designs. In addition, there are semi-finished stone tools, stone flakes, stone balls, and stone hammers. The Manghuai Neolithic Site, with its distinctive flaked stone tools—especially the double-shouldered stone tools—has been identified by archaeologists as a new cultural type and represents the Neolithic culture of the Lancang River basin. The distribution of the Manghuai Neolithic Cultural Site indicates that the Lancang River served as a cultural corridor connecting western Yunnan with northwestern China.