The Pengtoushan culture was a
Neolithic
The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...
culture located around the central
Yangtze River
The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ) is the longest river in Eurasia and the third-longest in the world. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains of the Tibetan Plateau and flows including Dam Qu River the longest source of the Yangtze, i ...
region in northwestern
Hunan
Hunan is an inland Provinces of China, province in Central China. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the Administrative divisions of China, province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangxi to the east, Gu ...
province,
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
. It dates to around 7500–6100 BC, and was roughly contemporaneous with the
Peiligang culture to the north. It is named after the
type site
In archaeology, a type site (American English) or type-site (British English) is the site used to define a particular archaeological culture or other typological unit, which is often named after it. For example, discoveries at La Tène and H ...
at Pengtoushan.
Sites
Pengtoushan, located in
Li County, Hunan, is the type site for the Pengtoushan culture. Excavated in 1988, Pengtoushan has been difficult to date accurately, with a large variability in dates ranging from 9000 BC to 5500 BC.
Cord-marked pottery was discovered among the burial goods.
Another important site is
Bashidang, also in Li County, belonging to the late stage of the Pengtoushan culture. It features a wall and a ditch, as well as a star-shaped platform.
Rice cultivation
Rice residues at Pengtoushan have been
carbon dated to 8200–7800 BC, showing that rice had been domesticated by this time. At later stages, pots containing grains of rice were also dated to approximately 5800 BC. By 4000 BC, evidence of rice domestication in the region is abundant in the form of bone and wooden spades, as well as pottery. The rice grains at Pengtoushan are larger than naturally occurring
wild rice. Large amounts of rice grains have also been found at Bashidang.
Gallery
File:Bone spade. Bashidang site. Hunan Museum.jpg, Remains of a bone spade from the Bashidang site
File:Guan jar. Pengtoushan culture. Hunan Provincial Museum.jpg, Reconstructed vessel
File:Support. Pengtoushan culture. Hunan Provincial Museum.jpg, Reconstructed leg of a vessel
See also
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List of Neolithic cultures of China
This is a list of Neolithic cultures of China that have been unearthed by archaeologists. They are sorted in chronological order from earliest to latest and are followed by a schematic visualization of these cultures.
It would seem that the defi ...
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Daxi culture
The Daxi culture (5000–3300 BC) was a Neolithic culture centered in the Three Gorges region around the middle Yangtze, China. The culture ranged from western Hubei to eastern Sichuan and the Pearl River Delta. The site at Daxi, located in the Qu ...
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Qujialing culture
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Nanzhuangtou
Footnotes
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Pengtoushan
History of Hunan
Neolithic cultures of China
Major National Historical and Cultural Sites in Hunan
8th-millennium BC establishments
History of the Yangtze