China News Service, Hangzhou, October 20 (Lin Bo Sun Linru) "The value of Liangzhu goes far beyond 'confirming the history of Chinese civilization for more than 5,000 years'. What's more, it presents a way of civilization growth that is different from that of Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt - heavy water due to rice cultivation, aggregation due to water control, and a unique spiritual order precipitated in jade and ancestor worship." During the 4th "Liangzhu Forum", Wang Wei, member of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and President of the Chinese Archaeological Society, said in an exclusive interview.
Comparing the early agricultural civilizations around the world, Lianghe and ancient Egypt relied on wheat agriculture to move toward complex societies, while the lower reaches of the Yangtze River followed a path of rice cultivation. Wang Wei first attributed the uniqueness of this path to the duality of "water".
"Rice agriculture requires an irrigation system and is highly dependent on water sources. However, in addition to relying on water sources, the lower reaches of the Yangtze River also face the prevention of water damage." Wang Wei said that it is this dual pressure of "water use" and "waterproofing" that gave rise to Liangzhu's large-scale water conservancy system.
Archaeological evidence shows that even before the successful inscription on the World Heritage List, 11 dams had been confirmed around Liangzhu Ancient City, with a total storage capacity of about 46 million cubic meters, equivalent to three West Lakes. The amount of artificially piled earth reached 2.88 million cubic meters. It was the largest dam system and public project in the world at the same time.
Wang Wei further pointed out that the construction of water conservancy systems is not an isolated engineering act. Behind it is the population size supported by the higher yields of rice agriculture. "Rice has the benefit of irrigation, and its yield is higher than that of millet in the north, and higher than that of wheat that relies on natural precipitation. Only when the population multiplies does it become possible to organize such large-scale public projects."
In Wang Wei's logic, "water" in Liangzhu is not only an ecological condition, but also a causal chain from agricultural surplus to population agglomeration to national capabilities.
If the water conservancy system is the "hard skeleton" of the Liangzhu civilization, then jade and ancestor worship constitute its "spiritual background."
Wang Wei divided the evolution of China's prehistoric jade culture into two stages: between 9,000 and 6,000 years ago, jade was mainly used as a carrier of beauty; after 6,000 years ago, when social differentiation gradually intensified, jade became a symbol of hierarchical status and etiquette. The common appearance of jade congs, jade bis and the unified divine emblem in Liangzhu culture shows that a cross-regional shared belief system has been formed.
This spiritual order is different from Western Asia, Egypt, etc. "In West Asia and Egypt, the worship of the sun god dominates. In China, worship of ancestors has always been the core content of sacrifices." In Wang Wei's view, jade has been upgraded from "stone" to "ritual vessel", and ancestor worship has expanded from family memory to social integration mechanism. This clue of spiritual evolution is intertwined with the material clues of rice farming, water control, and population aggregation, which together constitute the unique appearance of the civilization process in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River.
Overseas academic circles have long regarded Chinese prehistoric civilization as a case of isolated development. Wang Wei did not shy away from this point, but he emphasized that there is no contradiction between "self-contained system" and "open absorption".
Technological archeology provides evidence that was unimaginable in the past. He mentioned that DNA research has proven that the raising of cattle and sheep was introduced to China along with wheat from West Asia; metallurgy was also most likely introduced through West Asia and Central Asia.
He emphasized that the key is not "what is passed in" but "what happens after it is passed in."
He said: "We learned metallurgy from West Asia, but soon developed the technology of using pottery molds to cast bronze vessels, while West Asia has long used stone molds to make weapons and tools. Pottery mold casting gave birth to the highly developed bronze civilization represented by bronze ritual vessels in the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties."
In Wang Wei's eyes, the formation of Chinese civilization has always been a process of "local growth" and "re-creation by external factors". Wheat, cattle, and sheep entered the Central Plains, and met with local millet cultivation, domestic pig breeding, and wine-making technology. Together they created a "six livestock prosperous" business pattern; China's millet cultivation, silk, ceramics, and jade traditions also continued to spread westward.
"Exchanges and mutual learning have existed since ancient times. Zhang Qian's passage to the Western Regions opened up official channels, but before that, private and technical exchanges had a long history," he said.
It has been 90 years since the discovery of the Liangzhu ruins, but in Wang Wei’s view, it is far from time to stop exploring the origins of civilization. “What has been solved is ‘whether Liangzhu is a civilization’, but what has not been fully developed is ‘what kind of civilization Liangzhu is’.”
He raised a series of questions to be answered: Within the scope of Liangzhu culture, does the Yangtze River Delta region operate under a unified royal authority, or does each region form an alliance and share Liangzhu as the "alliance leader"? High-level tombs discovered in Shanghai, southern Jiangsu and other places also contain jade congs and jade bis. Is there a subordinate relationship or an alliance between these local elites and the ancient city of Liangzhu?
"Many details of this mechanism within the Liangzhu culture, the so-called central and local governments, royal power and alliances, still need to be studied in depth." Wang Wei said frankly that the current research on the state formation mechanism based on rice agriculture "has not yet progressed to that deep level."
In Wang Wei's vision, Liangzhu is not only a ruler to measure the unique position of the rice farming civilization in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River among the world's early civilizations; it is also a window that allows people to see that Chinese civilization has carved its own path from the beginning in the intertwining of local roots and external stimulation, which is neither closed nor dependent.
