Master Archaeologist

Chapter 354 Liangzhu Fangguo System
The royal city of the ancient Liangzhu Kingdom has a total area of ​​more than 300 million square meters.

This was already a very large city in the era 5000 years ago.

The core area of ​​this ancient city is the current Mojiaoshan ruins.

The Mojiaoshan site is the largest site of the Liangzhu culture, located 25 kilometers northwest of today's HZ city.

The plane of the central mound of the site is an east-west rectangle, about 670 meters long from east to west, and about 450 meters wide from north to south, with a total area of ​​about 30 square meters and a soil layer as thick as 10.2 meters.

There are also three small mounds on the big earth platform, which are three-legged. The south is Wugui Mountain, the north is Xiaomojiao Mountain, and the east is Damojiao Mountain.

The entire artificially built huge mound base is like a so-called "earth pyramid".

And on this large earthen platform, a large area of ​​rammed foundation sites and remains of large pillar holes have been found, which are the remains of large buildings at that time.

In other words, 5000 years ago, the ancestors of the Liangzhu Kingdom artificially built these three large mounds in the center of the city.

And these three mounds have once built many large buildings.

After these years of archaeological exploration, it can be basically confirmed that the large earthen platform is the royal palace of Liangzhu and a sacrificial area similar to the "Tai Temple".

Immediately to the northwest of the Mojiaoshan site is the so-called "Liangzhu Tomb" of the Fanshan site tombs.

It can be said that the culture of the Liangzhu Kingdom is indeed the source that has influenced the Chinese civilization for thousands of years.

Their imperial palace will also be equipped with the Temple of Heaven for worship, and their "imperial tomb" is also built next to the ruling center.

The birth of the ancient Liangzhu Kingdom was regarded as a "rebellion" for the entire lower reaches of the Yangtze River!
In the lower reaches of the Yangtze River more than 1 years ago, prehistoric settlements were still very rare, and only a few were found in the northeast of Jiangxi, where they lived in caves.

But ten thousand years later, in the intermountain basin in the middle reaches of the Qiantang River, many ruins represented by the Shangshan culture appeared. So far, more than 20 sites have been discovered, all of which are wilderness settlements near the river, with farming settlements appearing.

Although there are time differences in these settlements, they have generally reached a large scale and extended to the surrounding area to the Kuocang Mountain in the east and the northern foot of Siming Mountain in the north.

Around 8000 years ago, scattered settlements also existed in the intermountain basin in the middle reaches of the Qiantang River and the plain area on the south bank of the lower reaches.

7000 years ago was the period of great settlement development, but before 7000 years ago, the settlements in the entire region did not show obvious hierarchical differences.

The combination of ancient river channels and artificial moats at the bridgehead site of Shangshan Culture is only for defense.

Since 6000 years ago, due to the emergence of a few super-large central settlements, the hierarchical differences have become increasingly obvious.

For example, Hanshan Lingjiatan with an area of ​​over one million square meters and Zhangjiagang Dongshan Village with an area of ​​hundreds of thousands of square meters were important central settlements at that time.

Among different settlements, there are already differences between central settlements and ordinary settlements, and there are even intermediate-level settlements.

The level difference is also reflected in the refinement of the internal functions of the settlement and the differentiation of the cemetery.

For example, the emergence of large altars in Lingjiatan, the separation of high-level cemeteries from ordinary cemeteries, and the huge difference in burial objects are all important signs that social complexity has begun.

However, the most significant changes occurred during the Liangzhu culture.

From the late Songze period to the early Liangzhu period, the use of jade wares in the cemeteries of the Guanjingtou settlement in the Liangzhu area has diverged.

Large altars and high-grade tombs appeared in the Yaoshan cemetery in the early Liangzhu period, and a large number of jade wares were buried with them, which became an important status symbol. The largest number of jade wares buried in the tombs was more than 700 pieces (sets), which formed a huge difference from ordinary cemeteries such as in front of the temple.

Roughly starting early in the middle of the Liangzhu period, the Fanshan cemetery is a relatively independent cemetery that can be called a "royal tomb", which is completely different from the large number of ordinary cemeteries around it.

More importantly, the high and low dam water conservancy system in the Liangzhu area has been piled up with "grass-wrapped mud bags". There is an overall plan for flood storage and water regulation, which can form a reservoir area with an area of ​​8.5 square kilometers.

The Mojiaoshan large-scale artificial pile base with an area of ​​more than 30 square meters and a height of about 10 meters, and the city wall completed later with a total area of ​​more than 290 million square meters and a width of about 40-60 meters at the bottom of the city wall, also There is an outer city with an area of ​​more than 800 million square meters. The moat outside the city wall and the branch river channel excavated between the inner city river and the main river form a "well" shaped river network in the city, forming a fairly complete waterway system.

At the same time, a number of large-scale, rich burial objects, and high-grade cemeteries with jade as burials appeared in the entire Taihu Lake Basin, such as Gaochengdun in Jiangyin, Sidun in Changzhou, and Fuquanshan in Shanghai.
However, it is incomparable with Yaoshan and Fanshan cemeteries, thus becoming a central settlement of the next level.

There are a certain number of ordinary settlements outside the central settlement, and there is a settlement group composed of 6 small settlements around moats concentratedly distributed in Yujia Mountain, Linping, outside Liangzhu Ancient City.
The Maoshan site may be a grass-roots settlement mainly engaged in rice farming, and the same is true around other sub-central settlements.

It can be seen from this that the central settlement in Liangzhu area, with Mojiao Mountain as the core, the ancient city as the focus, and dams and river network systems, has been carefully planned and eventually became the center of the entire Liangzhu culture. The characteristic "pyramid-shaped" social structure has been formed in the Liangzhu culture.
As we all know, the evolution of human development generally goes through the era of primitive tribes first, then the age of settlements, and finally gradually enters the era of city-states and square-states.

Later, it was the era of feudal countries.

The Liangzhu civilization, on the other hand, obviously broke through the settlement era, expanded step by step from the mature central settlement of the settlement era, and formed a mature Fangguo system.

The core area of ​​the center is 30 square meters, which is the palace area and sacrificial area of ​​Liangzhu Kingdom. The city wall with an area of ​​nearly 300 square meters completed later is surrounded by the inner city of Liangzhu Kingdom.

And the width of this city wall is even 40-60 meters, which was definitely a bear city comparable to the capital of heaven 5000 years ago!

Outside the inner city, there is an outer city with an area of ​​more than 800 million square meters.

Moreover, the capital of the Liangzhu Kingdom is a city built on water like the water city of Venice.

Relying on the moat of the outer city, the river of the inner city, and the branch channels excavated between the main channels, a complex river network was formed in the city, linking the various areas of the entire Liangzhu ancient city.

This shows that the water transportation of Liangzhu people is very developed, and they have a mature "river road network" system!
This land of China 5000 years ago was simply a Zentraedi civilization!

And this is only the capital of Liangzhu Kingdom.

Beyond the capital, Liangzhu also ruled a large amount of territory in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, and even went north to fight against the settlements in Shandong and plunder the land!

Even foreigners who wear tinted glasses dare not deny that Liangzhu, with such a highly developed civilization and such a mature city, is not an ancient country, but a tribe!
(End of this chapter)