Ancient China

pronunciation

Ancient China was one of the oldest and longest lasting civilizations in the history of the world. The history of Ancient China can be traced back over 4,000 years. Located on the eastern part of the continent of Asia, today China is the most populous country in the world.

Dynasties

Throughout most of China's history it was ruled by powerful families called dynasties. The first dynasty was the Shang and the last was the Qing.

Description

Ancient China produced what has become the oldest extant culture in the world. The name 'China' comes from the Sanskrit Cina (derived from the name of the Chinese Qin Dynasty, pronounced 'Chin') which was translated as 'Cin' by the Persians and seems to have become popularized through trade along the Silk Road from China to the rest of the world.

It has generally been accepted that the Chinese 'Cradle of Civilization' is the Yellow River Valley which gave rise to villages sometime around 5000 BCE. While this has been disputed, and arguments have been made for the more widespread development of communities, there is no doubt that the Henan province, in the Yellow River Valley, was the site of many early villages and farming communities.

In 2001 CE, archaeologists uncovered two skeletons "buried in a collapsed house, which was covered with a thick layer of silt deposits from the Yellow River. In the layer of deposits, archaeologists found more than 20 skeletons, an altar, a square, pottery, and stone and jade utensils" (Chinapage.org). This site was only one of many prehistoric villages in the area.

The Romans and the Greeks knew the country as 'Seres', “the land where silk comes from”. The name 'China' does not appear in print in the west until 1516 CE in Barbosa's journals narrating his travels in the east (though the Europeans had long known of China through trade via the Silk Road). Marco Polo, the famous explorer who familiarized China to Europe in the 13th century CE, referred to the land as 'Cathay. In Mandarin Chinese, the country is known as 'Zhongguo' meaning "central state" or "middle empire".

Pre-history

Well before the advent of recognizable civilization in the region, the land was occupied by hominids. Peking Man, a skull fossil discovered in 1927 CE near Beijing, lived in the area between 700,000 to 200,000 years ago, and Yuanmou Man, whose remains were found in Yuanmou in 1965 CE, inhabited the land 1.7 million years ago. Evidence uncovered with these finds shows that these early inhabitants knew how to fashion stone tools and use fire.

While it is commonly accepted that human beings originated in Africa and then migrated to other points around the globe, China's paleoanthropologists "support the theory of 'regional evolution' of the origin of man" (China.org) which claims an independent basis for the birth of human beings. "The Shu Ape, a primate weighing only 100 to 150 grams and being similar to a mouse in size, lived [in China] in the Middle Eocene Epoch 4.5 to 4 million years ago. Its discovery posed a great challenge to the theory of African origin of the human race" (China.org). This challenge is considered plausible due to genetic links between the Shu Ape fossil and both advanced and lower primates, standing, then, as a 'missing link' in the evolutionary process.

However one interprets this data (the Chinese conclusions have been disputed by the international community), the solid evidence provided by other finds substantiates a very ancient lineage of hominids and human beings in China and a high level of sophistication in early culture. One example of this is Banpo Village, near Xi'an, discovered in 1953 CE. Banpo is a Neolithic village which was inhabited between 4500 and 3750 BCE and comprises 45 houses with floors sunk into the ground for greater stability. A trench encircling the village provided both protection from attack and drainage (while also helping to fence in domestic animals) while man-made caves dug underground were used to store food. The design of the village, and the artifacts discovered there (such as pottery and tools), argue for a very advanced culture at the time it was constructed.

Neolithic age

The Neolithic age in China can be traced back to about 10,000 BC.[12] The earliest evidence of cultivated rice, found by the Yangtze River, is carbon-dated to 8,000 years ago.[13] Early evidence for proto-Chinese millet agriculture is radiocarbon-dated to about 7000 BC.[14] Farming gave rise to the Jiahu culture (7000 to 5800 BC). At Damaidi in Ningxia, 3,172 cliff carvings dating to 6000–5000 BC have been discovered, "featuring 8,453 individual characters such as the sun, moon, stars, gods and scenes of hunting or grazing".[attribution needed] These pictographs are reputed to be similar to the earliest characters confirmed to be written Chinese.[15] Chinese proto-writing existed in Jiahu around 7000 BC,[16] Dadiwan from 5800 BC to 5400 BC, Damaidi around 6000 BC[17] and Banpo dating from the 5th millennium BC. Some scholars have suggested that Jiahu symbols (7th millennium BC) were the earliest Chinese writing system.[16] Excavation of a Peiligang culture site in Xinzheng county, Henan, found a community that flourished in 5,500 to 4,900 BC, with evidence of agriculture, constructed buildings, pottery, and burial of the dead.[18] With agriculture came increased population, the ability to store and redistribute crops, and the potential to support specialist craftsmen and administrators.[13] In late Neolithic times, the Yellow River valley began to establish itself as a center of Yangshao culture (5000 BC to 3000 BC), and the first villages were founded; the most archaeologically significant of these was found at Banpo, Xi'an.[19] Later, Yangshao culture was superseded by the Longshan culture, which was also centered on the Yellow River from about 3000 BC to 2000 BC.

Ancient China Paintings and Images