The exploitation of domestic animal products from the Late Neolithic Age to the Early Bronze Age in the heartland of ancient China

Li, Zhipeng; Campbell, Rod; Brunson, Katherine; Yang, Jie; Yang, Tao

doi:10.2307/j.ctvh1dr4j.8

Cited by 13 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The sex and survivorship analysis of the pig remains indicates a gradual decline in survivorship coupled with a lack of males, suggesting that Guandimiao husbandry may largely have been for exchange. These results complement those from Anyang, which suggest that the Shang capital was largely provisioned from the countryside (Campbell, Forthcoming; Li, Campbell, et al, ).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 69%

“…Compared with Xiaomintun, Anyang, a contemporaneous non‐elite neighborhood in the Shang capital, the pattern is similar. At Xiaomintun, based solely on fusion data, it was found that, “nearly one third of the animals were killed before 2–3 years, and roughly another one third were killed before 3–4 years”(Li, Campbell, et al, , p. 73). One difference between the two sites, however, is the claim “only around 7% of the cattle lived past 4–5 years” (Li, Campbell, et al, , p. 73) at Xiaomintun.…”

Section: Husbandrymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At Xiaomintun, based solely on fusion data, it was found that, “nearly one third of the animals were killed before 2–3 years, and roughly another one third were killed before 3–4 years”(Li, Campbell, et al, , p. 73). One difference between the two sites, however, is the claim “only around 7% of the cattle lived past 4–5 years” (Li, Campbell, et al, , p. 73) at Xiaomintun. At Guandimiao, it appears that roughly one third of the herd survived into old age, and that attrition was gradual and somewhat ad hoc as opposed to a planned, optimized, meat production model.…”

Section: Husbandrymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Zooarchaeology has made many important contributions to the study of the Chinese past, contributing to our understanding of domestication (e.g., Huang, ; Yuan, , ), regional trajectories (e.g., Flad, Yuan, & Li, ; Yuan, Huang, Yang, et al, ), and even secondary products (e.g., Brunson, He, & Dai, ; Li, Brunson, & Dai, ; Li, Campbell, Bronson, et al, ) and craft production (Campbell, Zhipeng, Yuling, et al, ; Hou et al 2018). Nevertheless, previous zooarchaeological work on the Chinese Bronze Age has focused on large sites and central places (e.g., Huang, ; Li, , ; Li, Campbell, et al, ). Despite awareness that large centres where provisioned from smaller agricultural sites, there has been a dearth of work on such sites as Chinese archaeology has struggled to deal with the demands of decades of large‐scale development mandated salvage excavation and the relatively small resources afforded to archaeology.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Animal use in a Shang Village: The Guandimiao zooarchaeological assemblage

Hou

Campbell

Zhang

et al. 2019

Intl J of Osteoarchaeology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Chinese Bronze Age zooarchaeological data sets have almost exclusively been derived from large, urban centres and often from elite contexts. The Anyang period (ca. 1250–1050 BCE) village site of Guandimiao fills an important lacuna as a small, non‐elite, rural site. The large urban sites of the Chinese Bronze Age are thought to have been more centres of animal consumption than of stock rearing, and so, Guandimiao presents the first glimpse of a possible production site. In addition, the near total excavation of the original village affords a rarely fine‐grained understanding of context allowing us to distinguish broadly between domestic, ritual‐related, and mortuary assemblages. These assemblages show differences in relative quantities of taxa, in body part distribution, bone modification, and taphonomy, giving additional insight into animal‐related human behaviour at the site. In addition, a variety of lines of evidence demonstrates a large dog‐related taphonomic bias, a subject that is generally ignored in Chinese zooarchaeology. Finally, the survivorship curves for pig and cattle generally show gradual attrition with a significant proportion of older animals, in contrast with contemporaneous Shang urban sites. This fact, plus the fact that the sex analysis performed on the pig mandibles demonstrated that they were nearly all female, supports the hypothesis that Guandimiao was a site of livestock raising and origin point for urban provisioning.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 69%

Section: Husbandrymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Husbandrymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Animal use in a Shang Village: The Guandimiao zooarchaeological assemblage

Hou

Campbell

Zhang

et al. 2019

Intl J of Osteoarchaeology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…2500 BC (Flad et al 2007;Yuan et al 2007). Previous studies of sheep kill-off patterns at Taosi, Xinzhai, and Erlitou indicate that sheep were used for secondary products, possibly wool (Li et al 2014a(Li et al & 2014b. Later in the Bronze Age at the Shang capital at Anyang (ca.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sheep, Cattle, and Specialization: New Zooarchaeological Perspectives on the Taosi Longshan

Brunson

Dai

2015

Intl J of Osteoarchaeology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this paper, we present a zooarchaeological analysis of the Longshan period sites of Taosi and Zhoujiazhuang (ca. 2300–1900 cal. BC) in southern Shanxi Province, China. We compare the faunal record at both sites in terms of the proportions of wild and domestic taxa; the slaughter patterns for the main domesticates; the types of bones used to produce utilitarian and decorative bone artifacts; and the types of bones used for ritual oracle bone divination. Differences in the faunal records at Taosi and Zhoujiazhuang provide insights into the connections between specialization and early urbanism. Our research also provides clues about how sheep and cattle pastoralism was initially adopted in the Yellow River Valley during the late 3rd millennium BC. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

show abstract

Zooarchaeology in Oceania: An overview

Crabtree

2016

Archaeology in Oceania

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper explores several main themes in the zooarchaeology of Oceania, including the question of Pleistocene "overkill" and its relationship to island biogeography, human impacts on the indigenous faunal communities of Remote Oceania, the spread of the Pacific faunal package -pigs, dogs, chickens and the Pacific rat -throughout Oceania, and the impact of European colonialism on traditional hunting, foraging, fishing and animal husbandry regimes. The methodological implications of some of these big-picture questions are also discussed briefly.

show abstract

The exploitation of domestic animal products from the Late Neolithic Age to the Early Bronze Age in the heartland of ancient China

Cited by 13 publications

References 0 publications

Animal use in a Shang Village: The Guandimiao zooarchaeological assemblage

Animal use in a Shang Village: The Guandimiao zooarchaeological assemblage

Sheep, Cattle, and Specialization: New Zooarchaeological Perspectives on the Taosi Longshan

Zooarchaeology in Oceania: An overview

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About