Banpo Neolithic Village

Xian 2016

This afternoon our guide, Bryan, took the three of us to the Banpo Museum and Neolithic Village.   The site was accidentally discovered in 1953 by workers excavating the foundations for a power plant.  Today, the modern city of Xian has crept up to its lovely surroundings.

The Chinese government has managed the site well, building a large hangar over the archaeological dig and a museum next door to showcase the many finds.
 

The holes in the ground indicate the position of upright poles in a typical round house

 

In the background are foundations of houses and in the foreground a hand dug ditch

This diorama illustrates the village in the background surrounded by the ditch

The ditch, or dry moat, protected the village from wild animals and drained away water in the wet season.

Neolithic adults (Anne in the middle!)

 It is believed that Banpo was a matriarchal society; and archaeological evidence strongly suggests they practiced what the Chinese call zouhun - "free love" - which is sexual relations without commitment. Men would visit women's homes at night and sleep with them and then leave in the morning to return to their mother's house and work their mother's land. Children were raised by the mother in her mother's house. This type of marital relationship is still practiced in China today by the Mosuo people of the Yunnan and Sichuan provinces near Tibet.

 

This neolithic site was occupied from around 4,800-4,000 BC making it 6-7,000 years old!   This is startling when you realise how skilled these people were.  For some unknown reason they left the location suddenly, leaving behind over 10,000 stone tools and artifacts, 250 tombs, six large kilns, storage pits and the foundations of almost 100 buildings.  

A beautiful handmade bowl decorated with ink drawn deer

And the best...... the world's first known cooking steamer!!

These girls were buried with goods to assist them in the after life

Life expectancy was about 25 years.  Adults were buried in graves outside the village but children were buried in urns close to the homes.  People were either buried on their own or in a group of the same sex.   More artifacts were found in females' graves than in men's.