It was a flood, not seawater, that removed the Hemudu culture, one
of the most important Neolithic cultures in China some 7,000 years
ago, out of its ancestral home, a local archaeologist suggested
recently.
It
has been a long-perplexing mystery why the Hemudu culture, a symbol
of China's ancient civilization, suddenly abandoned its home after
dwelling there for 2,000 years.
Uncovered in 1973, the Hemudu relics were situated in the Hemudu
Town in Yuyao in east China's Zhejiang Province.
Archaeologists have already decided, however, that the relocation
was caused by either the frequency of seawater or a flood.
Based on the analysis of the geographic environment in the region,
Shao Jiuhua, former curator of the Hemudu Museum, recently proposed
that a malicious flood wield a fatal strike at the Hemudu
Culture.
The Hemudu was attacked by at least two vicious and long-lasting
floods, he argued, one 6,000 years ago and the other 5,000 years
ago, as detected through the accumulation of strata.
The second flood not only submerged the houses of the Hemudu
residents, but unexpectedly changed the course of a local river
called Yaojiang River as well.
The change in the river course posed a natural barrier to the
residents who usually went hunting for food in the hills on the
other side of the river.
Even more detrimental, seawater mixed back in along the new river
caused the soil to have saline in it, which made it sterile and
forced the residents to move.
Shao also pointed to the remnants of some big logs in the Hemudu
relics as traces of a flood. Only logs that serve as keels in
houses were held down while trigs and twitch grass used for
thatching the roofs were washed away, he explained.
Moreover, the fact that the silt gets thicker eastward under the
Hemudu relics might be another factor pointing toward a flood, he
said.
At
the same time, Shao denied the theory of seawater invasion as "not
in line with the archaeological finding in the region."
None of the remnants like shells bequeathed by sea invasion had
ever been discovered in the vicinity, he said.
Furthermore, Shao emphasized that "sea invasion is gradual in its
effect and therefore could not annihilate a culture all of the
sudden like a flood, seaquake or an earthquake does."
(People's Daily)