An ancient sea shell discovered in northwest China's inland Qinghai province has provided a valuable clue to the area's links with cultures of the Indian subcontinent 3,000 years ago.
Chinese and Japanese researchers have concluded that a whelk unearthed in graves from the Neolithic Kayue Culture in Huangzhong County is a turbinella pyruin, which came from the Bay of Bengal.
Professor Li Fuxue, of the oceanology department of Xiamen University based in east China's Fujian Province, and Kuroauma Taiji, of the zoology department of the Natural History Museum and Institute, in Chiba, Japan, both concluded that the turbinella pyruin, which has a hole bored through the middle, was used as an ornament.
Wang Guodao, vice-president of the Archeology Research Institute of Qinghai, said the turbinella pyruin was commonly used as a musical instrument in Buddhist rituals in ancient India, but it was a rare find in China, especially in Qinghai, Wang said.
Archeologists are trying to ascertain the route by which the shell came to Qinghai.
(eastday.com February 2, 2003)
