View source for Banpo

{{Short description|Archaeological site in Shaanxi, China}}
{{other uses}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2022}}
{{infobox ancient site
| name = Banpo
| native_name = 半坡
| native_name_lang = zh
| image = Yangshao Village Diorama.jpg
| image_size = 300
| caption = Reconstructed diorama of a village at Banpo
| map_type = China
| map_caption = Location in China
| map_size = 300
| coordinates = {{coord|34.273|109.051|display=inline}}
| location = [[Shaanxi]], China
| type = Settlement
| built = {{circa|4700 BC}}
| abandoned = {{circa|3600 BC}}
| epochs = [[Neolithic China]]
| cultures = [[Yangshao culture]]
| discovered = 1953 by Shi Xingbang
}}
'''Banpo'''  is a [[Neolithic]] archaeological site located in the [[Yellow River]] valley, east of present-day [[Xi'an]], China. Discovered in 1953 by Shi Xingbang,<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3197015/shi-xingbang-pioneering-chinese-archaeologist-who-helped-excavate-terracotta-warriors-and-was|title=Pioneering archaeologist who helped excavate Terracotta Warriors dies at 99 |date=24 October 2022 |work=South China Morning Post}}</ref> the site represents the first phase of the [[Yangshao culture]] ({{circa|5000|3000&nbsp;BCE}}) and features the remains of several well organized settlements—including [[Jiangzhai]], which has been [[radiocarbon dated]] to {{circa|4700|3600&nbsp;BCE}}).<ref>{{Cite book |doi=10.1007/978-9-048-18716-4_8 | chapter=Climate Change and Desertification with Special Reference to the Cases in China |title=Changing Climates, Earth Systems and Society |year=2010 |last=Yang |first=Xiaoping |isbn=978-9-048-18715-7 |pages=177–187}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |chapter-url=http://faravashi.ir/download/Stark%20(ed.)%202006%20Archaeology%20of%20Asia.pdf |chapter=East Asian plant domestication |pages=77–95 |title=Archaeology of Asia |last=Crawford |first=Garry W. |editor-link1=Miriam Stark |editor-first=Miriam T. |editor-last=Stark |year=2004 |publisher=Blackwell}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |url=http://www.homepages.ucl.ac.uk/~tcrndfu/articles/china%20overview%20pre.pdf |title=A Critical Assessment of Early Agriculture in East Asia, with emphasis on Lower Yangzte Rice Domestication |last=Fuller |first=Dorian Q. |last2=Qin |first2=Ling |last3=Harvey |first3=Emma |journal=Pragdhara |year=2008 |pages=17–52}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |pmid=21592462 |year=2011 |last1=Meng |first1=Y |last2=Zhang |first2=H. Q. |last3=Pan |first3=F. |last4=He |first4=Z. D. |last5=Shao |first5=J-.L. |last6=Ding |first6=Y. |title=Prevalence of dental caries and tooth wear in a Neolithic population (6700-5600 years BP) from northern China |volume=56 |issue=11 |pages=1424–1435 |doi=10.1016/j.archoralbio.2011.04.003 |journal=Archives of Oral Biology}}</ref> An area of {{convert|5|to|6|ha|sp=us|sigfig=2}} was surrounded by a ditch, probably a defensive moat {{convert|5|to|6|m|ft|sp=us|sigfig=2}} wide. The houses at Banpo were circular, built of mud and wood on low foundations, with overhanging thatched roofs. There also appear to have been communal burials.<ref name=ching2>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dEBY37og6PYC |pages=8–9 |title=A Global History of Architecture |isbn=978-0-470-90245-5 |last=Jarzombek |first=Mark M. |last2=Prakash |first2=Vikramaditya |year=2011 |publisher=Wiley}}</ref>

==Site==
The settlement was surrounded by a [[moat]], with the graves and pottery [[kiln]]s located outside the moat perimeter. Many of the houses were semi-subterranean with the floor typically {{convert|1|m|ft|sp=us|sigfig=1}} below the ground surface. The houses were supported by timber poles and had steeply pitched thatched roofs.

According to the paradigm of archaeology influenced by [[Marxist historiography]] that was prevalent in China at the time the site was being excavated, Banpo society was considered to be [[matriarchal]]; however, new research contradicts this claim and the Marxist paradigm is gradually being phased out in modern Chinese archaeological research.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lhT0Z4L4g-kC |page=11 |title=The Chinese Neolithic |isbn=978-1-139-44170-4 |last1=Liu |first1=Li |year=2004 |publisher=Cambridge University Press}}</ref> The archaeological evidence to date has not allowed for deeper insight or analysis concerning the religious or political structure of Banpo society.<ref name="ching2"/><ref>{{Cite journal |doi=10.1073/pnas.0900158106 |title=Earliest domestication of common millet (Panicum miliaceum) in East Asia extended to 10,000 years ago |year=2009 |last1=Lu |first1=H. |last2=Zhang |first2=J. |last3=Liu |first3=K.-b. |last4=Wu |first4=N. |last5=Li |first5=Y. |last6=Zhou |first6=K. |last7=Ye |first7=M. |last8=Zhang |first8=T. |last9=Zhang |first9=H. |last10=Yang |first10=X. |last11=Shen |first11=L. |last12=Xu |first12=D. |last13=Li |first13=Q. |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |volume=106 |issue=18 |pages=7367–72 |pmid=19383791 |pmc=2678631|bibcode=2009PNAS..106.7367L |display-authors=8 |doi-access=free}}</ref>

The site is now home to the [[Xi'an Banpo Museum]], built in 1957 to preserve the archaeological collection.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.chinamuseums.com/ban_po.htm |title=Banpo Museum in Xi'an |publisher=chinamuseums.com |access-date=29 July 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180131145303/http://www.chinamuseums.com/ban_po.htm |archive-date=31 January 2018 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

==Banpo culture==
Banpo is the [[type site]] of the Banpo culture, first phase of the [[Yangshao culture|Yangshao Culture]]. Archaeological sites with similarities to the site at Banpo are considered to be part of the "Banpo phase" (4th-3rd millennium BCE) of the Yangshao culture. Banpo was excavated from 1954 to 1957.

The tomb of a four-year-old girl contains one of the earliest examples of children's [[Toy|toys]], a set of three stone balls.<ref name="GuoEymanSun">{{Cite book |last=Guo |first=Li |title=Games & Play in Chinese & Sinophone Cultures |last2=Eyman |first2=Douglas |last3=Sun |first3=Hongmei |date=2024 |publisher=[[University of Washington Press]] |isbn=9780295752402 |editor-last=Guo |editor-first=Li |location=Seattle, WA |pages=6 |chapter=Introduction |editor-last2=Eyman |editor-first2=Douglas |editor-last3=Sun |editor-first3=Hongmei}}</ref>

===Pottery innovations===
Banpo was the first culture to use the [[potter's wheel]] in China, while other cultures continued to use coiling techniques, and the potter's wheel only became generalized by the end of the [[Yangshao]] period.<ref name="YUP">{{cite book |last1=Chang |first1=Kwang-chih |last2=Xu |first2=Pingfang |last3=Lu |first3=Liancheng |last4=Pingfang |first4=Xu |last5=Wangping |first5=Shao |last6=Zhongpei |first6=Zhang |last7=Renxiang |first7=Wang |title=The Formation of Chinese Civilization: An Archaeological Perspective |date=1 January 2005 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-09382-7 |page=64 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sP-PN2StH2cC&pg=PA64 |language=en}}</ref> Banpo also had the first pottery kilns in China.<ref name="YUP"/> The designs of the Banpo were often geometric, and animal or anthropomorphic figures.<ref name="YUP"/>

<gallery widths="200px" heights="200px" perrow="4">
File:Banpo - Neolithic kiln (4535392749).jpg|Banpo pottery kiln
File:Banpo Neolithic pottery (4535389317).jpg|Banpo pottery made on a potter's wheel
File:YangshaoCordmarkedAmphoraBanpoPhase4800BCEShaanxi.jpg|[[Yangshao]] traditional [[cord-marked pottery|cordmarked]] [[amphora]] (Banpo phase, 4800&thinsp;BC, [[Shaanxi]]
</gallery>

===Designs===
[[File:Banpo motif (B&W).png|thumb|Banpo anthropomorphic motif]]
Banpo is known for a characteristic type of decorative pottery, with a red clay coating all over the body, and geometrical drawings in black, typically depicting a round human head with some fish around it. The round human head had a triangular design on top.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fang |first1=Lili |title=Chinese Ceramics |date=3 March 2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-18648-3 |page=10 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Dc0zHfMyv7wC&pg=PA10 |language=en}}</ref> Similarities have been noted between the motifs of the [[Afanasievo culture]] and [[Okunev culture]] of the [[Minusinsk basin]] in Siberia, and those on the potteries of Banpo.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kiselov (Киселёв) |first1=С.В. |title=Study of the Minusinsk stone sculptures (К изучению минусинских каменных изваяний) |date=1962 |publisher=Historical and archaeological collection ( Историко-археологический сборник) |pages=53–61 |url=http://kronk.spb.ru/library/kiselov-sv-1962b.htm|quote=During the excavations of the world-famous Yanshao [Yangshao] culture site near the village of Banpo near Xi'an, among numerous painted vessels, two large open bowls with paintings were found, especially important for comparison with images of masks from the Minusinsk-Khakass basin. Inside these bowls are painted masks that are strikingly similar to Minusinsk ones. They are distinguished by a horizontal division of the face into three zones, the presence of horns and a triangular figure above the head, as well as triangles on the chin (Fig. 2 ). Such coincidences can hardly be explained by mere chance. Even a few years before the discoveries in Ban-po, I had to pay attention to a number of features that bring the Eneolithic Afanasiev culture of the middle Yenisei closer to the culture of painted ceramics of Northern China. Apparently, the finds in Ban-po once again confirm these observations. At the same time, the noted finds and comparisons show that the appearance of images, so characteristic of the ancient stone sculptures of the middle Yenisei, not only goes back to the deep antiquity of the pre-Afanasiev time, but is apparently associated with the complex world of symbolic images of the Far East, now known from monuments of the Neolithic of Ancient China.}}</ref>  Pottery style emerging from the [[Yangshao culture]] spread westward to the [[Majiayao culture]], and then further to [[Xinjiang]] and [[Central Asia]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Zhang |first1=Kai |title=The Spread and Integration of Painted pottery Art along the Silk Road |journal=Region - Educational Research and Reviews |date=4 February 2021 |volume=3 |issue=1 |pages=18 |doi=10.32629/RERR.V3I1.242 |s2cid=234007445 |quote=The early cultural exchanges between the East and the West are mainly reflected in several aspects: first, in the late Neolithic period of painted pottery culture, the Yangshao culture (5000-3000 BC) from the Central Plains spreadwestward, which had a great impact on Majiayao culture (3000-2000 BC), and then continued to spread to Xinjiang and Central Asia through the transition of Hexi corridor|doi-access=free }}</ref>  

Several of the potteries have symbol marks, and are part of the [[Neolithic signs in China]], but each sign occurs singly, which is antinomic with the function of a written script. They could instead be the personal mark of individual potters.

<gallery widths="200px" heights="200px" perrow="4">
File:Pottery pot with human and fish design from Neolithic age (9000 to 2000 BC). Found in Shaanxi province. Beijing Capital Museum.jpg|Pottery pot with human and fish design, Shaanxi province. Beijing Capital Museum
File:Banpo bowl.jpg|Human faced&ndash;fish decorated bowl recovered at Banpo.
File:Banpo motif.jpg|Banpo anthropomorphic motif
File:Banpo Neolithic Village burial.jpg|Banpo burial
File:BanpoSkull.jpg|right|A skull recovered at Banpo displayed at the [[Xi'an Banpo Museum]].
File:Banpo pottery symbols.svg|Banpo pottery symbols
</gallery>

==See also==
* [[Banpo symbols]]
* [[Sanxingdui]]
* [[Cishan culture]]
* [[Nanzhuangtou]]
* [[Jiangzhai, Xi'an|Jiangzhai]]
* [[Yangguanzhai]]

==Footnotes==
{{reflist|2}}

==References==
{{commons category|Banpo Site}}
* Allan, Sarah (ed), ''The Formation of Chinese Civilization: An Archaeological Perspective'', {{ISBN|0-300-09382-9}}
* [[Kwang-chih Chang|Chang, Kwang-chih]]. ''The Archaeology of Ancient China'', {{ISBN|0-300-03784-8}}

{{Neolithic cultures of China}}
{{Prehistoric technology}}
{{Shaanxi topics}}
[[Category:Populated places established in the 5th millennium BC]]
[[Category:Populated places disestablished in the 4th millennium BC]]
[[Category:1953 archaeological discoveries]]
[[Category:History of Xi'an]]
[[Category:Archaeological sites in China]]
[[Category:Neolithic cultures of China]]
[[Category:Neolithic settlements]]
[[Category:Former populated places in China]]
[[Category:Archaeological type sites]]
[[Category:Major National Historical and Cultural Sites in Shaanxi]]
[[Category:5th-millennium BC establishments]]
[[Category:Tourist attractions in Xi'an]]
[[Category:Yangshao culture]]
[[Category:Archaeological discoveries in China]]