What is the era after the Neolithic Age in China?

The era after the Neolithic Age in China was the Bronze Age. The Bronze Age (or Bronze Age or Bronze Civilization) is a stage of human cultural development marked by the use of bronzes in archaeology. Because metals are easy to corrode, bronze relics discovered four or five thousand years ago are often rare.

There must be such a feature in the bronze age: bronzes occupy an important position in people's production and life, and the age when bronzes are accidentally manufactured and used cannot be recognized as the bronze age.

After the bronze age and before the iron age, the age in the world ranged from 4000 BC to early AD. All parts of the world have entered this era.

Bronzes were used in southern Iran and Mesopotamia from 4000 BC to 3000 BC, in Europe from 4000 BC to 3000 BC, and in India and Egypt from 3000 BC to 2000 BC. In Africa except Egypt and North Africa, bronze was used later, about no later than 65438 BC+0000 ~ early AD.

Copper smelting centers did not appear in the United States until nearly 1 1 century. China mastered bronze smelting technology before 3000 BC.

In the Bronze Age, several important bronze casting industrial zones were formed in the world, which became the center of the formation of ancient human civilization. In some areas with developed ancient culture, the bronze age was adapted to the social form of slavery, such as Aegean Sea, Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, China and other countries and regions. At this time, all slave countries prospered.

However, there are also some areas that have directly transitioned to the Iron Age without going through the Bronze Age. In the Bronze Age, writing appeared in civilized areas. ?

There are different opinions about the starting time of the Bronze Age in China. Some scholars believe that the late Longshan culture or Longshan era has entered the Bronze Age, about 3000 BC or later. Because only sporadic copper remains are found, which do not conform to the characteristics of the above bronze age, the possibility can be ignored. ?

From the1980s, Erlitou culture was generally regarded as the early culture of China Bronze Age, in which a large number of bronze ritual vessels, weapons, tools and decorations were unearthed. Because the carbon dating data of Erlitou culture is between 1980 BC, it is generally believed that around 2000 BC is the upper limit of China Bronze Age.

Later, some researchers classified the copper remains in the early northwest as the Bronze Age, and thought that there were two independent origins in the northwest and the Central Plains, but in absolute terms, they still thought that they entered the Bronze Age around 2000 BC.

Before Erlitou culture, only sporadic copper remains were found in the Central Plains. For example, there are red copper bells, arsenic copper gear-like devices, container fragments and so on. Found in the Taosi site in Xiangfen, but no bronzes were found; Bronze containers were unearthed at Wang Chenggang site in Dengfeng, and copper containers were unearthed at Xinzhai site in Xinmi.

There are few bronzes found in the first phase of Erlitou culture, all of which are small objects. In the second stage, bronze bells and bronze ornaments inlaid with turquoise appeared, and in the third stage, a batch of bronze ritual vessels and weapons were unearthed. Therefore, according to the current archaeological materials, the time when the Central Plains entered the Bronze Age was at most the second phase of Erlitou Culture.

According to Yuejueshu, Ou Yezi was invited by King Chu Zhao to "chisel the mountain, drain its flow, and take Iron Eagle as the three iron swords of Long Yuan, Taiya and Ministry of Industry".

The king of Chu once led the sword of Tai 'a to defeat Jin, Zheng and Wang Sanjun. Although the above records contain legendary elements, they also show the brilliance of Euclid's sword casting. This shows that the bronze casting technology in this period is exquisite.

As far as the current understanding is concerned, the whole East Asian continent entered the Bronze Age around BC 1700. The earliest archaeological cultures that entered the Bronze Age were Siba culture, Liangzhu culture, late Qijia culture, Xiajiadian lower culture and Erlitou culture. The communication between these earliest bronze age cultures needs to be further explored.

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The bronze mining and metallurgy industry is gradually recognized from the production practice of stone tool processing and pottery firing.

The earliest mining industry began to look for minerals from surface excavation. When they discovered the law that the vein or ore belt extends to the deep, people created a method of digging a shaft from the ground to the underground, and digging a tunnel from the bottom of the shaft to the surrounding area to find and mine ore. Sometimes people find that there is ore deep in the roadway, so they dig a shaft down from the roadway. This kind of well does not lead directly to the ground, so people call it a blind well.

In this way, the mine is generally supported by wooden frames to prevent the surrounding rock from collapsing. The frame made by tenon joint or lap joint can effectively bear the top pressure, side pressure and bottom pressure of roadway, ensuring the safety of underground miners and the smooth progress of mining work.

In this way, ore can be excavated from deeper underground. Compared with open-pit mining, this is an improvement, saving labor and time. From the Shang and Zhou mining relics discovered in Tonglushan, Daye, Hubei Province and Tongling, Ruichang, Jiangxi Province, it can be seen that both open-pit mining and pit mining were adopted. Of course, it is also a way to find copper ore from the sand and gravel entrained in the river in the mining area, and it has probably been mastered at this time.

In the process of searching for stones and processing, people gradually identified natural copper and copper ores. For example, there is a kind of copper ore, which is green in color and similar in cross-section texture to peacock feathers, so people call it malachite. This malachite has a high copper content, and its copper grade can reach 10-20% or higher.

This is an oxidized ore. As long as charcoal is smelted in a smelting furnace and heated to a slightly higher temperature 1000℃, copper can be smelted. It often appears with native copper, and its color is similar to that of copper rust, so malachite is probably the earliest copper ore used for smelting. The rich experience accumulated in the process of pottery firing provides the necessary high-temperature knowledge, refractories, modeling materials and modeling technology for bronze smelting and casting industry.

For example, the firing temperature of longshan black pottery and white pottery is close to the melting point of copper. At that time, the technology of making clay blanks and printing patterns with ceramic molds was similar to that of casting copper molds. Melting and casting furnaces, watercolors and molds are all ceramic utensils. Charcoal used for smelting copper is also the same as fuel used for burning pottery.

According to the information provided by archaeological work, almost all the places where ancient mining and smelting sites were found have residential sites of the same period. Therefore, when people make stone tools and disappear in these hills in search of raw materials, if they once knew copper ores such as natural copper and malachite, then mining these metal raw materials has become their new job.

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Copper smelting technology in the Spring and Autumn Period was developed on the basis of copper smelting technology in Shang Dynasty and Western Zhou Dynasty. The amount of bronze unearthed in Shang Dynasty and Western Zhou Dynasty and the amount of copper used may indicate that the copper smelting industry was relatively developed at that time, so it is reasonable to think that the smelting level of Shang Dynasty and Western Zhou Dynasty is not low.

It is very important to measure the smelting level, that is, the copper content in smelting slag. Because the higher the content of silica (SiO2 _ 2) in ore, the greater the viscosity of slag, the worse the fluidity of slag and the more copper it contains. In the spring and autumn period, the ore blending technology has been mastered in the smelting process, which has reduced the copper content in slag to 0.7%, which is a manifestation of high smelting level. Perhaps this kind of ore mixing technology appeared in the Western Zhou Dynasty.

According to statistics, there are tens of thousands of bronzes with inscriptions unearthed in Shang Dynasty and Western Zhou Dynasty, and bronzes without inscriptions are several times this number. In the Shang Dynasty and the Western Zhou Dynasty, it was impossible to provide such a large amount of copper raw materials without developed mining and smelting industries.

Most of the ancient copper mine sites in Shang and Zhou Dynasties were found in the contact zone between igneous rocks and marble. Because the rocks in the contact zone are relatively broken, it is easier to mine. Due to precipitation and leaching, the copper element on the surface is relatively concentrated in the contact zone, and the copper grade is gradually enriched from top to bottom, forming an oxide ore enrichment zone.

This condition made it an ideal copper mining place for ancient ancestors. The minerals here are mainly malachite, chrysocolla and chalcopyrite. , are oxide minerals. Natural copper is often found in the deep sea. Tonglu Mountain in Daye, as its name implies, is a copper-green hill. After every heavy rain there, many green malachite fragments are exposed on the ground and everywhere.

Therefore, its copper resources were developed and utilized a long time ago, and the mining remains of 1 1 No.2 and No.7 ore bodies are considered as the remains of the Western Zhou Dynasty or earlier.

At that time, the method of smelting copper ore was to put ore and charcoal into a smelting furnace for smelting. Because these ores are oxide ores, this smelting is called oxide ore reduction smelting. Although only the vertical copper smelting furnaces in the Spring and Autumn Period were discovered, the smelting furnaces in the Shang Dynasty and the Western Zhou Dynasty have not been seen. However, the simulation experiment proves that the shaft furnace used for copper smelting in the Spring and Autumn Period has good smelting performance, which can continuously feed, continuously discharge slag and intermittently discharge copper.

Baidu encyclopedia-bronze age

Baidu Encyclopedia-China Neolithic Age