| Abstract: |
Lying at a distance of four kilometers to the north of Shang-na-pang 上那蚌、the home of the Yuanmou Man, in Yuan-mou County, Yunnan Province, the site measures about 5,000 square metres in area. Between February 1972 and January 1973, three seasons of excavations were conducted at the site over an area of 496 square meters, bringing to light the remains of fifteen dwellings, seven hearths, four storage pits, thirty-seven tombs and a large quantity of implements, objects of daily use and animal remains. On the basis of stratigraphical evidence, the finds have been assigned to two stages of development, one earlier than the other. Built of logs on the ground level, the dwellings are all oblong in shape but with no fixed orientation and apparently no entrance passage. One dwelling dating from the early stage is further provided with a screen-like curved wall sheltering the entrance. The dead are mostly buried in an extended position with severed limbs, while urn burials are reserved for the children. The bulk of the implements consists of the stone axe and adze, as well as pottery spinning whorls. The pottery are all hand-made and dominated by the po-vase, pen-basin and various types of kuan-vases. However, the shapes are somewhat different between the two stages. The finds from the Ta-tun-tzu site show that the people lived mainly by farming, supplemented by some hunting, gathering and the raising of domesticated animals. Their staple grain seems to be rice of the keng variety but the farming techniques were still very primitive. The authors are of the opinion that the site probably dates from the period when the matriarchal clan society was already declining. Radio-carbon tests of the charcoal remains from post-hole No. 12 of Dwelling No. 5 of the early stage point to a date of 3210±90 B.P
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