Acta Anthropologica Sinica ›› 2004, Vol. 23 ›› Issue (01): 13-33.

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Bone artifacts from Dongfang Plaza site of Wangfujing,Beijing

LI Chao-rong; FENG Xing-wu; YU Jin-cheng; ZHAO Ling-xia   

  • Online:2004-03-15 Published:2004-03-15

Abstract: This is a special study on the artifacts unearthed from Dongfang Plaza Paleolithic site of Wangfujing, Beijing. Among 2000-odd pieces animal fossils discovered in situ, 411 pieces are identified as bone artifacts. A total of 245 pieces were found from the Lower Cultural Horizon and are classified as 23 bone chunks, 23 bone cores, 133 flakes, 22 chips and 44 bone tools including 10 scrap-ers, 26 points, 6 burins and 2 shavers; 166 pieces from the Upper Cultural Horizon are classified as 1 bone chunks, 3 bone cores, 5 flakes, 7 chips and 4 bone tools including 2 points, 1 burin and 1 shav-er; 146 pieces are without definite positions and are classified as 31 bone chunks, 56 flakes, 43 chips and 16 bone tools including 8 scrapers, 5 points and 3 burins.
Based on detailed examinations of these bone artifacts, general characteristics of the bone materials can be summarized as:
1) The bone artifacts were preserved well without suffering serious weathering or abrasion;
2) Bone tools were made mainly on some animal' s femur when they had been dried in the sun for some time, instead of being fresh
3) Bone flakes are dominant in this bone assemblage.
4) Most bone artifacts are irregular in shape.
5) Stone hammers are used to flake from exterior surface to cavity surface or from cavity surface to exterior surface, and to retouch in an alternating fashion or the way to cavity surface.
6) A total of 79 pieces of them are spliced into 33 bigger pieces.
7) 45 pieces of them have stone cutting, chopping, or scoring marks.
8) Some bones dyed by hematite powder reflect human' s religious ideology.
The characteristics of cultural remains show that the site was a primary deposit and a temporary camp. Cutting and chopping marks on some bone artifacts reflect the life style of butchering and eating animals;Scoring marks reflect exquisite human craftsmanship.
Dongfang Plaza site shares certain common characteristics in bone artifacts with some other similar Paleolithic sites such as the Upper Cave, Shiyu. In general, this further indicates that it has close affiliation to those sites discovered in North China in history.

Key words: Bone artifacts; Retouch technology; Human behaviors; Dongfang Plaza site at Wangfujing of Beijing