A report on the 2007 excavation of the Ranjialukou Paleolithic Site in the Three Gorges Region, China
PENG Fei; PEI Shu-wen; MA Ning; GAO Xing; LI Guo-hong
2009, 28(02):
130-146.
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The Ranjialukou Paleolithic site, located in Fengdu County, Chongqing, is buried in the third terrace of the left bank of the Changjiang River. The site has been excavated three times during 2000, 2001 and 2005 field work seasons by the staff of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (Chinese Academy of Sciences), as part of a salvage archeological project in the Three Gorges Region. The past excavations exposed a total area of about 1800 ㎡, with 1031 stone artifacts collected. A 4th excavation was divided into A and B trenches, which exposed area of 264㎡ and 1740㎡ , respectively.
Five stratigraphic layers of the third terrace were identified at the site, with the total thickness of more than 5 meters. Archaeological materials were unearthed mainly from the 5th layer, a layer of alluvial cobbles 1.0 m —3.0 m in thickness. A total of 470 and 116 stone artifacts were unearthed from the cultural layer of A and B trenches, respectively. Note that there are also 24 stone artifacts from the upper cultivated layer of trench B.
The stone assemblage includes cores, flakes, chunks and retouched tools. Lithic raw materials exploited core reduction and tool manufacture were locally available from ancient riverbeds, and there were more than 14 kinds of raw materials belonging to igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic types. Silicarenite is the predominant raw material, and the principal flaking technique is direct hammer percussion without prepared striking platforms, but showing anvil chipping and throwing against anvil techniques (“ Yangtze flaking technique”) . Most stone artifacts are large in size, and most blanks for tool fabrication are flakes exceeding 80 percent of blank size. Seven retouched tool classes are identified, with choppers and scrapers being the dominant classes, followed by notches, knifes, points, picks and cleavers. Modified tools appear to be retouched by direct hammer percussion with mostly unifacial retouch on the distal end and lateral margin of the blank.
Geomorphological and chronological comparison among sites in the Three Gorges region indicates that early human activities took place in the late Middle Pleistocene. The stone tool assemblage of the site not only resembles the Pebble Tool Industry (Main Industry) in South China , but also bears the unique characteristic of a high percentage of flakes and flake tools in the assemblage. It can be inferred from a comparison of the Three Gorges region, Luonan basin in Shannxi Province and Hanshui drainage area that this high percentage of flakes and flake tools existed in the adjacent areas, which may indicate a single Paleolithic cultural tradition.
