The Root of Jiangsu Civilization

Shunshanji Cultural Special Exhibition

May 18, 2024 is the 48th International Museum Day, and this year's theme is "Museums Committed to Education and Research", emphasizing the crucial role of cultural institutions in providing comprehensive educational experiences. On the occasion of International Museum Day on May 18th, our museum has launched the "Roots of Jiangsu Civilization - Shunshanji Cultural Special Exhibition". The Shunshanji Site is located in Meihua Town, Sihong County, Suqian City, Jiangsu Province. From 2010 to 2013, the Nanjing Museum Institute of Archaeology (Jiangsu Provincial Institute of Archaeology), together with the Suqian City Museum and the Sihong County Museum, conducted active archaeological excavations on the site, thus uncovering the mysterious veil of the ancient culture buried underground and dating back 8500 years - the Shunshanji Culture. In 2012, the Shunshanji Neolithic Archaeological Excavation Project in Sihong, Jiangsu Province was rated as one of the top ten new archaeological discoveries in China for the year 2012.

The Shunshanji culture is an archaeological culture from the middle to early Neolithic period in the middle and lower reaches of the Huai River, named after the Shunshanji site in Sihong. Based on its fixed pottery combination, unique cultural features, clear time periods, and certain distribution range, the remains represented by the first and second periods can be named Shunshanji Culture, with an absolute age of 8500 to 8000 years ago, which is the earliest known archaeological culture in Jiangsu Province.

A large circular trench with a circumference of nearly a kilometer has been discovered at the Shunshanji site. The trench is filled with a large amount of broken pottery, stone tools, and animal bones such as deer and pigs that have been consumed, indicating that a large number of residents lived along the inner side of the trench and gradually dumped their household waste into the area. A total of 5 well preserved Shunshanji cultural house sites have been discovered at the Shunshanji site, all located on the inner side of the moat and distributed in a concentrated manner. There are two types of house sites: ground type and shallow pit type, and some house sites have stove pits. The cemetery is located on the outer side of the moat in the northwest area of the site, all of which are rectangular vertical hole earth pit tombs arranged in an orderly manner. Most of them are buried with straight limbs and a few with bent limbs. Most of the tombs do not have accompanying objects, indicating that the social differentiation of Shunshanji culture is not yet obvious and the concentration of wealth is not high.

A large number of production and living utensils, such as pottery pots, pottery stoves, and pottery legs, were unearthed from the Shunshanji site. The combination of the three is a creative invention of the Shunshanji people. Among them, pottery legs are most distinctive in pig shape and double horn shape. In addition, relics such as bowls, jars, pots, beans, spinning wheels, spindles, stone sticks, stone axes, carbonized rice, pottery drums, and pottery sculptures were also unearthed. The discovery of pottery sculptures and pottery drums indicates that aesthetic preferences have gradually emerged.

The absolute age of the third phase of the Shunshanji site is around 7800 years ago, and it has significant cultural elements of the cross lake bridge from the Qiantang River Basin, which is a fusion of local traditions and external factors. This exhibition displays a total of 153 pieces/sets of relics and artifacts unearthed from Shunshanji and surrounding sites. The exhibition is divided into four units: Huanhao settlement, settled life, smoke rising from cooking, fishing and hunting collection, artistic interest, spiritual pursuit and inheritance development, exchange and interaction, comprehensively showcasing the cultural appearance and characteristics of Shunshanji site.

Exhibition Notice

Visit time: 8:30-12:00 AM 2:00-5:00 PM

Exhibition time: May 14th to June 16th, 2024

Exhibition Location: First Floor, Hai'an Museum (New Building)