中国早期铜器的几个问题

SOME PROBLEMS CONCERNING CHINA’S EARLY COPPER AND BRONZE ARTEFACTS

一在人类历史上,金属器的出现,是划时代的重大事件。由父系氏族公社的新石器时代晚期,过渡到奴隶制的青铜器时代,标志着社会发展和生产关系的巨大变革,从而关于金属器的产生和发展,也就成为考古学研究中的重要课题之一。早在商代,中国已进入奴隶制社会,灿烂的青铜文明在古代世界史上放射着异彩。

The coppers and early bronzes discovered after liberation has provided us with im-portant clues for studying the origin and development of China's bronze metallurgy.Butas some of the data is very problematic,Mr.Tang Lan's proposition that China's bronzescame into existence 6,000 years ago and that her bronzes predate her coppers is open toquestion.The article here offers some points for discussion.Laboratory tests show that the fragments of bronzes unearthed at Banpo in Xian,Sbaanxi province,and at Jiangzhai in Lintong,were made respectively of copper-nickel andcopper-zinc alloys.Since these alloys appeared much later than the Yangshao culture,thefragments referred to could have nothing to do with it.Some copper,bronze and brass implements were discovered at the Longshan sites,but they were products of a later period and do not belong to the Longshan culture.Asfor the three-legged bronze pitcher described in the book《西清古鉴》,although shaped verymuch like the pottery pitchers of the Longshan culture,it does not belong to that culture.The late stage of Longshan culture is overlapped with early Shang culture,so verypossibly the bronze pitcher was a product of the latter.Small copper objects,including a few bronze articles,are fairly common at the sites ofthe Qijia culture.Even the bronze mirror unearthed at Gamatai in Guinan,Qinghai pro-vince,resembles,both in shape and design,those excavated at the Shang dynasty tombsat Anyang,Henan province.These are indications that the Qijia culture went throughthe copper-making to the bronze-making stage of development and that the culture's latterperiod coincided with the Shang dynasty.The early Shang sites in Henan as represented by Erlitou already belonged to theBronze Age.The bronze instruments,contaiuers,weapons and ornaments found there areChina's earliest bronzes so far discovered.Their alloy composition,casting techniques,shapes and designs link them with the bronzes of the Shang culture's middle and latestages and trace a continuous line of development between them.