内蒙古哈民忙哈遗址房址内大批人骨遗骸死因蠡测——关于史前灾难事件的探索与思考

Investigation on the Mass Graves Found in House Foundations at the Hamin Mangha Site,Inner Mongolia:Exploration and Reflection on Prehistoric Catastrophic Events

内蒙古科左中旗哈民忙哈遗址一系列重要发现,最引人注目的当属数座房址内揭露出大批人骨遗骸,场景之震撼在我国史前考古中极为罕见。种种迹象表明遗址是遭遇突发事件而废弃的,是什么原因导致这一事件的发生,那些罹难者为何集中于房址内?本文通过凝固历史瞬间保存下来的情境观察和人骨反映的死亡年龄统计,结合自然环境与生业方式分析,在排除地质灾害、人为杀戮等灾难后,提出距今5000多年前科尔沁沙地曾暴发过瘟疫。导致哈民忙哈居民群体死亡的直接原因,应缘于一场肆虐的鼠疫,并由此引发了辽西新石器文化的变迁。

One of the most significant discoveries at the Hamin Mangha site in Inner Mongolia is a large amount of human remains found in a few house foundations, which are very rare in prehistoric archaeology of China. All the relevant evidence suggests that human remains were abandoned in a sudden event. This article investigates the potential causes and reasons of this event. The authors synthetize evidence from archaeological features, age profile of human remains, and economic subsistence at the site. After ruling out potential causes such as earthquake and warfare, this article proposes that the large death toll might have been caused by a plague in the Horqin Sandy Land 5,000 years ago. This natural disaster also led to a series of cultural changes in the Neolithic Western Liaoning.