A Study Of The Faunal Remains Excavated From Nanbaoligaotu Tomb In Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region And Related Problems

Nanbaoligaotu site and tomb are found in 1990 s. During the three years of excavation, we have uncovered four sites. A, B, and C site are tombs. The Late Neolithic tomb is the largest with the most abundant relics, and the unique cultural characteristics in the eastern Inner Mongolia and even in the whole northeast area that we have found so far. In the paper, we research the faunal remains and take the bone,horn, tooth, and shell artifacts as the main research objects.A total of 995 speciments of excavated faunal remains are found. Among them,888 speciments can be processed as bone, horn, tooth, and shell artifacts. Only 107 speciments can’t be processed. Overall, faunal remains have the higher degree of weathering, and a high lever of damage. 882 speciments can be identified to species and only 97 speciments can be identified to parts.Besides making a basic identification of animal species, this paper also focus on the bone, horn, tooth, shell artifacts of observation and research, to provide more evidence for further study at the time of the natural environment, life mode, the development level of handicraft industry, living habits and other issues.This paper is divided into six parts:Chapter 1 The preface is briefly introduces the Nanbaoligaotu tomb’s geographical location, excavation process, research results, as well as the research objects and the research content.Chapter 2 According to the observation records and statistical analysis, this chapter introduced the whole preservation condition of faunal remains, including animal species, NISPs, MNIs and other basic informations.Chapter 3 It describes and identifies the faunal remains, including mollusc,birds and mammals. Typical specimens are selected to described each of animalspecies and the detailed measurement data are listed to reference.Chapter 4 Observe and study the natural or artificial traces on the surface of animal bones. There are some reasons in the burial process, so the preservation condition of faunal remains is poor. This chapter mainly aims at discussing the production and using process of traces on the surface of animal bones.Chapter 5 This chapter is the key part of this article. The bone, horn, tooth, and shell artifacts are classified. From ingredients to forming process, there are some explicit discussion and analyzes the function of typical artifacts. At the same time, the making and using process of related problems are discussed. It provides the related artifacts’ photos and detailed measurement data for reference.Chapter 6 There are some related problems about Nanbaoligaotu tomb are discussed, mainly including four issues: the multicultural factors of the animal bone artifacts; the funerary custom and social phenomena; the life mode; and the ecological environment informations.Chapter 7 Above these results of research, mainly summarizes the basic informations of Nanbaoligaotu tomb’s animal bones, including the identification of animal species, the preservation conditions of faunal remains, some ecological environment and economic informations; bone surface trace analysis; the classification of bone, horn, tooth, and shell artifacts; process flow; the way of using informations and the human activities.