Research On The Burial Customs Of Dawenkou Culture In North Shandong Province

Dawenkou Culture is a famous archaeological culture distributed in Haidairegion in the late Neolithic Age.Amounts of burial materials of this culture havebeen excavated in south Shandong,east Henan,north Anhui and north Jiangsuprovince in the past,on which scholars have already carried out deepresearches,while such materials in north Shandong province are somewhat weak,towhich attention has not been given sufficiently in previous researches.On the basis ofpublished burial materials and previous researches,this paper,from the view of singlegrave、spatial layout of cemetery and the relationship of cemetery and dwellingarea,concretely analyzes and summarizes the burial customs of Dawenkou Culture innorth Shandong province,which is divided into4sub-areas according to thearchaeological cultural feathers,including northwest Shandong、 mid-northShandong、 Jiaodong peninsula and the Weihe river-Jiaolaihe river basin,thendiscusses the similarities and differences of burial customs compared with the formerand later archaeological remains in this region and contemporaneous neighboringremains.Based on the above,this paper makes a preliminary discussion on theconnotation and researching method of prehistoric burial customs.This paper is divided into5parts as follows:Chapter1:Preface.This section firstly introduces the natural geographicalenvironment from the ocean、mountains and rivers,then reviews the periodization ofDawenkou Culture and researching status of the burial customs within the scope ofthis paper.Chapter2:Research on the burial customs of single grave.This section analyzesand compares the statistics in detail on the burial customs among the4sub-areas,then divides all the Dawenkou Culture’s burials into5grades.Chapter3:Research on the burial customs of cemetery.This section firstly analyzes the relationship between cemetery and dwelling area in each site,and wefind that they two separate obviously from each other,while the cemetery location isdifferent among the4sub-areas. Secondly,we make an analysis on the spatial layoutof each cemetery.We find there are closely related grave rows or groups in mostcemetery,which should be a reflect of the treatment to the dead by the living.Thespatial layout of cemetery is comparatively similar in each sub-area,but certaindifferent among sub-areas.Chapter4:Comparison with adjacent burial remains.This section compares theburial customs of Dawenkou Culture with the former cultures,including HouliCulture and Beixin Culture,and the later culture in North Shandong province,whichis Longshan Culture,and also discusses its inheritance and development.Then thissection contrasts the burial customs in North Shandong with neighboring sub-areasof Dawenkou Culture in Haidai region,and discusses the similarities and differenceswithin Haidai region.Chapter5:Conclusion.Based on the study of this paper,this section makes apreliminary discussion on the connotation and researching method of prehistoricburial customs,and summarizes the main points of this article.