Archaeological Research At The City Site Of The Zhu State From Eastern Zhou To Western Han Periods With The Perspective Of Paleoethnobotany:A Case Study Based On Macroremains In 2015

The aim of Paleoethnobotany is to observe the plant and then to study human beings.While researching the macroremains from the excavation of the city site of the Zhu State in 2015,this paper is trying to understand the human-plant interaction from the urban aspect.In this period,feeding the inhabitants is on longer their main job,while improving the living condition and establishing the aesthetic standards have becoming the new features.Plants were used to divide different landscapes on purpose,which could also be one important reason for the evolution of urban landscape.In the given 24 identified plant categories of Zhu City,the number of wheat,millet and soybean have account for the most;un-agricultural plants do not account much,even though the categories are variable,including weed seeds and fruits&nuts.Basing on the plant remains assemblage and their characteristics,I distinguished the livelihood in both crop land and city land,aiming to reconstruct the urban landscape by understanding the plant habit.Inside of this highly programmed city,there is one area shows an outstanding feature,with a totally different plant characteristic.In the process of city complexity,the urban landscape experiences a huge transformation during Eastern Zhou and Han periods,which leads the change on human-plant interactions pattern and reflects the macro development of the society and culture in this time.As for the methodology,this paper intends to apply the time and space analysis of density into the paleoethnobotany research to figure out the relationship between the inhabitants and the plant.In addition,the ratio of grain to weed seeds could also provide a wider representation foundation.By comparing the Zhu City with the settlement center in different time phase,macroremain appears in similar pattern clearly:the settlement scale is in inverse proportion to plant ratio.From this term,I may suggest that,in one united cultural region,the status of residence zone is higher than the political,workshop,and crucial zones;which also means that because of the pre-plan on different city zones,the status of this settlement is higher than other villages or smaller settlements.In addition,the research on ancient agriculture and diet shows a great advantage by using the paleoethnobotanical method,the quantification could provide the most visual representation on grain structure.From the macro aspect,the grain structure of Zhu City remained a steady condition,with time goes by,the internal structure starting to change,like the competition of millet-wheat,the change of soybean,the transform of Adzuki Bean,and the disappearance of rice.From the micro aspect,the superiority of wheat could possibly reflect the ancient wheat revolution.However,it will be never enough with the archaeological evidence,only by combing the historical documents can we get a better understanding on the ancient agriculture and food structure.We attempted to build an archaeological interpretation model of urban plants through landscape.Only one city site is not enough.This paper can only elaborate the simple observation on the plants of the Zhu City,more conclusions need to be done in the future.