From a community to communities of practice: The Late Shang Dynasty site of Miaopu Locus North at Anyang, Henan Province, China

This thesis examines social developments in the Late Shang Dynasty (ca. 1300--1046 BCE) bronze-manufacturing site of Miaopu Locus North located in the modern day city of Anyang in Henan Province, China. The objects of this study are, first, to investigate the social aspects of bronze production during the Late Shang period and, secondly, to examine how the occupants of this site were socially, economically, and politically connected to the wider Shang society around them.; I approach these issues through the study of foodways: production, allocation, preparation, and consumption of food. My main source of data is whole and reconstructed ceramic vessels unearthed at the site in the early 1960s. This sample is supplemented by similarly reconstructed vessels from Dasikongcun excavated at the same time. I also briefly introduce sherd data from Xiaomintun Locus Southeast excavated in 2000 and 2001. Both of these latter sites are also located at Anyang. The methodology I use is ceramic use-wear analysis. This methodology is based on published studies in ethnoarchaeology and experimental archaeology, although I have added a significant statistical component to it.; Based on the ceramic data, reanalysis of excavation reports from other Anyang sites, and recent archaeological studies regarding Anyang and Miaopu, I argue that the site changed from a community of craft producers and their families, who were directly associated with and supervised by resident elites, to a workshop no longer displaying previous communal qualities. I suggest that this single community fragmented into several interrelated communities of practice thus forming a constellation of practice. I also argue that this transformation in the nature of Miaopu Locus is connected to contemporaneous changes in the structure of the Late Shang state.