Bulletin Autumn‧Winter 1981

Twenty-Third Congregation began three million years ago. The Pleistocene epoch is divided by geologists into three periods: Upper, Middle and Lower. In the Lower Pleistocene, 1,700,000-200,000 years ago, the land was populated by Homo erectus. Fossils of Homo erectus were found in many places and altogether there are five species: Yuanmouemis of Yunnan, Yunhsienensis and Yunhsiensis of Hupei, Lantienensis of Shensi and Pekinensis of Hopei. These Homo erectus made stone tools and invented the use of fire, which was their main source of energy. The dating of the Middle Pleistocene was from about 200,000 to 100,000 years ago. In the three main river basins of China were found relics and remains of Homo Neanderthalensis. There were the Ma-pa Man in the Chuchiang valley, the Ch'ang-yan g Man in the Yangtse valley, and in the Huangho valley there were the Ordos Man, the Hsu-chia-yao Man and the Ting-ts'un Man. The stone tools they used were varied and catered for the various hunting activities. The Upper Pleistocene dated from around 100,000 to 10,000 years ago, and the land was populated by Homo sapiens sapiens. In South China, there were the Li-chiang Man, the Lai-pin Man and the Liu-chiang Man, and in North China there were the Sjara-osso-gol Man, the Chih-y ü Man and the Upper- Cave Man. Not only did they develop the industry of stone, shell, bone and horn, but they also improved the techniques of grinding, polishing, piercing and carving. Settlement was established, with a familial social unit. They sewed, made tailored clothes and wore ornaments. Cultural development was truly reflected by the way they lived. Archaeologists labelled this long Pleistocene epoch the Palaeolithic age. The ensuing Holocene began 10,000 years ago. The inhabitants of China a t that time were generally called Proto-Chinese, and their culture belonged to the Neolithic age. In the recent decades, thousands of Neolithic sites have been recorded all over China. Not only had they made significant progress in agriculture and industry, but they have also learnt to use fire to make pottery. I n architecture, they had demonstrated their fine and sophisticated skills in making tenons and mortises and carving. The level of their material civilization was very high indeed. They lived in village communities, and the worship of a common ancestor provide d the uniting force. They invented symbols and characters as a means of communication and as decoration on daily utensils. The symbols and patterns on prehistoric painted pottery were painted by Chinese brushes, which were in use six to seven thousand years ago. Actually, the basic cultural traits of China were fully developed in the pre-historic period. The Chinese people were the master of a big mass of land with various types o f environment, and the Proto-Chinese adapted their cultures accordingly. Although they were inevitably different physically and in their language and culture, they were the Mongoloid race, which had survived without interruption. The most significant contribution of archaeology is to establish the pre-historic history of one million years of the Chinese people and culture. Although the articles unearthed are simple and rustic, they betrayed the abundant material underground, waiting for later excavations. Historical China can be traced back to the ancient Three Dynasties. The Hsia Dynasty existed roughly 4,000 years ago. Although no inscriptions have yet been found on the relics of the Hsia people, their dwelling sites, were laid, i n terms of cultural layers, right above the pre-historic leve l and beneath the Shang level. The layers were so distinct that the existence of Hsia is beyond doubt. Besides, there were the descendants of the Hsia people living i n the Chi state even during the Ch'un-ch'iu period. At that time there were more than one hundred small states, which were occupied by the different tribes i n the 7