Wang Zhongshu

Wang Zhongshu a Chinese archaeologist of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries (1925-2015), one of the founders of modern Chinese archaeology and a leading specialist on the Han dynasty and on the archaeology of ancient China's relations with other cultures. His work combined excavation, the study of artefacts and the analysis of written sources in the service of historical reconstruction.

Early Life and Education

Wang Zhongshu was born in 1925 in Zhejiang province. He grew up during the years of war and upheaval that accompanied the Japanese invasion and the civil conflict, and his education was interrupted and delayed by the disruption of the period. Despite these difficulties he pursued his studies and entered the field that would occupy his life.

He was trained in history at university and then, in the early years of the new order, was among the first cohort of students to be formed in the discipline of modern archaeology, which was then being established in China with the help of new institutions and new methods. He learned the techniques of excavation, the classification of artefacts and the interpretation of material evidence.

His formation combined a solid historical education with the practical skills of the field archaeologist. He took part in excavations from an early date and acquired a firsthand knowledge of the material record that informed all of his later scholarship and gave it an unusual concreteness.

The Archaeology of the Han Dynasty

Wang Zhongshu's most celebrated work is his comprehensive study of the archaeology of the Han dynasty, a book that surveyed the tombs, cities, industries and works of art of the period and reconstructed its material culture in remarkable detail. It became a standard reference in many languages and helped to introduce the achievements of Han archaeology to an international readership.

He examined the royal and aristocratic tombs of the period together with their furnishing, the structure of the capital cities and their palaces, the metallurgy, ceramics, lacquer ware, textiles and jades for which the age was famous, and the development of agriculture and transport. His account of Han technology and economy drew on the excavated evidence to illuminate the daily life of the empire.

The book demonstrated how archaeology could complement and correct the written record. Where the histories gave the framework of dynastic politics, the material remains revealed the conditions of agriculture, craft and commerce and the artistic achievements of a society that had unified China and extended its influence across Asia.

Cultural Exchange and the Silk Road

A second major field of Wang Zhongshu's research was the archaeology of cultural exchange between China and its neighbours. He studied the evidence for Chinese contacts with Japan, Korea and the peoples of Central Asia, and he examined the way in which objects, techniques and ideas moved along the routes of trade and diplomacy.

He was especially interested in the transmission of Chinese artefacts and technology to Japan in the early centuries of the common era, and in the reciprocal influence of foreign goods and customs on Chinese society. He analysed mirrors, coins, ceramics and other objects found far from their place of manufacture as evidence of the networks that linked the ancient world.

His work on the silk road and on the maritime and overland connections of the Han empire contributed to a broader understanding of ancient globalisation. He showed that China was not an isolated civilisation but one engaged in continuing exchange with its neighbours, and he brought archaeological precision to questions that had often been discussed in the abstract.

Excavation and Fieldwork

Wang Zhongshu participated in and directed important excavations, above all at the site of the Han capital and at other major centres of the period. The work at the capital yielded evidence for the planning of the city, the layout of its palaces and markets and the density and character of its population, and it clarified many questions about urban life in the empire.

He was also involved in the investigation of tombs and workshops, and in the study of the objects recovered from them. He combined the careful recording of context, the central discipline of archaeology, with the analysis of materials and techniques, and he trained students in the methods of field research that he had helped to develop.

His fieldwork gave him a direct acquaintance with the physical remains that underpins his written scholarship. He insisted that archaeological evidence must be interpreted in its context and that general conclusions must rest on the accumulation of well documented finds, a principle that guided his own work and that he passed on to his students.

Influence and Legacy

Wang Zhongshu is regarded as one of the founders of modern Chinese archaeology and as the scholar who did most to make the results of Han archaeology known to the world. His survey of the material culture of the dynasty remains a point of departure for students of the period, and his studies of cultural exchange opened a field that has grown greatly since.

He held senior positions in the national academy and in the archaeological institutes, and he took part in the international scholarly exchanges that reconnected Chinese archaeology with the wider world. His writings in English and his participation in conferences abroad gave foreign scholars access to a body of evidence that had long been difficult to obtain.

He died in 2015. He is remembered as an archaeologist of wide learning and generous spirit, a scholar who moved with ease between the excavation trench and the library and who worked to place the material remains of ancient China in a global perspective. His legacy is carried on by the field he helped to build.

See also

• Han dynasty
• Chinese archaeology
• Silk Road
• Su Bingqi