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A REPLY TO JI‐HUAN HE
Author(s) -
GOOD I.,
KENOYER J. M.,
MEADOW R. H.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
archaeometry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.716
H-Index - 67
eISSN - 1475-4754
pISSN - 0003-813X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-4754.2011.00591.x
Subject(s) - divinity , citation , library science , history , archaeology , art history , theology , computer science , philosophy
We are grateful for the opportunity to hear readers’ views concerning our joint paper on archaeological evidence for early silk in the Indus Civilization (Good et al. 2009), and are equally grateful for the opportunity to respond to one particular reader’s comments on our findings: Mr Ji-Huan He (2010), who writes ‘Silk is of China and China is of Silk’. First, we wish to clarify a major point. Our paper does not argue for a non-Chinese origin for the domestication of silkworms. We reported evidence that silk from wild indigenous forms of silkworm was known in the Indus Civilization at an early date, roughly contemporary with some of the earliest clear archaeological evidence for silk in China. Mr He points out that the earliest documentary evidence for silk in China comes from oracle bone inscriptions. These, however, date to the period of the Shang Dynasty (second half of the second millennium bc), which is later than the material discussed in our paper. Mr He also points our attention to depictions of what have been identified as silkworms on a c. 4900 bc engraved ivory basin from late middle Neolithic Hemedu, in Zhejiang province. Identifications of such depictions, however, remain interpretations. This carving is not silk, nor is it a depiction of sericulture activity, nor do we yet have extant silk textiles from this site or anywhere else at this early time period. As for actual remains of silk, our paper cited the original report for the evidence from the Qianshanyang site (Liangzhu Neolithic culture, Yangtze delta, Zhejiang province), from which some early silk textile fragments and other silk remains have been identified (Zhejiang 1960). In addition, there is what may be even earlier silk textile evidence from the Qingtai site (Late Yangshao Neolithic culture, Yellow River valley, Henan province: Zhang and Gao 1999). The Qianshanyang silk is associated with a bamboo basket from the earliest cultural deposits of the site, which have provided three radiocarbon dates with median calibrated values between