Yuhuangmiao: the socio-cultural dynamics of a community between the steppes and the Chinese plains

Abstract

The Yuhuangmiao culture emerged around the 7th to the 4th centuries BCE in northeastern China near Beijing. The burial ritual with stone layers, numerous animal deposits, and the material culture indicate a strong steppe connection. It is often used to support the narratives in the Chinese historical texts that people living in the area had a distinctive lifestyle from those in the southern, agricultural-based communities and that the two groups often had a hostile relationship. Based on the cemetery of Yuhuangmiao, we focus in our case study on the socio-cultural dynamics over time in communities of a small region between the steppes and the Chinese Central Plains and in confrontation with very different neighbors to the south and the northwest. We use a seriation and correspondence-based approach to propose a new chronology for three sites. The duration of the sites is divided into three phases, with a total span of around 200 years between 600 and 400 BCE. Our results show that the changes in the burial ritual and material culture reflect a community’s internal development and external communication with other regions. Based on our chronology, the elite members of the Yuhuangmiao community used objects with steppe designs and horses to express their identities and social power. This practice was most prominent in the first phase and waned over time. We suggest reconsidering previous interpretations of these practices as a decline of the Yuhuangmiao people and view it instead as an expression of intra-community changes, possibly as an indicator of a successful integration of a community with foreign immigrants in an area located between two very different systems: of the steppes and the Central Plains.