The excavation of burial M89 at Tiesan Road at the Yinxu Site in Anyang, Henan

Abstract

In 2006, a burial of the Shang Dynasty (numbered as 2006ATSM89) was found in the Shang Dynasty bone workshop zone on Tiesan Road in the south portion of the Yinxu Site. This burial, which dated to Phase II of the Yinxu Period, was a small, rectangular, vertical shaft pit burial. The grave goods included only one set of a bronze gu-goblet and a jue-cup, but there were numerous jades, ranging from a jade qi-battle ax with a bronze hilt and jade spearheads with bronze sockets – symbols of rather high status – to semi-finished jade products, jade castoffs, and jade-working tools. Based on an inscription in the shape of a jade scepter appearing on the bronze gu-goblet, the occupant of this burial is surmised to have been a petty aristocrat in charge of the production of jades and management of jade workshops. His clan might have been specialized jade workers, and there might be jade workshops of the Yinxu Period near this burial. As the first burial found at the Yinxu Site whose occupant can be tentatively identified as a jade worker, M89 is of great significance to the study of craft production of the Yinxu Period.