二里頭 중국 고대국가 기원론의 딜레마

Abstract

The excavations of the Erlitou site since the late 1950s have provoked fierce controversies about the identification with the Xia dynasty as well as the developmental stage of the site. Introducing the arguments over the contested site, this study tries to provide a new insight reconciling the contrasting views. While the existence of Xia as a leading polity of North China in the Luoyang Basin during the first half of the second millenium B.C. seems to have been plausible, it is difficult to accept the historicity of the legendary tales on the dynasty narrated in the transmitted texts. Depending on the individual scholar’s inherent premise for utilizing archaeological materials such as pottery, the Erlitou phase III and IV could be interpreted either as the beginning of an early state or the last stage of a chiefdom society. It is significant in this regard to note Li Min’s recent study of the Erlitou site, in which he pays attention to its two legacies: “the emergence of a political economy focusing on bronze metallurgy and the establishment of a Luoyang-centered political order.” The social memory of Erlitou inscribed thereafter to the people of North China began to form a long-lasting geopolitical tradition of Sandai 三代. Thus, the narratives of the legendary Xia dynasty in the Warring States texts indicate a cultural reconstruction concerning the social memories of the past.