稻作起源的考古学探索

根据农业起源理论与考古学实例分析,长江下游的水稻栽培发生在野生资源非常丰富的自然环境里,其驯化机制并非饥馑和用于果腹,很可能是为了增加美食的酿酒。稻作农业在良渚阶段成为主要经济形态与复杂社会强化剩余产品生产密切相关,良渚酋邦解体后的马桥文化又退回到了狩猎采集经济。农业经济最终成为不可逆转的发展趋势,是野生资源持续减少、人口增长和社会复杂化等因素共同作用的结果。文章呼吁,中国的农业起源研究要摆脱一味寻找最早栽培谷粒来确定农业起源时间和地点的模式,从人地关系的互动来了解农业起源的潜因和具体进程。

An Archaeological Exploration of the Origin of Paddy Agriculture

On the basis of the analysis of archaeological theory and unearthed data,this article argues that the domestication of rice was started in the environment with fertile resources.The dynamic of rice domestication might have been brewing rather than feeding.Paddy agriculture might have been caused by social complexity in the Liangzhu period when chiefdoms forced people to produce more surpluses.After the collapse of the Liangzhu chiefdoms,the Maqiao Culture retreated to hunter-gathering subsistence pattern.The irreversible trend that paddy agriculture became human dominant subsistence pattern might have been the result caused by the decrease of natural resources and the increase of population and social complexity.The article appeals that the study of the origin of agriculture in China should free itself from searching for the earliest cultivated rice and shift to understand its mechanism and process in terms of man-and-land relationship.