From Heaven and Earth to Discs and Tubes
National Palace Museum, Taipei, TaiwanFrom "Heaven and Earth" to "Discs and Tubes"
The early people who inhabited the land that we call China today exhibited in many ways, from all facets of basic existence to religious creations in art, three distinctive regional styles which in general corresponded to the geographical locations of three major clan groups as mentioned in the ancient literature: Yi, Yue, and Qiang. Yet as different as they were, the three also shared some important characteristics. So perhaps there indeed existed a common layer of "foundation civilization" for all cultures across East Asia, and certain message exchanges did occur among the respective ruling classes over the extremely long distance. All three clans believed in the supernatural power of jade, embraced a cosmic view of tien-yuan-di-fang (heaven being round, earth being square), and they all developed a philosophy of "Artifacts Imitating Nature" and therefore a "Kindred Empathy", based on the principle of "Like Produces Like", i.c. worshiping a deity by taking the form in his very image.
Accordingly, the Hongshan Culture in the northeast (the west of Liao River region) built round altars and square tombs: the Liangzhu Culture in the eastern region (Jiangnan) as well as many cultures in the inner west (Caiyuan, Banshan, Miaodigou-II, Longshang, and Qijia) devoted great human and material resources to making round bi discs and square cong tubes, which appeared to have no apparent practical uses. The jade cong of the eastern area evolved from jade bangles featuring an oblong-framed mask in low relief on each of the four sides, and grew eventually into multi-segment tall tubes. The primitive simplicity of the discs and tubes from the inner west, on the other hand, presents a sharp contrast and requires further systematic excavation and study before the following question can be answered: whether or not a native origin had ever existed for the highly developed "Culture of Bi and Cong" that later emerged in this area around 2000 B.C.E?
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