Revisiting the collective burial debate: a case-study of Yanghai cemetery, Xinjiang

ABSTRACT

The study of hezangmu, ‘collective burials’, is an integral part of long-standing debates within Chinese archaeology. Traditional interpretations, shaped by social evolutionary models from the 1950s onwards, link collective burials to descent and inherited identity and status. Our study revisits Yanghai cemetery in Xinjiang, one of the largest Bronze Age cemeteries excavated in China’s northwest, using GIS and statistical analyses. Our findings indicate that collective burial was a central aspect of Bronze Age funerary custom at Yanghai, with declining investment by the Iron Age. As a special form of collective burial, multi-layer collective burials emerged as a practical adaptation, not as a marker of special status. Their prevalence increased as ritual spending decreased. Based on our results, we suggest Bronze Age social stratification at Yanghai was shaped by local shamanistic practices.

KEYWORDS:

• Collective burial
• mortuary practice
• archaeology in China
• Xinjiang
• geographic information systems

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by research grants from the National Key R&D Program of China (2020YFC1521600), the Major Project of National Social Science Foundation of China (21&ZD285), and European Research Council (ERC) grant to Dan Xu (ERC-2019-ADG-883700-TRAM).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Author contributions

Conceptualization: XR, SW; methodology: XR; investigation: XR; funding acquisition: SW; project administration: SW, XR; supervision: SW, XR, EA; writing – original draft: XR, EA; writing – review & editing: SW. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Notes

1. ‘Burial space’ here and hereafter in the article encompasses both the planar dimensions and the depth of graves, providing a more complete understanding of grave size.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the European Research Council [ERC-2019-ADG-883700-TRAM]; National Key Research and Development Program of China [2020YFC1521600]; National Social Science Fund of China [21&ZD285].

Notes on contributors

Xiaoying Ren

XiaoYing Ren is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Human Phenome Institute of Fudan University, specializing in the fields of ancient DNA and quantitative archaeology. Her research is deeply focused on the themes of social complexity, social inequality, and gender issues in archaeology. She primarily investigates ancient societies in northwest and north China, spanning from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age.

Edward Allen

Edward Allen is currently a PhD candidate at the Department of Cultural Heritage and Museology of Fudan University. His research focuses on agropastoralism in northwest China, circa 2000 BC.

Shaoqing Wen

Shaoqing Wen obtained his Ph.D. degree from Fudan University in 2017. He joined Institute of Archaeological Science, Fudan University in 2019 as a junior research fellow and became an Associate Professor in 2022. His research interest focuses on molecular archaeology and quantitative archaeology. He is the co-author and co-editor of the book “Language, Genes, and Archaeology: An Interdisciplinary Exploration Centered on the Gansu-Qinghai Region” (2023).