Urban archaeology in Kaifeng, a capital city of dynastic China: progress and insights

ABSTRACT

Kaifeng is a well-known ancient capital in Chinese history. However, existing knowledge of its urban history derives primarily from historical documents rather than archaeology. In the last decade, archaeologists, including several authors of this article, have conducted many systematic excavations in Kaifeng city and unearthed large amounts of cultural material. Based on these materials, this article attempts to reconstruct the history of Kaifeng’s urban development beyond text, explores the local depositional features and summarizes experience of urban archaeology. Our investigation suggests that the urban space of Kaifeng has been continuously used for over 1000 years, while its city boundaries, political core zones and central axis have remained relatively unchanged; the flood deposits make it possible to conduct fieldwork under the ‘Pompeii premise’. Additionally, our experience suggests that an holistic design, an applied multi-disciplinary approach, and coordination with city administrators, constructors and residents are key to successful urban archaeology programs.

KEYWORDS:

• Urban archaeology
• Kaifeng
• Yellow River
• dynastic China

Acknowledgments

We thank the Xia Culture Collaborative Innovation Center of Henan University for supporting this project. We are grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Social Science Foundation of China under Grant numbers 19CKG028, 19ZDA204 and 21AKG007.

Notes on contributors

Zhen Qin

Zhen Qin (Ph.D) is an associate professor at the Department of Archaeology and Museology in Henan University, China. His research interests focus on geoarchaeology, environmental archaeology and GIS-based research on ancient cities.

Jinping Cao

Jinping Cao (Ph.D) is an associate professor at the Department of Archaeology and Museology in Henan University, China. Her research interests focus on field archaeology, urban archaeology and zooarchaeology.

Michael J. Storozum

Michael J. Storozum (Ph.D) is a research fellow at Newcastle University, U.K. His research interests focus on geoarchaeology, environmental archaeology and Chinese archaeology.

Haiwang Liu

Haiwang Liu (Ph.D) is the director of Henan Provincial Institute of Cultural Heritage and Archaeology. His research interests focus on field archaeology and urban archaeology. He directs field excavation programs in Kaifeng.

Sanying Wang

Sanying Wang is the director of Kaifeng Institute of Cultural Heritage and Archaeology. He conducts field archaeology and directs field excavation programs in Kaifeng.

Junwei Wan

Junwei Wan is a researcher at Kaifeng Institute of Cultural Heritage and Archaeology. He conducts field archaeology and directs field excavation programs in Kaifeng.

Qifeng Ge

Qifeng Ge the director of Kaifeng Museum and conducts field archaeology in Kaifeng. His research interests focus on urban archaeology and museum studies.

Weidong Hou

Weidong Hou (Ph.D) is an associate professor at the Key Research Institute of Yellow River Civilization and Sustainable Development, Henan University, China. His research interests focus on field archaeology and urban archaeology.