Exploring the social structure of Kunming Yangfutou cemetery, Yunnan, Southwestern China

Summary

Dian is the most important polity from Warring States to Western Han period in the Dian Lake area of Yunnan, southwestern China. Except sparse records in Shiji, Hanshu and Huayangguozhi, our understanding of Dian all comes from archaeological discoveries, especially those large and complex cemeteries. Since 1950’, archaeologists excavated many important Dian cemeteries including Jinning Shizhaishan, Jiangchuan Lijiashan, Chenggong Tianzimiao, Qujing Batatai, Chengjiang Jinlianshan and Kunming Yangfutou. These cemeteries usually have several hundred burials with abundant burial goods; however, the complexities in burial goods also confuse researchers. Some scholars applied several statistic methods in the analyses of these Dian cemeteries for understanding their social structures, social hierarchies and gender relations but none of them pay attention on spatial relations among burials. This paper applies spatial autocorrelation techniques in GIS to analyze the Yangfutou cemetery to explore the spatial distribution of burial goods and their relations with the social structure. With Moran’s I and Local G* autocorrelation analyses, I argue that the Yangfutou cemetery can divided into six groups possibly according to descendant relations. The southern group might be an elite group compared to others. The other groups might be equal in social status but different in terms of economic situation.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage