|Founded||c. 1500 BC|
|Abandoned||c. 1300 BC|
The Erligang culture (simplified Chinese: 二里岗文化; traditional Chinese: 二里崗文化; pinyin: Èrlǐgǎng Wénhuà) is a Bronze Age urban civilization and archaeological culture in China that existed from approximately 1500 to 1300 BC. The primary site was discovered at Erligang, within the modern city of Zhengzhou, Henan, in 1951.
Later investigations showed that the Erligang site was part of an ancient city surrounded by a roughly rectangular wall with a perimeter of about 7 kilometres (4 mi). The walls were of rammed earth construction, a technique dating back to Chinese Neolithic sites of the Longshan culture (c. 3000–2000 BC). It has been estimated that the walls would have been 20 metres (66 ft) wide at the base, rising to a height of 8 metres (26 ft). Large workshops were located outside the city walls, including a bone workshop, a pottery workshop and two bronze vessel workshops. The modern city sits on the remains of the Erligang city, rendering archaeological excavations impossible. Therefore, most of the information about the culture comes from studying other Erligang sites.
Erligang bronzes developed from the style and techniques of the earlier Erlitou culture, centred 85 km to the west of Zhengzhou. Erligang was the first archaeological culture in China to show widespread use of bronze vessel castings. Bronze vessels became much more widely used and uniform in style than at Erlitou.
The culture was centered in the Yellow River valley. In its early years, it expanded rapidly, reaching the Yangtze River, as evidenced by the large site at Panlongcheng in Hubei. Since Zhengzhou lacked access to local bronze metals, sites like Panlongcheng were probably used to secure distant metal resources. The culture then gradually shrank from its early peak.
Many Chinese archaeologists believe that the ancient city of Zhengzhou was one of the early capitals of the Shang dynasty mentioned in traditional histories. However many scholars and Western archaeologists have pointed out unlike the later Anyang settlement, no written records have been found at Erligang to link the archaeological remains with the official history.
- The Chinese name is pronounced ɑɻligɑ̃(ŋ), roughly like English AR-lee-gahng and not early-gang.
- Bagley, Robert (1999), "Shang Archaeology", in Loewe, Michael; Shaughnessy, Edward L., The Cambridge History of Ancient China, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 124–231, ISBN 978-0-521-47030-8.
- Liu, Li, "The products of minds as well as of hands: production of prestige goods in the Neolithic and early state periods of China", Asian Perspectives: the Journal of Archaeology for Asia and the Pacific 42 (1): 1–40, doi:10.1353/asi.2003.0025.
- Fong, Wen (ed.) (1980). The great bronze age of China: an exhibition from the People's Republic of China. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN 0870992260.