Early horse traction in the lower Yellow River valley: pathological evidence from the Bronze Age rural site, Qingqiu, China

Abstract

Domestic horses had a profound impact on the economy, warfare, and social organization of the late Shang Dynasty (c.1300 − 1046 BC, Bronze Age). However, as horses from archaeological contexts of this period are almost exclusively associated with the elites, data on horsepower exploitation strategies from the rural, non-elite sites are still lacking. In this study, we present the results of pathological examinations on six horses from the late Shang period discovered at the Bronze Age village site of Qingqiu, Shandong, China. Our results suggest that horses were used for traction as early as the late Shang period in the rural site in the lower Yellow River valley. They were probably harnessed individually for draught work, unlike Yinxu, the Shang capital, where paired horses were harnessed to pull one chariot in the elite cemeteries. Additionally, taking into account evidence of frequent interregional resource exchange during the late Shang period, we propose that horse traction played a vital role in the transportation of important resources by the late second millennium BC.