A Study On Human Skeletons Of Tang Dynasty Yielded From Sanhezhuang Graveyard,Daxing District,Beijing City

Sanhezhuang graveyard of Daxing district in Beijing is located in the northwest area of North China Plain,east of Taihang mountain and south of Yanshan mountain,where the climate is characterized by four distinct seasons.Historically speaking,Daxing district had been in the transition zone of the Northern nomadic culture and the Agricultural civilization of Central Plains,where the populations with different physical traits and cultures communicated and integrated with each other.The discovery of the Sanhezhuang graveyard fills in the gap of human skeletons found in Daxing district from Han to Ming and Qing dynasties.Especially,the abundant and well-preserved human skeletons of Tang Dynasty would be the key materials for the research on the physical characteristics,the evolution of the nation,the economic development and even the social culture of Tang dynasty in this area.Generally,the dissertation presents a systematic and detailed analysis on the human skeletons of Tang dynasty yielded from Sanhezhuang graveyard by using the methods of Ancient demography,Paleopathology,Skull morphology,Height analysis,etc.Moreover,combining with relevant results of historical documents and other archaeological research,this paper summarizes ethnic characteristics of Sanhezhuang population and also discusses the relationships among different ancient population groups,hoping to provide a detailed reference data for the study of geographical changes of races in this area.This dissertation consists of six chapters.Chapter? IntroductionThis chapter gives a brief introduction to the natural geography and historical evolution of Daxing district,describes the excavation process and archaeological founds of Sanhezhuang graveyard and expounds the research purpose and academic value of this dissertation.Chapter? Ancient Demography ResearchAccording to the detailed identification of the human skeletons of Tang dynasty from Sanhezhuang graveyard,this chapter analyzes and summarizes their characteristics of the age and gender,supplying the fundamental data for understanding the social structure,the division of labor nutrition and health of this population,etc.Chapter? Study on PaleopathologyThis chapter makes a statistical description and analysis on the observed Paleopathological information of human bones of Tang dynasty from different aspects,such as catagma,nonspecific infectious disease,nutritional and metabolic disease,congenital abnormality,dental disease and so forth.Chapter? Height AnalysisBased on the skeleton materials of humerus,femur and tibia,this chapter evaluates the height of ancient population of Sanhezhuang graveyard by using the height estimation method from Forensic Anthropology.Furtherly,it seems from the comparison of average height of men and women among different ancient population groups that the average height of Tang dynasty group of Sanhezhuang graveyard is most similar to that of Ming and Qing dynasty groups of Xitun graveyard,showing a low-middle level of height.Chapter? Skull Morphology AnalysisAccording to the detailed observing,description and analysis on the Non-metrical morphological traits and Metrical morphological traits,this chapter summarizes the Skull Morphological traits of this population group.Furtherly,by the skull comparison between the Tang dynasty group and other different ancient groups in terms of key measured values,angle values and index values,the author also discusses their similarities and differences,and holds that the Skull Morphological traits of Tang dynasty group of Sanhezhuang graveyard shows mixed features within the range of variation of the Mongolian race.What is more,combining the results above and the relevant historical documents,this chapter tries to discuss and summarize the changes of physical characteristics through time in Beijing and thesurrounding areas.Chapter? ConclusionThe chapter makes a general summary for this dissertation.