The general thesis that the earliest Chinese states directly emerged as political entities rather than evolving out of suddenly burgeoning economic centers remains generally unchallenged despite the evidence from Hsi Shan. Nevertheless, the work of archaeologists more sensitive to questions of resource acquisition and control is gradually adding a new dimension to the otherwise fairly cohesive picture of how localized Lungshan chiefdoms developed into integrated, incipient states with well-defined economic and ritual centers capable of exercising broad administrative control.68
The Hsia and Shang were both agricultural-based economies in which animal rearing played a vital role, but the discovery of metals and development of metallurgical techniques, coupled with the difficulties of maintaining power and the demands imposed by externally oriented warfare, soon saw great emphasis placed on securing such crucial natural resources as copper, tin, and salt. Expansive productive activities had to be undertaken in order for the state’s workers to fabricate the requisite luxury, ritual, and military goods in sufficient quantity. Mines, smelting sites, transportation corridors, and fabrication facilities also had to be protected from local brigands and external marauders.
Evidence that the Hsia deliberately subjugated or otherwise colonized peripheral areas along the perimeter of the Yi-Luo river valley to ensure vital mineral production becomes prominent in Erh-li-t’ou’s third period, when copper-based metallurgy began to advance in the flourishing capital. The settlements vary in their extent and sophistication, but they clearly display evidence of an imposed presence. Most lay at the confluence of rivers or the mouths of valleys that provide access into nearby mountains and, apart from serving as transportation foci, operated as accumulation points and warehousing centers.
Even though the most extensive and sophisticated production facilities, especially those for ritual objects, were confined to the capital, large-scale craft facilities dedicated to manufacturing objects that fully utilized the indigenous resources are often found. Tung-hsia-feng and P’an-lung-ch’eng, two well-known sites that would have enhanced importance in the Shang, are prime examples. Both served as transport and production centers during the Hsia, though P’an-lung-ch’eng lacked walls in the Hsia.
The fortified town of Tung-hsia-feng in southern Shanxi controlled access to the somewhat dispersed mineral deposits found in the Chung-t’iao mountain area, primarily copper with important trace metals intermixed, including tin and zinc.69 Coincident with Erh-li-t’ou’s initial fluorescence, local Tung-hsia-feng graves suddenly begin to show the presence of definitive Erh-li-t’ou products, especially ceramics. Molds for identically styled arrowheads and axes have also been recovered, and a shift in the divination media from pig to oxen bones mirrored a change that occurred in Erh-li-t’ou’s second period. Although these items are insufficient evidence in themselves, the swift, no doubt militarily based imposition of Hsia forces is confirmed by a sudden flourish of defensive activity.
Two basically concentric ditches 130 meters and 150 meters in diameter, separated by 5.5-12.3 meters, have been excavated. The interior ditch is approximately 5 to 6 meters wide, but the exterior only 2.8 to 4 meters. Precisely constructed laddered sides and depths of about 3 meters characterize both ditches. A dramatic increase is seen in the number of arrowheads attributable to this period and a concomitant shift to their being fabricated mainly from bronze rather than bone. Taken together, the evidence suggests that Tung-hsia-feng had been deliberately transformed into a military center designed to ensure the acquisition and production of the metals increasingly deemed vital to the ruling clan’s prosperity and dominance.70