Culture and civilization have been an enduring topic since the birth of modern humanities. The exploration of the origin of Chinese culture began with painted pottery. In the 1920s, while seeking survival and rejuvenation of China, Chinese people constantly reflect on why the ancient civilization of thousands of years has fallen behind? Which culture is better or worse? These discussions about Chinese and Western culture became a hot topic at that time.
As far as archaeology is concerned, Andersen is the first to express his views on this issue. He compared the painted pottery unearthed in Yangshao village with that in Central Asia, and consulted Western archaeologists to put forward the hypothesis that Chinese culture came from the West. He regarded the colored pottery from the prehistoric times as a part of Chinese culture. This view was based on painted pottery and Andersen's special academic status, which was quite popular at that time.
However, Chinese scholars always hold a cautious attitude towards this kind of statement. From an academic point of view, it is not convincing to say that ancient Chinese culture was spread from the west only by comparing the patterns of Chinese and foreign painted pottery. From the emotional point of view, it is also unacceptable to say that China's splendid and long history and culture originated from the West. In addition, there is a gap between the relics of Yangshao discovered by antesheng and the relics of Shang Dynasty discovered in Anyang. Therefore, in order to prove their views, Andersen sought the way of spreading painted pottery to the west, while Chinese scholars sought the source of Shang civilization to the East.
In this context, people found Longshan culture. The discovery of this ancient culture has aroused great interest of Chinese scholars. Because it is very different from the known Yangshao culture, the black pottery and bone divination, which are obviously higher in production technology, show its close relationship with the Yin Shang culture, which is incomparable with the painted pottery culture. However, due to the existing academic framework and the current situation of war, it was impossible to carry out large-scale field activities and other subjective and objective factors. Although the stratigraphic relationship between Yangshao culture and Longshan culture was found at that time, people did not get a correct understanding of the relationship between Yangshao culture and Longshan culture. The two cultures were regarded as the two major cultures of confrontation between the East and the West in the same period. Each of them had its origin and met in Henan Province. The Yangshao Longshan cultural dualism of prehistoric China was formed.
After 1949, with the construction of large-scale infrastructure, many archaeological sites emerged. In Shaanxi county of Henan Province, close to Yangshao village of Mianchi County, the second phase culture of Miaodigou was discovered. Like the Yangshao culture, its pottery is popular by hand, but it has not reached the condition of the general rotation system of Longshan culture. A certain number of painted pottery shows its close relationship with the Yangshao tradition. At the same time, a large number of pottery pieces similar to eggshell pottery appeared, and pottery vessels such as bronze vessels, tripods and beans sprouted, which opened the precedent of typical pottery of Longshan culture, and the whole culture showed a strong transitional style.
It is also proved that the Central Plains culture has been continuously developed from Yangshan to Yangshan in ancient times.
With the discovery of a large number of archaeological remains all over the country, the interaction circle about the origin of Chinese civilization, the theory of starry stars and the theory of double flowers have emerged one after another. In recent years, some scholars put forward the related concepts of Miaodigou era, and believed that the three levels of cultural community in this period opened the precedent of China's early civilization, and the analysis of painted pottery is one of the important contents. In these three levels, the core areas of Southwest Shanxi, western Henan and the east of Guanzhong have typical and fluent petal pattern painted pottery. The petal patterns in the main area of the middle reaches of the Yellow River are slightly immature and sluggish, while the outer marginal areas such as the lower Yellow River, the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River and the Northeast appear variant petal patterns.
Today, the exploration of the unique connotation of painted pottery remains and its important role in the origin of Chinese culture and civilization is still deepening.
