Anthropocene archaeology of the Yellow River, China, 5000-2000 BP

Abstract

In this paper, we use geoarchaeological and paleoenvironmental data from three localities in the Yellow River Valley, China – Taosi, Sanyangzhuang, and the Yiluo Valley – to argue that human activity in the mid- to late-Holocene contributed to large-scale changes in the behavior of the Yellow River and that these changes were of sufficient magnitude to bend the arc of China’s history. Massive anthropogenic landscape transformation from the later Neolithic into the early Dynastic periods, especially in the Chinese Loess Plateau, increased sedimentation in the Yellow River requiring intensive investment in flood control features to protect an ever-growing population. As the Yellow River channel aggraded, channel gradients became increasingly steep, and avulsions occurred with greater frequency and consequence. Flooding reached an apogee in the first decades of the Common Era when a massive avulsion of the Yellow River ca. 14–17 CE caused the river to shift to the south and east of its former channel. This avulsion and the catastrophic flooding that followed triggered the collapse of the Western Han dynasty. The Yellow River – known as ‘China’s Tribulation’ – has been seen as a natural scourge that afflicts the inhabitants of the fertile North China Plain. However, when viewed in an Anthropocene perspective, it is evident that China’s Tribulation largely is the result of human manipulation of the environment.

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The Holocene
2015, Vol. 25(10) 1627 –1639
© The Author(s) 2015
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DOI: 10.1177/0959683615594469
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Introduction
Background
China’s Yellow River is widely known as ‘China’s Tribulation’ or
the ‘River of Sorrow’ (Wu and Ge, 2005) because of its frequent
flooding and course changes through history. China’s Tribulation
is a powerful symbol of the capriciousness of the Yellow River,
suggesting that the river is beyond human control and that it is
naturally dangerous, unpredictable, and untamable. An Anthropo-
cene perspective, though, challenges this story of forbearing peo-
ple contending against a capricious river. For the last 5000 years,
humans have shaped the Yellow River, both inadvertently and
actively, such that the behavior of China’s Tribulation is the out-
come of a complex amalgam of human and natural processes.
Anthropogenic alteration of the environments of the Yellow River
watershed and direct engineering of the Yellow River itself made
humans the primary geomorphic agent affecting the river by ca.
3–2 kya. Human actions, and the ways they amplified climatic
and geological circumstances through time, are largely responsi-
ble for the massive flooding and catastrophic results for which the
Yellow River is known by the early dynastic period.
We use case studies from three locations – the Taosi site, the
Sanyangzhuang site area, and the Yiluo Valley (Figure 1) – to
argue for an Anthropocene hypothesis that incorporates a variety
of effects on the landscape over time. Between 5 and 2 kya, Chi-
nese societies altered many otherwise natural processes in the
Yellow River watershed, and in doing so changed the course of
their own history. This evidence joins with other data to show that
there is an unexpectedly early anthropogenic footprint in numer-
ous parts of the globe (Ellis et al., 2013a: Figure 1; Redman, 1999,
2004; Wilkinson, 2010).
Geography
The Yellow River originates in the Tibetan-Qinghai Plateau and
flows through the Chinese Loess Plateau (CLP) (Figure 1). The
CLP covers ~640,000 km2 in northwest China and is composed of
thick Pleistocene-age loess deposits (Wang et al., 2006). Although
loess is well suited for agriculture (Catt, 2001), the silt-sized soil
skeleton of loess promotes deep penetration of water into the
ground surface (Shi and Shao, 2000); in most regions of the CLP,
this soil condition coupled with a semi-arid environment means
that vegetation is largely confined to limited numbers of trees,
shrubs, and grasses (Li et al., 2003; Shang and Li, 2010). Meager
plant cover and the loose soil structure of loess result in continu-
ous soil erosion and gullying.
Over the Holocene, an estimated annual average of 0.8 × 109
tons of sediment washed down from the CLP into the Yellow River
(Shi et al., 2002: 280). Once it enters the North China Plain (NCP)
east of modern Luoyang (Figure 1), the transport capacity of the
river is surpassed by the sediment load resulting in rapid aggrada-
tion (Liu and Jiyang, 1989: 223–224). The river’s bed and banks
are prone to erosion because they are composed of relatively
Anthropocene archaeology of the Yellow
River, China, 5000–2000 BP
Tristram R Kidder1 and Yijie Zhuang2
Abstract
In this paper, we use geoarchaeological and paleoenvironmental data from three localities in the Yellow River Valley, China – Taosi, Sanyangzhuang, and
the Yiluo Valley – to argue that human activity in the mid- to late-Holocene contributed to large-scale changes in the behavior of the Yellow River and that
these changes were of sufficient magnitude to bend the arc of China’s history. Massive anthropogenic landscape transformation from the later Neolithic
into the early Dynastic periods, especially in the Chinese Loess Plateau, increased sedimentation in the Yellow River requiring intensive investment in
flood control features to protect an ever-growing population. As the Yellow River channel aggraded, channel gradients became increasingly steep, and
avulsions occurred with greater frequency and consequence. Flooding reached an apogee in the first decades of the Common Era when a massive avulsion
of the Yellow River ca. 14–17 CE caused the river to shift to the south and east of its former channel. This avulsion and the catastrophic flooding that
followed triggered the collapse of the Western Han dynasty. The Yellow River – known as ‘China’s Tribulation’ – has been seen as a natural scourge
that afflicts the inhabitants of the fertile North China Plain. However, when viewed in an Anthropocene perspective, it is evident that China’s Tribulation
largely is the result of human manipulation of the environment.
Keywords
Anthropocene, China, environmental archaeology, Sanyangzhuang, Taosi, Yellow River, Yiluo Valley
Received 3 December 2014; revised manuscript accepted 9 June 2015
1Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St. Louis, USA
2Institute of Archaeology, University College London, UK
Corresponding author:
Tristram R Kidder, Department of Anthropology, Washington
University in St. Louis, Campus Box 1114, One Brookings Drive, St.
Louis, MO 63130-4899, USA.
Email: trkidder@wustl.edu
594469HOL0010.1177/0959683615594469The HoloceneKidder and Zhuang
research-article2015
Special Issue: The Anthropocene in the Longue Durée
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1628 The Holocene 25(10)
coarse-grained sediments that lack structural cohesion (Chien,
1961; Jing et al., 1995: 484–485). Channel switching and avulsions
are common as the channel aggrades and the slope differential
between the channel bed and the surrounding floodbasin increases.
Because of high sediment load and unstable bank conditions, the
Yellow River Holocene alluvial floodplain is characterized by rapid
sediment accumulation and thick sediment deposits (Jing et al.,
1995; Wu et al., 1996a; Xu, 1998, 2003; Xu et al., 1996).
For much of the Holocene, the lower Yellow River flowed
north to discharge in the Gulf of Bohai (Saito et al., 2000, 2001;
Wu et al., 1996a; Xu, 1989; Xue, 1993; Ye, 1989: Figure 1). Avul-
sions in Western Han times (206 BCE–23 CE) shifted the course
eastward (Wang and Su, 2011). At the end of the Northern Song
Dynasty (960–1127 CE), the river relocated southward from its
ancestral course (Lamouroux, 1998; Zhang, 2009). Between 1128
and 1855 CE, the main trunk of the river flowed almost due east
to the Yellow Sea. An avulsion east of Kaifeng in 1855 diverted
the river northward into its current channel (Jing et al., 1995:
285–286; Xu, 1989) (Figure 1a).
Climate
Over the Holocene, the East Asian monsoon has altered between
strong and weak periods. Strong monsoon periods bring moisture
farther into the continental interior. During weak periods, the
monsoon boundary retreats south and east, resulting in less mois-
ture reaching the interior (An et al., 2000; Cai et al., 2010; Clift
and Plumb, 2008; Cosford et al., 2008; Maher, 2008; Selvaraj
et al., 2007; Tan et al., 2009, 2011a; Yancheva et al., 2007). These
trends are punctuated by years of abnormal weakened summer
monsoons associated with El Niño. Strong El Niño events result
in extreme aridity in central China (Wen et al., 2000).
Most parts of North China experienced warmer temperatures
and greater precipitation between 7 and 5 kya (An et al., 2000,
2006; Cosford et al., 2008; Dong et al., 2010; Dykoski et al., 2005;
Morrill et al., 2003; Wu et al., 2012; Zhai et al., 2011; Zhang et al.,
2011). The so-called Holocene Optimum (HO) developed asyn-
chronously across China and demonstrates temporal and spatial
differences in temperature and precipitation (An et al., 2000; He
et al., 2004; Wang et al., 2010). Middle Holocene cultural expan-
sion coincides with the onset of the HO (Shi et al., 1993).
Increasing aridity defines late-Holocene (following ~4200 cal.
BP) climates in north China (Zhang et al., 2011). Moisture avail-
ability became increasingly uncertain and conditions generally
were adverse for plant and crop growth (An et al., 2006; Dodson
et al., 2013). Climate records suggest that the frequency and
amplitude of drought and flood events were increasing between 3
and 2 kya, and this information is also apparent in the historical
records (although the latter data probably reflect reporting bias)
(Ban, 1962; Hsu, 1980: Table 12).
Case studies
Background
The early and middle Holocene was a period of growing land-
scape control in China; plant and animal domestication was pro-
ceeding, but subsistence practices were highly varied (Flad et al.,
Yellow River
Chinese Loess
Plateau
(CLP)
North China
Plain (NCP)
122°E120°E118°E116°E114°E
40°N
38°N
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34°N
32°N
9
10
Yellow Sea
Yangtze R.
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Bo Hai Sea
7
1
6
4
5
8
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1853
1938-1947
Channel avulsion
date
A
(a)
Beijing
12
3
Figure 1. Map of China showing locations of the Chinese Loess Plateau (CLP), North China Plain (NCP) and sites or site locations discussed in
the text (1: Taosi; 2: Sanyangzhuang and Anshang locality; 3: Yiluo Valley, where Erlitou and Han-Wei Luoyang are located). The black rectangle shows
the location of inset map A, which indicates the approximate locations of the Yellow River and Yellow River megadeltas in the late-Holocene.
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Kidder and Zhuang 1629
2007, 2010; Fuller et al., 2007; Liu and Chen, 2012). Steadily
increasing populations were leaving a growing environmental
footprint through expanding landscape clearance for settlements,
agriculture, and greater technological investment in pottery and
other tool production (Mo et al., 2010). Human activities were
increasingly indelible, marking the onset and expansion of new
relationships between people and their physical world. By ca.
5–4 kya, populations throughout the Yellow River drainage
reached new highs (Wagner et al., 2013: Figure 5). Pollen data
show that vegetation shifts were considerable (see Zhuang and
Kidder, 2014: Table 1), while charcoal records reflect more and
more use of fire for land clearance and other activities (Hu et al.,
2010; Li et al., 2009; Xu et al., 2002). Soil and sediment proxy
data demonstrate that humans were modifying fields at an ever-
increasing rate and with greater intensity (Song, 2011). Agricul-
tural innovation and expansion were also critical in shaping
human–land interaction.
Erosion at Taosi
Taosi is a massive late Neolithic walled site located in the Linfen
Basin in the Fen River valley. The occupation at Taosi is divided
into three periods – early, middle, and late – that span ca. 4300–
3900 BP. At its height, Taosi encompassed roughly 300 ha. The
early and middle period city was enclosed by a rammed earth
wall covering nearly 280 ha. The early and middle period occu-
pation included elite residential and palace/temple areas with
substantial rammed earth building platforms, a royal cemetery
with roughly 10,000 graves, storage areas, craft production
facilities organized into ‘industrial parks’ (He, 2013: 268), ritual
precincts, and commoner habitations. Settlement survey has
located 54 sites in the ‘Taosi cluster’. These sites range from
small ‘villages’ (1–9 ha) and ‘secondary centers’ that range up to
200 ha, to the Taosi site itself. The Linfen Basin underwent a very
rapid increase in population during the late Neolithic (Li et al.,
2013). This local population increase may have been caused by
growing aridity, which forced previously dispersed middle Neo-
lithic groups into fewer but larger site clusters (Liu, 2004; Liu
and Chen, 2012; Liu and Feng, 2012; Liu et al., 2004; Shao,
2000) located in favorable and relatively well-watered locales.
Investigations in the CLP demonstrate that surface erosion and
material re-deposition were common ca. 4400–3900 BP (He et al.,
2006; Huang et al., 2002a, 2002b, 2006a; Li et al., 2012; Zhang
et al., 2010). At Taosi, the stratigraphic evidence points to human-
induced erosion and the subsequent formation of gullies (He,
2013; Li et al., 2013) (Figure 2). Intermittent gravel layers indicate
periods of intense high-energy hillslope erosion off the nearby
Ta’ershan Mountains during and at the end of the site occupation.
These thin erosion episodes that transported large gravel and boul-
der-sized clasts were absent prior to the site’s occupation and are
not found following the abandonment of the site. With the con-
struction of the large walled site, housing greater concentrations of
people than in earlier times, timber consumption likely increased
dramatically. Wood from trees and shrubs would have been needed
for wall construction, house building, and fuel for fires for heat
and for ceramic production. In addition, field clearance for agri-
culture and the effects of caprine grazing are also probable causes
of increasing tree and shrub clearance (Brunson et al., in press). At
Taosi, charcoal recovered from domestic contexts indicates that at
least 25 tree species were being consumed (Wang et al., 2011),
while palynological analysis shows a progressive decline in tree
and shrub pollen following ca. 5000 cal. BP and a corresponding
increase in genera that indicate clearance, such as chenopodiaceae
and compositae (Li et al., 2014: Figure 3). Analysis at archaeologi-
cal sites in the CLP indicates that there are increases in charcoal
concentration and herbaceous pollen from 5000 to 4000 BP (Hu
et al., 2010; Li et al., 2009; Xu et al., 2002). These data point to
intensified biomass burning and vegetation change associated with
human settlements across the region (Huang et al., 2003, 2006a,
2006b, 2007; Marlon et al., 2013; Ren, 2000; Tan et al., 2005,
2011b; Wang et al., 2013).
Eroded materials from Taosi and contemporary sites in the
CLP were transported into the Yellow River. Shi et al. (2002) con-
structed a model for sedimentation-rate changes in the lower
reaches of the Yellow River and suggest a three-stage evolution of
average sedimentation rates from 0.2 cm/yr from ~11,000 to 7500
BP, through 0.25 cm/yr from ~7500 to 3000 BP, to 0.22 cm/yr
from ~3000 BP to the present. Other analyses support this pattern.
Xu (1998, 2003), using a similar method, argues there are two
evident changes in ‘temporal variation in mean sedimentation
rate’ of the Yellow River, one starting ca. 5000–4800 BP and the
other from ca. 1400 BP. Xu argues that the trend prior to 5 kya is
the result of climatic conditions associated with growing aridity,
while following 5 kya the sedimentation rate is increasingly
driven by anthropogenic factors. These sediment increases sug-
gest that increasing deposition in the NCP is the result of greater
erosion in the upper and middle reaches of the Yellow River, some
of which appear to be enhanced by human landscape modification
such as is seen at Taosi.
Flooding in the NCP
These sedimentation-rate data, however, represent a generalized
pattern that masks considerable temporal and spatial variability.
Research at Sanyangzhuang and nearby sites provides us with a
picture of the long-term effects of anthropogenic changes through-
out the Yellow River drainage (Kidder and Liu, 2014; Kidder
Figure 2. Erosion deposited gravel layers at Taosi. (a) View of site,
looking NE across the Zhongliang Gou gulley. Arrow points to a
thin gravel layer above a massive basal gravel bed. The basal gravels
were deposited ~4600 cal. BP; subsequent gravel beds above this
indicate periods of episodic erosion during and immediately following
the site occupation. (b) Close up of gravel (and cobble) layers within
site matrix. OSL sample locations can be seen on left (reported in
Li et al. (2013)). Scale is 10 cm.
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1630 The Holocene 25(10)
et al., 2012a, 2012b). The study area is located east of the main
trunk of the Yellow River up through the end of the Western Han
occupation (Figure 3). The composite Holocene stratigraphy of
the region extends to 12–13 m below the modern surface and is
composed of multiple stable buried surfaces (paleosols) inter-
spersed with Yellow River flood deposits. Through time, the
periods of stability are shorter and flooding more common (e.g.
Kidder et al., 2012b: Figure 5). In addition, the landscape itself
reflects increasing evidence of unambiguous anthropogenic
modification related to managing the Yellow River and to the
intensification of food production.
At Sanyangzhuang, a paleosol formed on a Yellow River flood
deposit between ca. 5.9 and 4.9 kya cal. BP. The base of this
paleosol is extensively bioturbated. An agricultural field with dis-
tinctive ridges and furrows (Figure 4) dated from 4140 to 3160
cal. BP was added to the upper part of this natural paleosol. Inves-
tigation over roughly 1 km2 indicates that this field is continuous
across the surveyed area. A sharp drop in arboreal pollen in this
period is coupled with increases in herbaceous species, poaceae,
and a marked rise in Selaginella sinensis; these data indicate
expanding clearance and associated human activities (Liu et al.,
2013: Figure 3; see also Cao et al., 2010).
At Anshang, there is a contemporary paleosol but no corre-
sponding evidence of agricultural field construction although
micromorphological data show evidence of considerable anthro-
pogenic disturbance. At Anshang, there are three ditches and an
earthen levee (Figures 5 and 6). The ditches and the levee were
sandwiched between two paleosols separated by Yellow River
flood deposits. The youngest ditch began to fill ca. 2952–2792
cal. BP and was completely filled by 2859–2757 cal. BP (Kidder
and Liu, 2014: Figure 6, Table 1). The levee at Anshang was strati-
graphically superior to the three ditches but underlay a paleosol
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Figure 3. Map of part of the North China Plain, showing the location of Sanyangzhuang (black circle) and Anshang (black rectangle). Symbols
are not to scale. Gray shades are mountains; darker shades represents higher topographic elevations within the floodplain while lighter shades
are the lowest elevations. The solid black arrow points to the Zhang River alluvial fan discussed in the text. Modern cities are represented by
red dots and provincial capitals are shown as stars. Provincial boundaries are shown by thin black lines.
Figure 4. Sanyangzhuang Profile 1. Strata 2 and 3 are, respectively,
the natural paleosol and the anthrosol dating to the Late Neolithic/
Early Bronze Age. Note the extensive bioturbation at the base of 2
and the clear ridge-and-furrow pattern of 3. Stratum 4 is a massive
Yellow River flood and 5 is a Warring States anthrosol with ridges-
and-furrows. Stratum 6 is a laminated Yellow River flood deposit and
7 a Han Dynasty anthrosol. Note relative lack of bioturbation in 5
and 7. Strata 8 and 9 are Late Western Han flood deposits.
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Kidder and Zhuang 1631
assigned by stratigraphic position to Warring States (475–221
BCE) times.
The levee was built in two episodes; the first was a compacted,
rammed earth core, roughly 2.5–3 m high with a 35- to 40-m-long
landside berm. The second stage doubled the height, and the berm
was extended to nearly 60 m. Little time elapsed between the con-
struction of the first and second stages based on the lack of a
paleosol or other indicators of bioturbation on or in the surface of
the first construction stage.
Following the initial burst of anthropogenic landscape modifica-
tion during the late Neolithic and Bronze Ages at Sanyangzhuang,
there is a major Yellow River flood marked by a 1- to 1.3-m-thick
massive deposit of silty sediment. At Anshang, contemporary flood
deposits covered the landside of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (ca. 760–
221 BCE) levee. A Warring States-age paleosol formed on the
surface of this deposit. At Sanyangzhuang (Figure 4, no. 5), a
roughly 10- to 15-cm-thick Warring States period ridge-and-furrow
agricultural field covers the surveyed area of the site. In contrast to
the earlier field, which formed on/in a natural paleosol, the Warring
States deposits were made before any natural soil forming activities
could occur. Low levels of arboreal pollen, large amounts of herba-
ceous pollen, and abundant Selaginella sinensis indicate continued
large-scale clearance and human landscape transformation (Liu
et al., 2013: Figure 3).
The Warring States occupation was brief; another Yellow
River flood occurred and the region was inundated. A prosper-
ous Western Han Dynasty (206 BCE–9 CE) occupation is found
on the surface of the Warring States flood deposits (Figure 4,
no. 7) (Kidder et al., 2012a). The village consisted of multiple
residential compounds situated in and among agricultural
fields. Roads, field paths, wells, kilns, and looms complement
the houses and extensive plowed fields. Contemporary struc-
tures and agricultural fields are found across a ~50 km2 area. The
inhabitants were cultivating wheat and millet and processing
Figure 5. Western Zhou period irrigation ditches at Anshang. (a) Ditches A and B; (b) ditch C, which is perpendicular to A and B and is older
based on stratigraphic relationships. Horizon 6Ab is a Late Neolithic or Bronze Age paleosol, Horizon 7Ab is a Middle Holocene paleosol, and
Horizon 8Ab is a Middle to Early Holocene paleosol (see Kidder and Liu, 2014).
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1632 The Holocene 25(10)
silk worms. Ongoing extensive land clearance is shown by low
levels of arboreal pollen, increases in the pollen of herbaceous
and grass species, and a large amount of Selaginella sinensis
(Liu et al., 2013: Figure 3).
The Han occupation at Sanyangzhuang spans ca. 132 BCE to
14–17 CE. A massive flood at the end of this occupation buried
and preserved the landscape (Figure 7). The initial stage of this
flood event was a catastrophic failure of the Yellow River levee
west of Sanyangzhuang. A massive slackwater flood deposit is
widespread throughout the region and serves as a marker bed for
the late Western Han flood. The breach in the levee grew, how-
ever, and a coarse-grained, high-energy sediment splay was
deposited across the region. In some locales, incipient paleosols
formed, indicating that the splay evolved over time and with mul-
tiple anastomosing channels. The western part of the splay is
3–3.5 m thick and it thins on its margins.
The Yiluo Valley
Further evidence of substantial anthropogenic transformation of
the Yellow River landscape comes from work conducted in the
Yiluo River Valley near the site of Erlitou as well as investiga-
tions at the Eastern Han (25–220 CE) and Wei (220–266 CE)
Dynasty imperial capital of Luoyang (Figure 8). Our work at Erli-
tou was focused on exploring the history of the broad fluvial
channel immediately south of the site. Extensive coring and three
excavation units were used to understand the channel history. At
Luoyang, we did reconnaissance level study of the erosion history
at the NW corner of the city wall.
The Yiluo Valley is located in the southeastern portion of the
CLP within the middle reaches of the Yellow River catchment.
The Yi and Luo Rivers are large perennial tributaries to the Yel-
low River that join east of modern Luoyang. The Yiluo Valley is
historically important because it is an area with both an extensive
Figure 6. Artificial levee at Anshang, dated to later Zhou (Spring and Autumn period). Stage 1 is the earliest phase of levee construction,
followed rapidly by stage 2, which increased the height and width of the levee. Horizon 6Ab is a Late Neolithic or Bronze Age paleosol while
7Ab is a Middle Holocene Paleosol (See Kidder and Liu, 2014).
Figure 7. Flood deposits in the NCP dated to end of late Western Han at the Anshang site. The late Western Han flood deposits (between
arrows) are marked by multiple thick red silty clay deposits sandwiching a massive Yellow River silt flood package. Similar deposits dated to the
same interval have been noted at Sanyangzhuang (see Kidder et al., 2012a: Figure 4). The scale is 10 cm.
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Kidder and Zhuang 1633
archaeological record and because it has been home to some of
China’s early political centers and dynastic capitals.
Rosen’s (2007, 2008) geoarchaeological investigations of the
Yiluo Valley demonstrate that there is a significant and early
human landscape footprint. With the arrival of middle Neolithic
people ca. 7.2 cal. kya, long-term and large-scale changes are
noted in drainages flowing into the Yiluo Valley from the southern
flanks of the Songshan. A mid-Holocene stable land surface sup-
ported traces of human occupation and is associated with fine-
grained, low-energy stream flows. Beginning ca. 7.2 cal. kya,
there is an abrupt shift to a higher energy environment at several
localities. An episode of greater stream capacity, channel aggra-
dation, and floodplain accumulation lasted from the middle Neo-
lithic Yangshao (~7000–5000 cal. kya) through the late Neolithic
Longshan periods (~4600–3900 cal. kya) and came to an end
sometime between 4.1 and 3.6 cal. kya. Massive gravel buildup at
this time suggests that high-energy channel flow was linked to
substantial soil erosion and gullying in the upper catchment that
‘was new in the Holocene sediment record of this region’. Tribu-
tary valleys feeding the Yiluo record an episode of valley filling
associated with ‘compelling evidence for human management of
this river floodplain during the Neolithic’. This pattern parallels
that seen at Taosi and, we believe, provides further support for
evidence that human modification of the river was contributing to
local environmental transformations as well as large-scale modi-
fications of the sediment budget in the downstream, NCP. This
alluviation event comes to an end after the Longshan period,
and there is no alluvial deposition within the study area from
early Bronze Age or later. Rosen (2008) suggests this may be a
consequence of climatically induced aridity that lowered Yellow
River base flow leading to increased incision by high-order tribu-
taries (pp. 304–305). As discussed below, though, there may be an
alternative explanation for the absence of alluvial deposits.
Today, the Luo River is located on the north side of the Erlitou
site and we were investigating whether the channel had been
located on the south side before and during the Erlitou site occu-
pation. We confirmed that the paleochannel was the course of the
river up to the end of Western Han times when it was abruptly
abandoned. The channel bed rapidly fines upward and a paleosol,
OSL dated 3030 ± 270 to 870 ± 110 cal. BP, developed. The paleo-
sol was truncated in Northern Song Dynasty times and the chan-
nel filled through intermittent flooding indicated by sequential
fining-upward sediment packages.
The abrupt shift in the location of the Luo River channel to its
current northward location is explained by a massive anthropo-
genic intervention. At the end of Western Han, the imperial capi-
tal was relocated from Chang’an, in modern Xian, to a location
east of modern Luoyang (Bielenstein, 1976). As part of the con-
struction of the planned imperial capital of Luoyang, the Luo
River channel was canalized to flow at the southern boundary of
the new city (Cotterell, 2008). This canal construction was part of
a large-scale process of hydraulic engineering and river manage-
ment undertaken throughout many parts of the Yellow River and
its tributaries beginning in Warring States times and continuing
into the Han (Needham et al., 1971; Sima, 2013: 1687–1701). Re-
routing the Luo allowed goods transported from the nearby Yel-
low River to be brought directly to the capital and shaped the city
so that it had a proper cosmological configuration (Cotterell,
Figure 8. The Yiluo Valley. The Yellow River is visible north of the Mangling Hills. The site marked Han-Wei is ancient Luoyang, capital of the
Eastern Han and Cao Wei dynasties. The modern city of Luoyang is shown to the west of Han-Wei Luoyang and the Bronze Age sites of Erlitou
and Yanshi to the east of the Han-Wei site are marked.
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1634 The Holocene 25(10)
2008; Wheatley, 1971), with the Mangling Hills to the north and
the river at the immediate southern boundary. Thus, Luoyang rep-
licated the layouts of earlier capital cities in the Yiluo Valley,
including early Bronze Age Erlitou, Shang Dynasty Yanshi, and
Eastern Zhou Wangcheng.
The construction of the imperial capital reconfigured the Luo
River and significantly transformed the local environment. On the
northeast side of the walls of Luoyang, we see evidence of rapid
accumulation of colluvial flood deposits onlapping the city wall
(Figure 9). These deposits show continuous colluvial accumula-
tion punctuated by high-energy events that transported gravels
and cultural remains. These deposits, which begin as soon as the
city wall was constructed, suggest the Mangling Hills were
denuded of vegetation at the onset of city construction. Increas-
ingly massive human intervention at local and watershed scales
led to further increases in erosion and downstream sediment accu-
mulation, pushing the Yellow River toward a geomorphic thresh-
old that led to river destabilization and avulsion by the end of
Western Han.
Discussion
Climate, environment, and humans
Increasing aridity defines climate change in the Yellow River
Basin over the middle to late-Holocene. A critical climatic effect
is the way increasing aridity preconditioned (Bintliff, 2002) the
landscape to erosion by limiting vegetation growth and inhibiting
water infiltration. This effect was most keenly felt in the CLP,
where topography and soil conditions inherently favor rapid ero-
sion (Shi and Shao, 2000; Wang et al., 2006). Human expansion
into the CLP during the HO, when climatic conditions were wet-
ter and favorable for settlement (Liu and Chen, 2012), amplifies
natural preconditions when climates changed for the worse and as
intensification increased.
We speculate that climate change may also accelerate intensifi-
cation of food production because with relatively high populations
experiencing increasing aridity, and with limited land available for
expansion, the only option was to deploy more effort in the same
amount of land. Examples of these growing investments include
the use of new crops in the Bronze Age and later, notably wheat
(Dodson et al., 2013), wells in Neolithic and later times (Wang,
2001), increasing use of canals for irrigation (Needham et al.,
1971; Sima, 2013: 1687–1701), and a rapid increase in new
production technologies, including crop rotation strategies (Hsu,
1980; Song, 2011), novel plow types and agricultural technolo-
gies (Bray, 1978, 1979–1980), and new materials (notably metal).
Trade, exchange, and especially warfare and territorial conquest
also are a form of climatically stimulated intensification as societies
that could not produce sufficient food and basic resources appro-
priated them through force.
Early Anthropocene intensification
The period from 5 to 2 kya represents an early episode of rapid
intensification in the Yellow River Valley. Demographic change
underpins much of the evolution of the Anthropocene in China.
An increase in sites through the mid-Holocene documents the
expansion of populations in the NCP and the CLP (Liu and Chen,
2012: 220–221; Wagner et al., 2013). This population expansion
correlates with the relatively mild climates of the HO. Settlement
contraction in Longshan times is offset by changes in settlement
configurations. There were fewer Longshan settlements, but
many are considerably larger; in areas such as the Linfen Basin,
concentration of Longshan settlements of varying sizes indicates
that spatial contraction may not tell the whole story. Populations
increase, as do the sizes of the largest settlements, in the Bronze
Age (Underhill et al., 2008; Wagner et al., 2013: Figure 3) and
reach ~60 million at the time of the Han census of 2 CE (Ban,
1962: Di li zhi).
Technological innovation was a major force in the expan-
sion of food production and political growth through military
means. Ceramic production for vessels, molds for metal cast-
ing, and for industrial and architectural purposes, coupled with
metallurgical invention, required expanded production and the
political capacity to support it. The increasing use of animal
traction, new agricultural technologies (Bray, 1978), and new
agricultural strategies of field rotation, field amendment, irriga-
tion, and drainage was also important (Hsu, 1980; Song, 2011).
Figure 9. Colluvial deposits at Han-Wei Luoyang. (a) View of multiple episodes of alternating fine- and coarse-grained sheet erosion deposits
onlapping the rammed-earth city wall (visible on left); (b) close up of the uppermost coarse-grained erosion episode showing composition of
rolled gravels, rounded CaCO3 nodules, and cultural materials.
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Kidder and Zhuang 1635
Between 3 and 2 kya, technological intensification expanded to
industrial scales, with ceramics, iron, salt, fabrics, and other
crafts being produced in large, often state-sponsored or con-
trolled, workshops run by trained specialists (Pan, 1950). Metal
weapons allowed Chinese states to wage war more efficiently
and to field large armies that expanded the boundaries of the
emerging centralized political system.
Growing state-level organization is closely linked with
changing economic strategies (Ellis et al., 2013b). State-like if
not truly state-level organization emerges in the late Neolithic
and early Bronze Age (Liu and Chen, 2003, 2012; Shelach and
Jaffe, 2014) and becomes increasingly entrenched through the
Bronze Age. The emergence of an imperial state under the Qin
(221–206 BCE) and its expansion during Han times mark a mas-
sive transformation in production and the control of economic
processes. Pomeranz (2009) argues that the principal driving
force behind political centralization ‘is a continuing increase in
incentives and pressures to expand economic production’
(p. 10). He refers to this tendency as the ‘Developmentalist Proj-
ect’, which constitutes a widespread socio-political endeavor
found in a range of societies defined by practices of state-
building, sedentarization, and resource intensification. Pomer-
anz specifically implicates the Developmentalist Project with
increasing environmental degradation and growing resource
consumption as states were compelled to bring more land into
production and to settle more people on the land. By Han times,
this feedback loop was inexorable, and once begun, it was dif-
ficult, if not impossible, to reign in.
The river transformed
The consequences of intensification are increasing anthropogenic
interventions in the environment. An obvious effect is the trans-
formation of the Yellow River. The Yellow River was largely sta-
ble through much of the Holocene, flowing in a northerly path
along the western edges of the NCP. Large-scale flooding was
uncommon and punctuated an otherwise long-term stable land-
scape up to ca. 5 kya. Erosion and sediment transport in the river
began in earnest ca. 5 kya. Between 3 and 2 kya, growing popula-
tions in the CLP, using new and more efficient technologies and
supported by intensified state-level infrastructure, expanded the
amount of land under cultivation and the intensities of production
per unit of land; erosion and sediment transport into the Yellow
River increased as a result.
Sediment accumulation was growing after 5 kya with increas-
ingly rapid buildup from 3 to 2 kya (Kidder and Liu, 2014:
Figure 9; Shi et al., 2002; Xu, 1998, 2003). At Sanyangzhuang
and Anshang, we see an uptick in flooding coupled with decreas-
ing landscape stability. Natural paleosols did not have time to
develop as populations in Warring States and Han times rapidly
colonized formerly flooded habitats and transformed them to
anthropogenic environments replete with fields, farms, roads, and
industrial facilities. At Anshang, large-scale flood control and
water management projects were ongoing by ca. 2.7 kya.
A major consequence of levee construction was increasingly
rapid aggradation of sediments within the river bed because the
river was now constrained in a limited channel. At Anshang, the
levee was quickly raised again after the initial construction to
cope with this challenge. By this point, the gradient between the
river bed and the floodbasin at Anshang was ~2.5–3 m, and it was
at least 3 m at Sanyangzhuang.
Flooding throughout the NCP is documented with increasing
frequency in Han times. A series of large floods occurred in the
first two decades of the Common Era. The most calamitous of
these massive floods happened ca. AD 14–17 and buried an area
up to 1800 km2 beneath a 3-m-thick sediment splay (Kidder et al.,
2012a, 2012b). The area inundated by water from this flood
event covered much of the low lying portions in eastern Henan,
southern Hebei, western Shandong, and northern Anhui. With this
flood and the associated avulsion, the Yellow River abandoned its
trunk channel position held for up to 8000 years.
The Han flood of 14–17 CE was catastrophic across a vast
region of north-central China. Soon after the flood, the region
experienced widespread famine and large-scale social unrest fol-
lowed. This area was an epicenter of popular discontent that was
channeled into civil war and rebellion against the Emperor. The
overthrow of the emperor in 23 CE has been attributed to the after
effects of this flood (Bielenstein, 1954, 1959, 1986). The region
witnessed unprecedented population loss associated with flood,
famines, and the extensive political tribulations at the end of
Western Han.
Yellow River avulsions cannot be solely attributed to anthropo-
genic effects. Climate, basin geometry, and natural sedimentation
all play a role, but humans were the most important. For example,
anthropogenic environmental change altered basin geometry along
the western edges of the NCP. North of Anyang is a large alluvial
fan of the Zhang River that extends into the floodplain from the
Taihung Mountains (Wu et al., 1996b: Figure 6) (Figure 3). Forest
clearance to fuel bronze production when Anyang was the Shang
period royal capital and field burning associated with more intense
agricultural production led to increasing erosion and fan accumu-
lation (Cao et al., 2010). The fan’s progradation into the Yellow
River floodplain effectively tilted the basin increasingly to the
south and east, which would have magnified the slope gradient
east of the aggrading Yellow River.
River base-level adjustment following the Han floods is
another example. With a more direct channel to the sea, the base
level of the river changed and the entire upstream river channel
had to accommodate to these new conditions. Following the 1855
Tongwaxiang avulsion, the effects of erosion within the main
channel could be immediately gauged for more than 100 km
upstream (Qian, 1990: 8–9) and tributary systems compensated
by incising their floodplains. Following the late Western Han
flood, increased incision among higher order tributaries in the
Yiluo Valley, for instance, magnified erosion and colluviation at
sites such as Luoyang and may account for the absence of post-
Neolithic sediments noted by Rosen (2008: 305).
Conclusion: An Anthropocene
cycle?
Although China’s Sorrow has been understood as a natural condi-
tion, evidence suggests that it is part of a long-term Anthropocene
cycle driven by feedback among natural and human circum-
stances. An intensification feedback loop emerges ca. 5 kya, is
amplified ca. 3–2 kya, and defines the dynastic cycle from then
on. Consistent population growth and expansion of populations
into less or uninhabited lands is one element. This is associated
with increasing emphasis on sustained, secure, and scalable food
production, which is linked with technological innovation and
economic infrastructure development. The feedback loop is made
possible and given impetus by a strong, centralized political sys-
tem with the ability to exercise dominion over people, land, and
resources beyond the political and ethnic core of the original pol-
ity. Consumption of environmental resources is required to feed
interactions among these variables.
Greater population, especially in the floodplain of the lower
reaches of the river, requires increasing investment in fixed capi-
tal (notably landuse enhancements) to encourage and sustain pro-
duction, which requires ever-growing investment in capital
maintenance and improvement (Elvin, 2004: 120). In this area, a
primary focus on investment was in managing the Yellow River
through creation of levees and canals. By Dynastic times, as pop-
ulations expanded the central government encouraged the migra-
tions of people to the edges of empire. This policy had multiple
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1636 The Holocene 25(10)
goals. First, it relieved crowding in the NCP. Second, it provided
a demographic bulwark against ‘Barbarian’ neighbors in the
northwest, including the ecologically fragile CLP.
Both in the NCP and CLP, technology was required to enhance
productivity. The most notable productivity enhancements focused
on agricultural products, tools, and management practices. In the
late Neolithic, it was new crops and crop rotation methods; by the
Bronze Age, it was irrigation, field clearance, and new tools; in Han
times, it was the widespread use of iron tools. These technological
changes constituted a series of intensification revolutions that
allowed various Chinese polities to expand agricultural production
and to wage war that permitted territorial expansion and political
consolidation. The downside of these practices was environmental
degradation, especially in the CLP, as seems to be the case at Taosi.
Following late Neolithic intensification, this degradation resulted
in massive erosion within the Yellow River floodplain that accumu-
lated by late Western Han times. This environmental transforma-
tion created China’s Tribulation and imperiled the productive
resources of the NCP. The emphasis on technology also helped pro-
pel greater investment in fixed capital in the NCP. Technologies of
river management were increasingly relied on as a way of protect-
ing intensified investment of production in the fertile and highly
populated alluvial floodplain. Although this pattern of technologi-
cal intensification is especially notable in Dynastic times, we see it
present in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, albeit at smaller scales.
Increasing aridity through time is both cause and effect in this
feedback loop. The retreat of the monsoon boundary heightened
the environmental fragility of the CLP and increased natural ero-
sion. The use of progressively more effective land clearance tech-
nology considerably enlarged the climate-driven effects of erosion
on the CLP. These effects are notable at sites like Taosi and in the
sedimentation rates of the Yellow River by the late Neolithic and
only grow more pronounced with time. But climate change also
probably pushed greater technological innovation and intensifica-
tion as growing populations adapted to declining natural environ-
mental abundance by other means.
The final cog in the process was political intensification.
Although variable across space and through time, political central-
ization was a dominant force influencing the emergence and per-
petuation of the Anthropocene condition in China. In the Chinese
case, centralization took a number of forms and included growing
political intervention in the economy, manipulation of taxes and
economic policy to promote production, control of a vast and intri-
cate bureaucracy, replete with highly controlled access to offices
and power, political control of bodies by assigning (and, as needed
altering) social status, and spatial segregation into administrative
subunits dependent on the central bureaucracy. The political econ-
omy was supported and sustained by a heavy reliance on agricul-
tural (and to a lesser extent, craft) production that gave incentives
to farmers (and bureaucrats) to produce enough so that there was a
surplus after taxes were extracted (Dubs, 1955; Huan, 1967;
Loewe, 1974, 1986; Pan, 1950). Centralized polities require
greater and greater resource intensification. In China, this is seen
by repeated calls for increasing attention to the ‘fundamental’
(agricultural production) (e.g. see Huan, 1967). Furthermore, we
see repeated instances of political expansion and the projection of
economic, military, and political power outward beyond the
boundaries of any given polity. This expansion allows states to
gather more resources and to intensify domestic production. This
in turn encourages the centralization of political power. In China,
political expansion was accompanied by demographic shifts that
placed larger and larger numbers of people in the fragile environ-
ments of the CLP. Because of this, tribulation, in the form of
excess sediments, flowed down the Yellow River from the periph-
eries to the center. As exemplified by the Western Han case,
anthropogenically driven environmental changes shifted the riv-
er’s threshold conditions leading to catastrophic flooding and sor-
row. The result was reversion to a lower level of socio-political
complexity. This pattern happens with the Han, the Tang, the Song,
and the Qing (Dodgen, 2001). In each instance, Yellow River
flooding stimulated by increased sedimentation associated with
territorial expansion in the CLP and beyond consumed resources,
caused flooding, and affected the state’s ability to govern.
China’s Tribulation neither is an entirely natural phenomenon
nor is it wholly the product of human action. The intersection of
environmental, climatic, and human forcings has shaped not only
the Yellow River but also the history of China over the last
5000 years. Modern China is grappling with many of the issues
outlined here. Complex demographic, technological, political,
climatic, and environmental factors are shaping the nation’s fate,
and the Yellow River sits at the heart of these matters. The Anthro-
pocene is not an event but a process that evolves over consider-
able time and through the actions of many natural and human
agents and agencies. This work shows that the roots of the modern
Anthropocene are deep and tangled; however, if we are to under-
stand the modern world, we need to recognize that we did not
arrive here overnight.
Acknowledgements
We thank Mr Haiwang Liu (Henan Provincial Institute for Ar-
chaeology, Zhengzhou), Professor Duowen Mo and Mr Ren
Xiaolin (Peking University, Beijing), Mr Zhen Qin and Mr Mi-
chael Storozum (Washington University in St. Louis), Dr Arlene
Rosen, and the Henan Provincial Institute of Archaeology, Zheng-
zhou City. We are also indebted to the two anonymous reviewers
for their thoughtful critiques and suggestions.
Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency
in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
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