ARCHAEOLOGY IN H.K. AND SOUTH CHINA
165
they have revealed a new province of culture, which from its leading characteristics as well as its geography can be seen to link the Chinese classical culture with that of the Archipelago and the Pacific Islands, generally referred to as 'Indonesian'. The reciprocal influence of these two cultures has never been adequately studied, for only in a region on their respective boundaries, such as the China Coast, can this be done.
These characteristics may be summed up as: 1. use of stone adzes, chiefly rectangular and stepped; 2. working stones with circular borer to make rings, and with stone saws to cut stone implements; 3. pottery made on the turn-table, in both coarse and fine qualities built up by the ribbon technique and decorated with cord, mat and geometrical patterns; 4. lance heads of shale or slate; 5. cylindrical stone beads; 6. rings of hard stone used as ornaments; 7. cultivation, probably by growing grain in cleared patches of jungle; 8. fishing and boatbuilding; 9. cloth-making. The later form of this culture has in addition these features: 10. casting of bronze weapons and tools; 11. use of ceremonial objects of jade, especially in burials; 12. hard, high-fired pottery stamped with the f pattern; 13. leadless glaze, green and brown, applied to pottery.
Second, they demonstrate the flow of Chinese culture to the south and its replacement of the native culture, in which can be seen traces of the ancient Chinese culture of the Shangs.
Third, they show that this native culture formed part of a culture-province which included not only the Chinese coast provinces but Japan, Manchuria, Formosa and Annam, and whose remoter connexions extend landwards into E. India and N. Asia, and seaward as shown by the adze forms into the Archipelago, the Philippines, and the furthest Polynesian islands. For instance, a highly polished adze with a large tang, of very distinctive form, is found in Hong Kong, the Philippines, Hawaii, Tahiti, New Zealand and Hervey Islands.
Fourth, light is thrown upon the ancient trade routes of S.E. Asia. Painted pottery, which was not, it seems, made on the China Coast, was imported from Tongking, probably along the West River. Bronze and jade of Chinese workmanship was imported from the Yangtse valley, by which of the three possible routes is uncertain. The Swabue people produced quantities of shale lance-heads, harpoons, arrow heads and rings, sometimes very delicately worked,