144
S. F. BALFOUR
Indonesian pottery, particularly round the rim of the vessel. The other patterns appear to have no counterparts in pottery that we know. Especially the "double F" is intriguing. It appears at a glance a type of stylised design derived from an animal motif such as might have come from ancient China, but it is very unsafe ground to suppose that it is so. Lastly, the glaze is of a good pigment and was certainly derived from China. The variety of pottery from the primitive soft type through the "Indonesian" type to the half-Chinese "double F" pattern shows that while much of it was imported, some was made locally.
Metal implements have been found in the sites in much smaller quantities than the stone and pottery, but moulds for making them have been found in larger quantities. They are made of baked clay in two separate pieces which fitted together and into which the molten metal was poured and took its shape. These moulds were probably made locally. Therefore the people using them were not plentifully supplied with metal and they were obliged to melt and reshape old weapons when they became unserviceable, continuing to use the same pattern without any efforts to improve it. This inference neutralises any attempt to date the inhabitation of the sites by comparing the metal implements with those used in China at certain dates. It is true that the shape of the weapons originally came from China, but there is no certainty that the Chinese influence continued for long; in fact, the opposite seems the most likely.
The most typically Chinese of the bronze weapons are the ko and the small axe. The ko is the small cutting and piercing implement with a curved blade ending in a sharp point which is written with the character. It is of very ancient origin and continued to be used by Chinese soldiers in the Han dynasty and later. The small axe with a convex blade and a hollow socket for insertion of the handle is also of early Chinese origin. It was once used in a more simplified shape for money, but that the inhabitants of this region used it for killing can be proved by a piece of bone which was found adhering to an axe in one of the sites. Both these types of weapon are most ancient, in addition to them fragments of bronze swords and daggers, some of them embossed with Chinese designs, have been excavated and a small number of bronze utensils.
144
S. F. BALFOUR
Indonesian pottery, particularly round the rim of the vessel. The other patterns appears to have no counterparts in pottery that we know. Especially the "double F" is intriguing. It appears at a glance a type of stylised design derived from an animal motif such as might have come from ancient China, but it is very unsafe ground to suppose that it is so. Lastly, the glaze is of a good pigment and was certainly derived from China. The variety of pottery from the primitive soft type through the "Indonesian" type to the half-Chinese "double F" pattern shows that while much of it was imported, some was made locally.
Metal implements have been found in the sites in much smaller quantities than the stone and pottery, but moulds for making them have been found in larger quantities. They are made of baked clay in two separate pieces which fitted together and into which the molten metal was poured and took its shape. These moulds were probably made locally. Therefore the people using them were not plentifully supplied with metal and they were obliged to melt and reshape old weapons when they became unserviceable, continuing to use the same pattern without any efforts to improve it. This inference neutralises any attempt to date the inhabitation of the sites by comparing the metal implements with those used in China at certain dates. It is true that the shape of the weapons originally came from China, but there is no certainty that the Chinese influence continued for long; in fact, the opposite seems the most likely.
The most typically Chinese of the bronze weapons are the ko and the small axe. The ko is the small cutting and piercing implement with a curved blade ending in a sharp point which is written with the character. It is of very ancient origin and continued to be used by Chinese soldiers in the Han dynasty and later. The small axe with a convex blade and a hollow socket for insertion of the handle is also of early Chinese origin. It was once used in a more simplified shape for money, but that the inhabitants of this region used it for killing can be proved by a piece of bone which was found adhering to an axe in one of the sites. Both these types of weapon are most ancient, in addition to them fragments of bronze swords and daggers, some of them embossed with Chinese designs, have been excavated and a small number of bronze utensils.
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