CIVILISATION cannot survive without salt. So archaeologists have always been puzzled by the apparent absence of salt extraction sites in ancient China 鈥� despite extensive records of salt being made and used.
Now a salt 鈥渇actory鈥� dating back 4000 years has been discovered at a site called Zhongba on the Ganjing river in south-east China. Rowan Flad of Harvard University and colleagues at the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei discovered a large number of pottery fragments dating back 4000 years at a site where brine seeps up to the surface from underground salt deposits.
Most pieces came from pointed-bottom vats, pointed-bottom cups and 鈥渏arlets鈥� with rounded bottoms 鈥� distinctive shapes of pottery that other cultures also used to extract salt from brines.
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The team used chemical analysis on certain vessels to identify signatures of salt production that were similar to those found at modern salt factories in the area (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0502985102).
This is the first time archaeologists have used chemical methods to prove that salt was produced at a prehistoric site. 鈥淧revious salt archaeology has relied on more circumstantial evidence,鈥� says Flad.
