A03：Construction of an archaeological information platform

　Formation of Erlitou culture in the late third millennium BCE was a process of convergence of the local societies which flourished in various regions. The period can also be considered as a reformation stage of the societies under the impact from the Western world. Thus the “networks”, which actually connected the regions on various spatial scales, should have played a significant role during this process. Archaeologically, mutual acceptance of prestige goods among the regional societies is a prominent indicator for understanding the inter-regional relations. The focus of this research group is to study the background of the relations and the interaction implied from the tracing of the prestige goods. To achieve this study’s goals, not only archaeology but also approaches from philology, ethnology, linguistics, and geoinformatics are used. The spatial structure of the networks and their interactions will be explored using the three hierarchical spatial scales of continental level, inter-regional level, and the level of base-settlement and its surrounds. Reconstruction of the actual routes which the impact from the Western world followed is the main focus in the continental level, while the changes of relations and their spatial structures between regions (e.g. Zhongyuan Region and Shandong peninsula, Shandong peninsula and Lower Yangtze) are examined in the inter-regional level. Influence from changes observed in a certain spatial level are expected to be inherited among the different levels. In this sense, base-settlement and its surrounds is a level which can clearly show the impact of the changes as human activities. Land use and settlement patterns will be discussed for this level in a cooperative study with the research group A01, which includes the analysis of prestige goods and potteries. The results and derived data will be stored in a WebGIS-based database, allowing for the sharing of knowledge among project members. Finally, evaluation of the formation process of Erlitou culture, the center of the cultural hybridity, will be conducted through the reconstruction and visualization of the spatial structures.

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