【Neolithic Age】Kuahu Bridge Site

The Kuahu Bridge Site is a Neolithic Age site located in the Xianghu Lake Scenic Area. The site covers an area of 150,000 square meters, with low hills to the north and south. The Kuahu Bridge Neolithic Age Site is named after an ancient bridge that spans the upper and lower Xianghu lakes.

The overall path of human civilization is from mountains and caves to river valleys and plains. Based on actual archaeological findings, the earliest Neolithic Age culture in the Zhejiang region was distributed in the central mountainous area of Zhejiang, and the Kuahu Bridge culture was an early branch of mountain culture that developed into plain culture.

The Kuahu Bridge site was first excavated in 1990 and underwent three archaeological excavations in 1990, 2001, and 2002, with an excavation area of about 1,000 square meters. A large number of cultural relics have been unearthed, including pottery, bone, wood, stone tools, and artificially cultivated rice, which dates back to between 8,000 and 7,000 years ago according to carbon-14 and thermoluminescence dating.

In November 2002, a canoe and related relics were discovered, and the carbon-14 dating of the canoe sample showed that it was about 8,000 years old. This is the earliest canoe-related relic found in China to date.

In May 2003, a site of the same type as Kuahu Bridge, called the Xiasun Site, was discovered in the Xiasun Natural Village of Xianghu area.

On April 12, 2002, in the "Top Ten New Archaeological Discoveries in China in 2001" organized by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, the Chinese Archaeological Society, and the China Cultural Relics News, the Kuahu Bridge site was named one of the top ten new archaeological discoveries of the year due to its unique and novel cultural features. The discovery of the Kuahu Bridge site broke the two-part system of the Hemudu culture and the Majiabang culture in the Neolithic Age culture of Zhejiang, thus establishing a multi-dimensional regional cultural pattern and setting a new benchmark for the formation of a holistic concept in the study of Neolithic Age culture in the Yangtze River Basin.

In December 2004, the "Kuahu Bridge Archaeological Academic Seminar and Press Conference" was held in Xiaoshan. More than 40 archaeologists, including Yan Wenming, a famous archaeologist, Vice Chairman of the Chinese Archaeological Society, member of the National Cultural Heritage Expert Group, and professor at Peking University , announced the naming of the "Kuahu Bridge Culture" to the news media.

Kuahu Bridge Site Museum

Due to long-term sedimentation of lake mud, the topsoil of the Kuahu Bridge site is 3 to 4 meters thick, which has kept the cultural relics relatively intact. The cultural relics are now stored in the Kuahu Bridge Site Museum. The museum began construction in 2007, and was completed and opened in September 2009, and it was upgraded in 2020.

The design of the Kuahu Bridge Site Museum was inspired by the "canoe," and the overall architecture is shaped like a ship, with both the planar and three-dimensional forms using the "boat" shape. The museum is like a light boat moored in vast time and space. The "Kuahu Bridge Culture" is a great treasure left by our ancestors, and the completion and opening of the museum provides a platform for people to understand "8,000 years of civilization history," and has become a representative historical and cultural landmark.

Address: 978 Xianghu Road, Xiaoshan District (near Xianghu Lake)

Tel: 0571-83869286

Opening hours: 9:00-17:00, closed on Mondays (open on legal holidays)