Origin of the Alans

[Alanus]

From Minusinsk to Northeastern China: the Q Migration, Part 4-- the "Sino-Siberians"

In the 3 above posts, we have followed the Siberians from Minusinsk, across Tuva, down through Mongolia, where we find them at Tevsh Uul, right on the eastern corner of the Gobi Altai. We also know (from Part 3 above) that the same culture-- males buried in a prone, face-down, positions-- have been found in Inner Mongolia.


   
The trek continues, punctuated by petroglyphs of chariots scratched on two mountain ranges-- at the western tip of the Yinshan and along the eastern side of the Helanshan. The migratory trajectory from Tevsh Uul into China was directly south. The above map shows the Gobi mountains, so picture a movement straight down to the Yellow River.

   
Once below Hetao, "the hump in the Yellow River," this culture moved southeastward occupying what is now eastern Shaanxi, and in particular, southwestern Shanxi, right where the Yellow River turns from its southern course and flows directly to the east. The map shows the Shang Dynasty in red and the subsequent Zhou Dynasty in blue. The western part of the Shang area was settled by a Siberian "Lijiaya culture... thought to have been an area of horse breeding and possibly a transit point for chariots coming from the steppe into the Shang core." (Gina L. Barnes, Archaeology of East Asia, Oxbow, 2015) 

West of this area, on the periphery of the Shang sphere, we see the duchy of Hao, which I believe was a settlement founded by King Wu Ding and governed by his third wife Fu Hao. In other words, Hao was not her family or tribal name. She appears to come from the Xia Zhi.

The Xia Zhi appear to be contemporaneous to the Lijiaya culture and occupying the same ground. Initially, King Wu Ding conducted a short war against them, a ten month campaign. This brief encounter seems to have ended in a prosperous treaty for both sides. The Xia Zhi received recognition as a Shang prefecture, attested by the high number of ornate Shang vessels in their burials. In turn, Wu Ding gained chariot technology and an extremely bad-ass third wife from the "Zhi family." The rest, of course, is history. The Lijiaya prospered, and graves contained much more than the usual "northern bronzes and Karasuk-style knives," including gold chariot rein holders (those "bow-shaped objects") and gold, wrap-around, Andronovo arm bands. There's nothing quite like gold... except maybe jade.

We can fast-forward to the second bad-ass woman, the one in Baifu M2, buried supine with her skull-bashing mace, and her male "companion," the guy lying face down in a prostrate position. We have shades of Tevsh Uul in first-generation Zhou China. The woman commander and her accomplice become the first known "Sino-Siberians." Possibly they were related to Lijiaya and the Xia Zhi. The Lijiaya culture was a substantial one; at least 10 different sites have been found. Also, they liked building things with well-placed rocks, just as the Tevsh Uul folks created ornate waisted slab burials. Wickedly odd, or not, the Zhou polity overlays the Lijiaya culture and the gold-wearing Xia Zhi people. The first Zhou capital, just west of Lijiaya, was at the duchy of Hao, another incidence of odd happenstance.


   
Let's fast-forward again, this time to the decade just prior to 900 BC. We'll take a little tour of the Peng Clan cemetay at Hengbei. We can visit more dead people, not just mostly dead but Totally Dead. Again, oddly enough, a convenient Yellow Dot on the above map locates the Hengbei cemetery right in the middle of the former Lijiaya/Xia Zhi area... or, in fact, did the Xia Zhi actually became an important Zhou entity called Peng?


   
The Peng cemetery dates to second generation Zhou, the final resting place of Peng Bo ("Duke of Peng") and his wife Bi Ji. The above photo shows Peng Bo's grave as excavated, the Duke found in "a prostrate position." Bi Ji, on the other hand, was "in an extended supine position with her hands placed across her belly." It's deja-vu all over again!


   
We are extremely fortune to have a detailed Y-Haplogroup list of the Peng cemetery's occupants. Grave M1 contains Bi Ji, the Duke's wife, descended from a well-heeled Chinese paternity, Haplogroup O. We turn to Peng Bo, the "aristocrat" in M3. His paternal lineage is Haplogroup N, about as Siberian as you can get without reaching the North Pole.


   
I'm not joking. Here is the map for Y-Haplogroup N. These Siberians hadn't heard about Global Warming yet, and you know they wore heavy fur coats.


   
The Peng cemetery list records more than 50% of its individuals as Y-Haplogroup Q, most common in Siberians. (see Map) If we look back to the grave list, twelve of the twenty-two occupants were buried prostrate. However, we do not know the sex of each individual, and certainly-- like Bi Ji-- a good percentage of the deceased must have been women.

This takes us back to Tevsh Uul in the Gobi Altai, with the males buried prostrate while a woman was interred supine. It takes us to Baifu, the woman warrior lying supine while her male companion was face-down. This is culturally echoed at Hengbei. There's a exceedingly distinct probability that those buried prostrate in the Peng Clan cemetery were men, while those buried supine were their Chinese wives (many of those listed as Y-Haplogroup O from their father's lineage). Among steppe tribes, it was common (and preferred) to marry outside of the clan. But any way we evaluate it, Duke Peng of the Zhou was a Sino-Siberian... as were the majority buried at Hengbei. Archaeologists and Anthropologists have claimed the Zhou "were aided" by steppe tribes in defeating the Shang. I would go a step further-- a significant portion of the Zhou polity included Siberian steppe people.