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A system of ancient ceramic water pipes, the oldest ever unearthed in China, shows that neolithic people were capable of complex engineering feats without the need for a centralised state authority [ucl.ac.uk]:

In a study published in Nature Water, the archaeological team describe a network of ceramic water pipes and drainage ditches at the Chinese walled site of Pingliangtai dating back 4,000 years to a time known as the Longshan period. The network shows cooperation amongst the community to build and maintain the drainage system, though no evidence of a centralised power or authority.

Dr Yijie Zhuang (UCL Institute of Archaeology), senior and corresponding author on the paper, said: "The discovery of this ceramic water pipe network is remarkable because the people of Pingliangtai were able to build and maintain this advanced water management system with stone age tools and without the organisation of a central power structure. This system would have required a significant level of community-wide planning and coordination, and it was all done communally."

The ceramic water pipes make up a drainage system which is the oldest complete system ever discovered in China. Made by interconnecting individual segments, the water pipes run along roads and walls to divert rainwater and show an advanced level of central planning at the neolithic site.

What's surprising to researchers is that the settlement of Pingliangtai shows little evidence of social hierarchy. Its houses were uniformly small and show no signs of social stratification or significant inequality amongst the population. Excavations at the town's cemetery likewise found no evidence of a social hierarchy in burials, a marked difference from excavations at other nearby towns of the same era.

The level of complexity associated with these pipes refutes an earlier understanding in archaeological fields that holds that only a centralised state power with governing elites would be able to muster the organisation and resources to build a complex water management system. While other ancient societies with advanced water systems tended to have a stronger, more centralised governance, or even despotism, Pingliangtai demonstrates that was not always needed, and more egalitarian and communal societies were capable of these kinds of engineering feats as well.

Journal Reference:
Li, C., Cao, Y., Zhang, C. et al. Earliest ceramic drainage system and the formation of hydro-sociality in monsoonal East Asia [open]. Nat Water 1, 694–704 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44221-023-00114-4 [doi.org]

Original Submission