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An extremely rare tiger patterned stone axe dating back to the Liangzhu Culture period was unearthed at the Dinggeng Site in Yixing City. The tiger patterned stone axe, with tiger, cloud, and bird patterns carved on both sides has attracted experts and scholars from all over the country to explore the mystery of the early civilization in Wuxi.

The Dinggeng Site, located in the northeast of Zhoutie Town, Yixing City, was discovered in 2020. About 10 thousand square meters have remained though the original distribution area of this site was over 20 thousand square meters. In early March of this year, 1800 square meters of archaeological excavation work was completed.

"The main archaeological discoveries include stone, pottery, jade, and bone artifacts from the Liangzhu Culture period, which dates back to somewhere between 4500 and 5000 years ago," said Liu Baoshan, Director of Wuxi Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology.

A large number of production and living tools were unearthed at Dinggeng Site, including 329 stone tools and about 500 fishing net pendants.

The number of unearthed stone tools and fishing and hunting tools accounts for a large proportion, which is rare in sites of similar scale. A stone axe with a "tiger carved symbol" carved horizontally on both sides is particularly striking.

"We now see that this image has three clear themes, one is the bird pattern, the other is what we accurately call the tiger filled with bird patterns, and there is also an image in the middle that looks like a spiral, like a rolling shutter door. You can see that it is carved on both sides and is actually a whole, and both sides are locked together. Therefore, I think it is not a graffiti, but a very meaningful image of the society during the Liangzhu Culture period," said Fang Xiangming, Director and Researcher of Zhejiang Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology.

This pattern combination is the first time it has been found in Liangzhu cultural relics. Experts said that the Liangzhu cultural sites discovered and excavated previously were mainly distributed in the east of the Taihu Lake. The large-scale Liangzhu cultural settlement site discovered at Dinggeng site for the first time opened a window for the project of exploring the origin of civilization in the west of the Taihu Lake.

According to the unearthed cultural relics, it can be inferred that Dinggeng site should be a high-level settlement with aristocratic life, and its productivity has reached a high level. Further study is needed to study the relationship between the site and the western civilization of the Taihu Lake, Liangzhu civilization, and the origin of Chinese civilization.

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