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Yanghai Tombs covers the Yanghai cemetery near Turpan and the cannabis found in its tomb M90: the site, the grave, the dating of the find, its botanical, chemical and genetic analysis, and the readings of its use.
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Discussion
Sources
- Jiang et al. (2006), Journal of Ethnopharmacology 108: the identification of the M90 cache as Cannabis by morphology and anatomy, its radiocarbon date of 2500 years before present and the ritual or medicinal reading.
- Russo et al. (2008), Journal of Experimental Botany 59: the site, tomb M90 and its goods, the corrected calibrated date of 2700 years before present, the microscopy, chemistry and DNA results and the cultivation reading.
- Zhao, Jiang and Grassa (2019), Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 11: the date range of the cemetery (about 1260–48 BCE), its assignment to the Subeixi culture and the 25 plant species found there.
- Ren et al. (2019), Science Advances 5: the Yanghai find as of about 500 BCE, and the absence of any sign of burning in the tomb.
- Jiang et al. (2016), Economic Botany 70: the Jiayi burial shroud and its grouping with Yanghai and the Altai.
Source discrepancies
- Date of the M90 cannabis. 2500 years before present by radiocarbon (Jiang et al. 2006); a calibrated 2700 years before present after recalibration against the horse gear and Chinese tree-ring data (Russo et al. 2008); about 500 BCE (Ren et al. 2019). All three are given in the article, each attributed.
- Span of the cemetery. Russo et al. give "some 2500 tombs dating from 3200–2000 years BP"; Zhao, Jiang and Grassa give about 1260–48 BCE. The article gives the second, the more recent statement by the archaeobotanical team, and no tomb count.
- THC in the sample. The abstract of Russo et al. (2008) says the material contained tetrahydrocannabinol; their results say a small peak at the retention time of THC could not be confirmed by its spectrum, and base the THC reading on the dominance of its breakdown product cannabinol. The article follows the results.
- The people. Russo et al. link the cemetery with the Gushi (Jushi) of the Hou Hanshu; Zhao, Jiang and Grassa assign it to the Subeixi culture. Both are given.
- A second cannabis find. Cannabis was found together with caper seed (Capparis spinosa) in another Yanghai tomb (Jiang et al. 2007, Journal of Ethnopharmacology 113: 409–420). Its date differs between sources: 2800 years before present in the title of that paper, 2500 years before present where Zhao, Jiang and Grassa list the same paper, and 2700 years before present first and 2200–2400 years before present after recalibration in Russo et al. (2008). It is left out of the article until its date is settled in a source.
Sources not used
- The excavation report: Li, Lü and Zhang, "Excavation on the Yanghai cemetery in Shanshan (Piqan) County, Xinjiang", Acta Archaeologica Sinica 2011 (1): 99–150, in Chinese.
- Lü, Wang and Guo (2017) on the phases and dating of the cemetery, Tufanological Research 2017 (1): 1–18, in Chinese.
Images reserved in the article
Two images have places in the article but are not yet uploaded:
File:Cannabis-Yanghai-tomb-M90-drawing.jpg(lead): the reconstruction painting of tomb M90 on Wikimedia Commons as "Perspective drawing of M90 in No.1 Plateau, Yanghai Cemetery.jpg", CC BY-SA 4.0. The painting shows the man whole on a wooden bed; Russo et al. describe his skeleton as disarticulated, which is why the caption calls it a reconstruction.File:Cannabis-Iron-Age-burial-sites-Central-Eurasia-map.jpg(Site), a map to be drawn: an outline of Central Asia and southern Siberia with modern borders in light grey and four labelled dots, at Yanghai and Jiayi near Turpan, at the Jirzankal Cemetery in the Tashkurgan valley of the eastern Pamirs and at the Pazyryk barrows in the eastern Altai. Each label carries its date: Yanghai M90 about 2700–2500 years before present, Jiayi M231 about 2800–2400 years ago, Jirzankal about 2600–2400 years ago, Pazyryk barrow 2 about 300 BCE.