Protected Sites :Dingcun Site

The Dingcun Site is located along both sides of the Fen River in Xiangfen County, Shanxi Province.
The Dingcun Site, discovered in 1953, is an archaeological site of the Mid Paleolithic located in North China. It has become one of the key projects under excavation the next year. A total of 11 Paleolithic sites were excavated together with 3 sites of animal fossils, 3 human teeth, and 2005 stone tools. Altogether there are 28 kinds of mammal fossils, including rhinoceros, wild horse, Nama elephant, deer, field mouse, and primitive ox. A child's right upper skull fossil was unearthed in 1976, and the child was named as Dingcun Man according to modern archaeological nomination standard. With the fore-tooth taking the shape of shovel, the Dingcun Man belongs to a developing period between Peking Man and modern man, and is similar to Mongoloid and far different from white.

Stone tools excavated in the site were mostly made of hornfels, mausoleum stone and limestone. Shaped by direct strike, these stone tools were comparatively thick and sturdy, including chopping tools, scraping tools, sharp-pointed tools and stone balls. The most representative tool of the Dingcun Culture is the three-edge pointed tool, which was known as Dingcun pointed tool for its discovery site. The geological age of the Dingcun Man and its culture belongs to the late Pleistocene period, while their cultural age belongs to the Mid Paleolithic Age.

The Dingcun Culture is a major representative culture of the Mid Paleolithic Age in China.