China has a long coastline, the mainland coastline alone has more than 18,000 kilometers.There are more than 6,000 islands ringing around the mainland. The coastline of the islands is more than 14,000 kilometers long. They stretch in the vast waters of the Bohai Sea, the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea, and the South China Sea and are closely connected with the world's largest ocean—the Pacific Ocean. The ancestors carried out maritime activities and provided extremely favorable conditions for the development of maritime traffic.To carry out sailing activities, there must be ships.The history of shipbuilding in our country stretches for thousands of years and started as early as ancient times.

It is difficult to verify exactly when the ancestors invented boats, but it can be said that my country is the country that invented boats very early.At least in the Neolithic Age (about 10,000-4,000 years ago), our ancestors used canoes and rafts extensively, and went to the ocean with their extraordinary courage and wisdom, which laid the foundation for our country's navigation industry.The production level of the primitive society was very low, and water was a necessary condition for human survival. Most people gathered in places with water and made a living by fishing and hunting. In the process of fighting with nature, the ancestors observed and understood nature. "The ancients saw fallen leaves because they thought they were boats" (Liu Xiang's "Shiben"), "the ancients saw the 窾 [kuan inscription, meaning hollow] wooden floats and knew it was a boat" (Liu An's "Huainanzi·Shuoshan Xun").It shows that our ancestors already knew that some objects have buoyancy. "The Suiren clan used pao [pao robe] to save water, and the Fuxi clan began to ride the bamboo tree" ("Huainanzi Wuyuan"). Both the Suiren clan and the Fuxi clan are figures in ancient legends.The Suiren family lived in the era when the clan commune equivalent to the Upper Cave Man began, and the Fuxi family lived in the era when the matriarchal clan equivalent to the Banpo clan flourished.This vividly illustrates the process of water wading through improvement. "Pao" means a gourd, and "Using Pao to aid water" means that the ancients used gourds or tree trunks as buoys to fish in deep water in order to improve their lives.Later, people connected several gourds with ropes and tied them around their waists to increase their buoyancy when crossing water. Paddle together to improve people's ability to fish in water.It is said that Fuxi could teach people how to make nets to fish and raise livestock.People raise livestock and inflate the animal skins to make buoyancy devices—skin bags. "Fuxi's family began to ride on a raft", and a raft is a raft. "The ark is set up with 桴 [fu Fu, same 桴], and rides on the 桴济河" ("Mandarin · Qi Yu"), "merge trees to cross".According to the interpretation of Jin Guopu's annotation "Erya·Shishui", wooden rafts are called 簰 [pai brand, that is, 箄], which means big rafts, and bamboo rafts are called rafts, which are small rafts.It is to tie up a few logs or bamboos, use rafts to save goods, and cross the river by rafts.According to research, the raft was invented by the Baiyue people in the southeastern part of my country during the Neolithic Age.The raft was the first water vehicle that appeared before the boat was invented.

Rafts are easier to build than canoes.It is easy to obtain materials, easy to make, can carry more loads, runs smoothly, and is not afraid of shallow water and fast currents. It is a very good water tool.People of all nationalities in our country have made various forms of rafts by using the rich local resources, such as wooden rafts in the south of the Yangtze River, bamboo rafts on the Lijiang River, birch bark boats of the Oroqen people in Heilongjiang, yak skin boats of the Tibetan people, and sheepskin rafts along the Jiuqu Yellow River. Wait.The vehicles created by these ancient peoples still play an important role in our lives today.

When humans entered the Neolithic Age, they were able to make production tools such as stone axes and stone adzes (ben Ben), and they could also make fire manually.Fire and stone axes enable man to build canoes.There is a section of stone adzes that was an ancient shipbuilding tool. Generally speaking, it is a rectangular flat object with a beveled edge, like an ordinary iron adze in the shape of a planer. The facing side is not as flat as the front, but rises in the middle to form a horizontal ridge, which divides the back into two parts, the front and the back.There are segmented stone adzes that can be used with a handle, especially where the canoe is required on the coast or on the island.This kind of ancient shipbuilding tools is mostly distributed in coastal areas of my country, with Fujian, Guangdong, and Jiangxi being the most, followed by Zhejiang, and many found in Taiwan.Because some stone adzes are not as easy to manufacture as hammered Paleolithic tools, it is impossible to manufacture them successfully in all parts of the world.Generally, it originated in one place, and later, with the migration of the manufacturer, some stone adzes also spread to wherever they went.Most of the utensils found in China are primary and middle-level utensils, and very few high-level utensils.However, those found in the Philippines and Polynesian islands are mostly high-grade and made later than those seen in China.Based on this, archaeologists deduce that some stone adzes originated in the southeast coast of China, and later spread to the Pacific islands after the Baiyue people sailed from island to island.It can be seen that all the islands where stone adzes have been unearthed are generally the places where the Baiyue people in the southeast coast of China drifted from island to island for maritime activities.The distribution of some stone adzes shows the development of the navigation industry in the ancient coastal areas of our country.

"Yi Xici Xia" says, "Fuxi's family cut [kuku] wood for boats, and Shan [yanyan] wood for boats. "Cutting wood for a boat" is the method of making a canoe: choose a large tree trunk, chop and cut a long groove with a stone ax or a stone knife, then burn the sawdust with fire, cut, cut and burn again until the long groove reaches the Appropriate length and depth.People sit and stand in the trough and can float on the water and go far away.Generally speaking, to build a canoe, you need to choose a log with a diameter of more than one meter and a length of five meters, or even more than ten or twenty meters.With the canoe, the scope of people's activities has expanded, and production has further developed.So who invented the canoe?There are many sayings in the literature.It is said that "Panyu began to build the boat", and it was said that the two ministers of the Yellow Emperor "drummed together, and Huo Di made the boat", or "Qiao Hang made the boat". These show that the boat was not invented by one person, but in many places. There are inventors, including famous masters.In short, our country is the country that invented the boat very early.When did the canoe appear? In 1973, a 7,000-year-old Neolithic ancient residential site was discovered in Hemudu Village, Yuyao County, Zhejiang Province.Six wooden oars were found at the site, all made from a single plank.There is a residual length of 0.6 meters, a width of 0.12 meters, a leaf length of 0.5 meters, and a geometric pattern composed of horizontal and oblique lines engraved on the handle.The other wooden oar is 0.92 meters long, and the whole is slender and flat, like a willow leaf.It shows that the ancestors already knew how to cut planks, and had the conditions to develop into making wooden boats.A carbon black pottery canoe model was also collected near the wooden paddle, which was determined to be a relic 7,000 years ago. "Confirming each other, it can be concluded that the lower limit time for the appearance of canoes was about seven or eight thousand years ago.

In 1958, a canoe with a length of 11 meters, a width of 0.9 meters, an inner bottom width of 0.56 meters and a depth of 0.42 meters was excavated in Yancheng Township, Wujin County, Jiangsu Province.It is hollowed out from a whole section of a large log.According to research, this is a canoe from the Spring and Autumn Period.This can also be corroborated with the record of "cutting wood for a boat". Around 1965, two more canoes were discovered in Yancheng.According to research, it is also from the Spring and Autumn Period.One of them has a pointed head and an open tail. It looks like only half a canoe, but it is actually a complete canoe.Open tail, no tail plate, easy to build.When the boat is docked, it is also convenient to get up and down.When sailing, people sit forward, the head is heavy and the tail is light, and the open tail is raised above the water, so there is no risk of water entry.This is another type of canoe.So far, more than 20 canoes have been unearthed in my country, and their shapes can be roughly divided into three types:

1. Head side and tail side: no warping, almost flat bottom. 2. Pointed head and pointed tail: Both the bow and the tail of the boat are raised. 3. The head is pointed and the tail is square: the bow of the boat is raised and the tail is flat. Later ship types were mainly of these types, with flat bottom and pointed bottom, which were probably developed from the canoe type. According to myths and legends, when Dayu controlled the flood, he "traveled by car on land and by boat on water" ("Historical Records Xia Benji"). After traveling on the water for 13 years, he passed the house three times without entering, and finally conquered the flood.He was able to lead the people to dredge rivers so that they could flow into the sea smoothly, and he was able to build irrigation channels to turn floods into water conservancy. It can be said that canoes played a great role.With canoes, people can cross waters, conquer nature, and open up new areas of life to create a better life.To this day, canoes are still used as a tool for crossing rivers in the southwest of my country and among some ethnic minorities.In addition, a large canoe with a diameter of 1.3 meters can be seen on the Yigong River in the east of Tibet.Some people used canoes as water tools during their lifetime, and they also used canoes as burial utensils after death.The same is true abroad. The Republic of Kiribati, a country in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, is composed of 33 large and small islands. The transportation between islands still relies on canoes as the main means of transportation.

Rafts and canoes were the simplest and most important means of crossing water for our ancient ancestors.They became the prototypes of the two major ship-type systems in ancient Chinese shipbuilding technology. With the tools for crossing water, the ancient ancestors were able to carry out sea fishing and migration voyages. The Dongyi people on the eastern coast of my country have been accustomed to sea activities since ancient times.They created the Longshan culture and the Baiyue culture, which together with the Central Plains became the three cradles that nurtured the culture of the Chinese nation.

In 1928, Neolithic cultural remains were discovered in Longshan Town, Zhangqiu County, Shandong Province, known as the Longshan Culture.Longshan culture is characterized by thin and shiny eggshell-like black pottery, also known as black pottery culture. In 1959, Dawenkou cultural relics were discovered in Dawenkou at the junction of Tai'an and Ningyang counties in Shandong.It is distributed in Shandong and northern Jiangsu.The early stage of Dawenkou culture was in the stage of matrilineal clan commune five or six thousand years ago, and the stage of patrilineal clan commune in the middle and late period was four or five thousand years ago.The Longshan Culture is a late Neolithic culture evolved from the Dawenkou Culture, about 4,000 years ago.

In the Baishi Village site in Yantai, Shandong Peninsula, and the Zijingshan site in Penglai, straight-mouthed cylindrical jars, typical utensils of the Neolithic culture in the Liaodong Peninsula, were unearthed, as well as geometric patterns, embossing patterns, etc. Such as parallel oblique lines, leaf veins, network patterns, embossed pottery, etc.Black, bright, thin, wheel-polished black pottery and refined pottery such as three-legged cups were found in the upper layer of Guojia Village, Lushunkou.It shows that the Longshan culture of the Shandong Peninsula has been exchanged and penetrated into the coastal areas of the Liaodong Peninsula.

Baiyue culture refers to the culture created by the ancestors of the Yue ethnic groups (hence the name Baiyue) who lived in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian and Lingnan regions in southeastern my country in ancient times.The Yue nationality is a nation that is good at sea activities, and they spread the Baiyue culture through sailing activities.The typical site of Baiyue Culture is in Hemudu, Yuyao, Zhejiang.Typical artifacts of the Baiyue Culture are imprinted pottery and segmented stone adzes.In modern times, a large number of Baiyue cultural relics have been discovered in Taiwan. Many stone adzes have been found in Taiwan, and Longshan cultural relics can be seen everywhere. The phenomenon of mutual influence and penetration of cultures in various coastal areas of our country is precisely the result of our ancestors' ancient voyages.So how did ancient times sail?The method must be very primitive, but must have the most reliable landmark positioning to navigate.Our ancestors had to keep the familiar terrain in their sight and memory so as not to get lost.In the long-term nautical activities, the original astronomical knowledge is obtained in the practical observation.On Jiangjun Cliff in Jinping Mountain, Lianyungang, Jiangsu Province, there is a rock carving on Jiangjun Cliff. It is carved on a black rock at an altitude of 20 meters. On it, patterns and various symbols such as crops, human faces, birds and beasts, and nebulae can be seen.There are triangular pointed ornaments on the head and patterns carved on the face.There is a nebula map in the middle of the human face, and there are figures representing the sun and moon in the nebula map.These reflect the astronomical knowledge of Neolithic coastal dwellers.They have accumulated experience in astronomical observation through years of nautical practice, and they may have known to use the sun, moon and certain stars to identify directions to guide voyages, return voyages, and fishing activities.This is the inevitable result of human beings conquering nature and striving for survival. The Chinese bordering on the western Pacific started sea voyages with primitive boat buoyancy and primitive navigation knowledge as early as 7,000 years ago, which shows that China, like the Mediterranean countries, is the birthplace of world marine culture.

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