Shima is a massive Chinese Neolithic city originally mistaken for a Great Wall section. Today it's a desert, but thousands of years ago the region was lush enough for agriculture. Climate change caused desertification and abandonment. No textual records mention it. Civilizations can vanish from landscape AND history!
Shima: massive Chinese Neolithic city lost to climate change and forgotten
Key facts
- Large city dating to the Chinese Neolithic, located in northern China
- Originally misidentified as a section of the Great Wall because it exists where no city should be located
- Region is currently a desert but was once a lush environment supporting agriculture
- Pollen samples and climate history reveal the region supported agriculture thousands of years ago
- Climate change caused desertification, leading to abandonment of the city
- No textual records exist mentioning the city
- Demonstrates that entire civilizations can vanish from both landscape and written history
Site mentioned
Sources
The first Neolithic urban center on China's north Loess ...sciencedirect.com
by Z Sun · 2018 · Cited by 111 — Shimao was apparently a high-level complex society with a powerful ruling elite group dominating a large region in the north Loess Plateau. Many of its material ...
Exploring China's Past: The Shimao Archaeological Site ...learninglab.si.edu
... city in China's Shaanxi Province that is believed to have flourished in the late Neolithic (ca. 5000-2000 B.C.E.) to the early Xia Dynasty ...
Top 10 Discoveries of the Decade - Neolithic City of Shimaoarchaeology.org
They had discovered the lost city of Shimao, which dates back to 2300 B.C. Over the past 10 years, excavators including Zhouyong Sun of the Shaanxi Provincial ...
(PDF) Shimao: China's Hidden Cityacademia.edu
Shimao's discoveries suggest advanced settlements existed in northern China over 4,300 years ago, challenging the Central Plains narrative. This suggests ...
Shimaoen.wikipedia.org
Shimao is a Neolithic site in Shenmu County, Shaanxi, China. The site is located in the northern part of the Loess Plateau, on the southern edge of the ...
Keep exploring
Every site on this page sits on the globe, and the people who research them are on the Discord.
3D Globe · Sites by country · Story Archive · Research Library · Weekly Journal · Search
AI-generated text · images from the original sources · always verify with the sources.