The Sanxing Pits Site is located in Sanxing Village of Nanxing Town, about 10 kilometers west of Guanghan County in Sichuan Province. Lying to the north of the site is the wide Duck River.
A large number of jade and stoneware was unearthed at the site in 1929. Between 1980 and 1986, repeat excavations produced house, tomb, sacrificial pit and kiln sites, including a great amount of precious cultural relics like gold, bronze, jade, bone and pottery ware. In the two pits from the Shang Dynasty (17th century to 11th century BC) excavated in 1986, archaeologists found large bronze human statues, golden sticks and bronze trees with an exuberance of branches and leaves.
Over 100 relics were unearthed at the Sanxing Pits Site, including stone statues, bronze human statues, heads and masks — the smallest measuring several centimeters and the largest at about 1.7 meters in height. The largest bronze statue is 1.7 meters high with a 0.9-meter-high base — a total height of 2.6 meters. It dons a corolla on its head and has broad eyebrows and two clenched fists held up at shoulder level. Standing on a sacrificial altar held by monsters, the statue wears a type of tailcoat decorated with patterns of a phoenix, beast head and floating clouds that are said to take the form of a wizard. The bronze human sculptures and heads with masks of various expressions indicate that the masterly casting technique of ancient artists is over 3,000 years old.
The Sanxing Pits Site covers an area of about 6 million square meters. It has played a key role in unraveling the social life, sacrificial ceremonies and religious practices of a period compared to the Shu culture of the Shang Dynasty.
(Source: chinaculture.org)
