Archaeology: Level One Site Summary
The following group of paragraphs were written by House 43 as a class. Students offered ideas and sentences to the group while looking at and analyzing the artifacts from level one of our Kashgar, China dig site. The inferences made by House 43 students in these paragraphs present possible explanations as to why these artifacts were found together in the same place. Enjoy!
We think the first level of our site is a merchant’s house or antique store because we found many things that are precious like the jewels, money, and the pottery. There are a lot of different objects here. A merchant is a person who sells stuff. He is like a shopkeeper who travels, like Marco Polo’s father and Uncle. He trades his items for other things. We found Mah Jong tiles and they could be in the house as a game to play or they could be to sell. The box might be a merchant’s wallet for carrying money. The merchant might sell decorations for the house because we found a small dragon statue. We also found a lion statue. We heard that if you pet a lion paw, it gives you good luck. So, he might have it in his house for good luck or maybe to sell for decoration for good luck for the people. Maybe he had lots of good luck charms because merchants need lots of good luck to have good travels and trade. The turtles might have been used for holding chopsticks. We heard that it was not polite to put chopsticks on the table, so the turtle was flat to hold the chopsticks. So maybe the merchants sold the turtles with the chopsticks we found. Another reason it could be a merchant’s house is that we found a lot of coins, but we did not find a lot of money. We don’t know that the person was rich or famous. There are teapots so maybe he sold tea or something that needed to be oiled. If it is a merchant, the merchant painted because there is ink and a paintbrush. Maybe he was an artist.
We also think this might not be a merchant’s house because it seems like a collectors house because collectors collect all sorts of artifacts. At a merchant’s house there might be lots of the same thing or have items of one theme, but at this house there were lots of different things. Maybe he was artist because of the paintbrush and ink. He or she might have used the flute. Many times instruments inspire artists. It is quite common for an artist to have lots of inspirations and quite a few things for his art. There are a lot of things that he might have used because they look to be in pretty good condition like the round silver bell. Maybe he is a musician because we found a flute.
Level one might also have been a restaurant or a kitchen, a dining room or living room in a house because we found plates, teapots, bowls, chopsticks, vases and decorations. The bicycle could have been used for delivery if it was a restaurant. The flute and games could have been entertainment in the restaurant.
We looked at the coins. There were coins from 1968, 1973, 1975, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1992, 1958, 1967, and 1994. We know that level one is most recent, but we don’t know how recent level one is. We know that the site is, at its oldest, 15 years old because we found a coin from 1994.
We spent a lot of time calling the merchant a man, but it could have been a woman. We found perfume bottles, some earrings, a necklace, and a purse. Maybe a man and a woman lived here. Perhaps there was even a family. The merchant, or whomever, would have used a bike to travel. We know this because we found bike pedals, bike brakes and reflectors. When we watched a video about Kashgar, there were a lot people who travel with their things on bicycles.