Tag: Cherchen man

Ancient Chinese Mummies Originated in Europe and Siberia

A group of ancient Chinese mummies found in China have long fascinated experts and the public, largely because the bodies look more distinctly European (or even Celtic) than Asian. Now a new scientific report published last month says the oldest of these mummies dating back almost 4,000 years likely originated outside of China, from a mixture of places such as Europe and Siberia. What’s more, these ancient people had an “obsession with procreation”, burying their dead alongside symbolic vulvas and giant phalluses.

For decades now, the ancient corpses have been found in Chinas Tarim Basin, a desert region near the western frontier of the country. The dry climate of the area has kept the bodies well-preserved, leaving the hair and skin, as well as their clothes, intact.

The oldest known grave site containing the so-called mummies is Xiaohe cemetery, Small River Cemetery, which is located near a dried-up river bed. Tests show that the site was used as early as 3,980 years ago.

A team, largely made up of Chinese scientists, analyzed the DNA from 30 of the oldest mummies found at Small River Cemetery. The results suggest that the people were of mixed ancestry, carrying DNA from populations based in Europe, Central Asia and Siberia. The report adds that intermarriage between these people had probably begun before before they entered the Tarim Basin 4,000 years ago.

Tarim Mummies & Blatent Sexual Symbolism

The work at Small River Cemetery has also uncovered more about the culture surrounding the people buried there. Archaeologists have found a field of long wooden poles, about 13-foot in height, standing erect at the site. They concluded that the poles are likely phallic symbols and show the culture’s infatuation with procreation and sex.

An article in the New York Times online quotes archaeologist Victor Mair’s view of the ancient people’s obsession with procreation, saying: The whole of the cemetery was blanketed with blatant sexual symbolism. They write:

Looking again at the shaping of the 13-foot poles that rise from the prow of each womans boat, the archaeologists concluded that the poles were in fact gigantic phallic symbols… The mens boats, on the other hand, all lay beneath the poles with bladelike tops. These were not the oars they had seemed at first sight, the Chinese archaeologists concluded, but rather symbolic vulvas that matched the opposite sex symbols above the womens boats.

Mair, who is also one of the authors of the recently published scientific report, called it “a gigantic breakthrough” in the study of the mummies’ DNA.

In a brief interview with Heritage Key, Mair said that the culture of the people buried at Small River Cemetery derived from the West, even as part of their DNA can be traced to South Siberia. In his previous research papers, Mair has noted that the felt hats and string skirts worn on the mummies resembles that of clothing worn in ancient European cultures.

As for what language the earliest mummies spoke, Mair believes it was Tocharian. The language, which is now extinct, likely died out in the 9th century AD, but was used by people in the Tarim Basin.

Mair added that as far back as 4,000 years ago, people were already moving through what would become the Silk Road. But he said that this movement was largely heading from West to East. Not until the Han Dynasty (206 BC to 220 AD) did the movement begin shifting the other direction.

Mair, who has written a book about the fascinating mummies of the Tarim Basin, will present his findings and theories in a lecture at the Bower Museum on 27th March.

No Celts in Ancient China

Every now and then a news story comes to light about the so-called Celtic mummies of China. The story has been making rounds for most of this century, from scientific conferences to ABCNews. Without detracting from the wonder that is the Cherchen mummies, lets set the record straight concerning the Celticness of these men and women” writes Emma Wohlfart on her blog PastPresenters. What arguments does she offer and err.. were we mistaken too?

Emma – who introduces herself as a twenty-something writer with an archaeology degree, a laptop and a maxed out library card – agrees that there were Bronze Age contacts between Europeans and the Chinese, but wants to get the message across, preferably once and for all, that they were not Celtic:

  • The ‘Xinjiang Europeans’ had all died by the time anyone was referred to as a Celt.
  • Icons found with the bodies which resembled in some ways the Sheela na Gig figure are no sign of Celticness. The Sheela na Gigs we know from Ireland are 2400 years younger and occure all across Europe.
  • The standing stones surrounding the burial was linked to the British dolmens, but these belong to the Stone Age and predate Celtic culture by thousands of years and exist in Asia too.
  • DNA findings were that the mummies shared DNA with, amongst others, modern Swedes, Finns, and Italians, neither of which are particularly Celtic.

After Emma has convinced you that the Celts never got quite as far as China, you can quickly learn more about the these fascinating ancient peoples of Europe by listening to the Sixty Second Celtic Chronicle podcast series on Emma’s YouTube Channel, starting at the introduction, of course.

A Celt in China: The Mysterious Origins of Cherchen Man

The Loulan Beauty - she's not much a catch these days, but we're assured she was a looker in her day. Picture by Bharat Vij.Cherchen Man, who died around 1000 BC, appears to be as Scottish as square sausage tall, dark-haired, clad in a red tunic and tartan leggings and sporting a beard as ginger as a burning fox. His DNA attests to his Celtic origins. So why on earth, then, was his mummified corpse discovered buried in the barren sands of the Taklamakan Desert, in the far-flung Xinjiang region of western China?

Its a question that still has experts scratching their heads, especially since Cherchen Man is just one of hundreds of ancient desiccated corpses of European origin found in the Tarim Basin in western China over the last 25 years. His remains, along with others, are now kept in a museum in the Xinjiang provincial capital of Urumqi, which also houses a reconstruction of how this intrepid traveller might have looked before he died.

It had been well known and accepted that Celtic influence stretched far and wide at the civilizations peak around 300 BC, from Scotland in the north to Ireland in the west, southern Spain and Italy in the south and parts of Poland, Ukraine and central Turkey in the east. But few experts expected to discover the remains of humans of Celtic descent in central Asia, almost as far east as Tibet. Theyve been described as among the most important archaeological finds of the past quarter century, and point to an ancient connection having evidently existed between east and west as early as the Bronze Age.

Theyre among the most important archaeological finds of the past quarter century, and point to an ancient connection between east and west as early as the Bronze Age.

The burial site of Cherchen Man and his people bore other hallmarks of Celtic culture, such as large standing stones that look like British dolmens. He was found buried with what appears to be his family three women and a baby, all of whom have equally European features. One womans hair is light brown, and it looks like it was freshly brushed and braided before her mummification.

An even older Tarim mummy than Cherchen Man is the 4,000-year-old Loulan Beauty discovered near the town of Loulan who too has long, flowing fair hair, and features that look to be of Nordic origin. All of these European migrants seem to have been peaceful folk, since very few weapons have been found in their graves, or valuable goods that suggest evidence of a caste system. Nonetheless, they might have done well to learn the meaning of the name of the Taklamakan Desert before they made their long journey there you go in, it translates, and never come out.

Picture by Farrukh Younus. All rights reserved.