According to anthropologists, all races in the world belong to the same species and have the same origin. About 50 thousand years ago, human physique developed to the late stage of Homo sapiens. At the same time, the three major races in the world have basically taken shape.
According to the classification of anthropologists, contemporary China people belong to the East Asian and South Asian subtypes of Mongolian race. The main characteristics of the Mongolian race are: medium skin color, straight and hard hair, less body hair and beard, flat face, medium nose width, low nose bridge, medium lip thickness, canthus canthus with inner canthus folds (commonly known as Mongolian eyes), high eye socket, prominent cheekbones, shovel-shaped front teeth, flat facial bones and less body odor.
China civilization was formed in the late Paleolithic period and the Neolithic period. The human bone fossils found in China belong to primitive Mongolian race and late Homo sapiens, so it can be said that late Homo sapiens in China is our direct ancestor.
At the top of Gulong Mountain in Zhoukoudian, southwest of Beijing, near the first place where Homo erectus was found, Neanderthal fossils were found, including three relatively complete skulls. Dunrui Wei, a famous anthropologist, observed that one of the male skulls is very similar to some fossils of Homo sapiens in western Europe in measurement, but it should be regarded as a primitive Mongolian race in appearance. Another female skull is very Melanesian; There is also a female skull that looks like an Eskimo type. So, he came to a strange speculation: these cavemen were residents who moved from other places, and they were extinct because of the attack of the native Mongolian race, so the physical characteristics of China people later had no direct inheritance relationship with them. Later, scholars re-studied the skulls of three Neanderthals, thinking that Dunrui Wei overemphasized their differences and underestimated their * * * *. In fact, these three should all represent the primitive Mongolian race, especially close to China, Eskimos and American Indians. They are the same ancestor of the above-mentioned people, and not a few people gather at the top of a mountain.
Cavemen belong to the late Homo sapiens in China, with a brain volume of 1300- 1500ml. Within the variation range of modern people's brain capacity, the branches of cerebral arteries are also close to modern people, indicating that their intellectual development level is close to modern people.
From 5000 BC to 3000 BC, Yangshao culture appeared in northern China, mainly distributed in Guanzhong, most of Henan, southern Shanxi, northern Hebei, Hetao, Gansu and Qinghai. Up to now, more than 1000 sites have been discovered, covering the core area of early Chinese civilization, affecting most of the later cultures in the Central Plains and being the backbone of Chinese civilization. The residents of Yangshao culture are mainly East Asian Mongolians, including some factors in Central Asia and South Asia, and it is the main culture of East Asian Mongolians. During this period, the ancients began to settle in villages on a large scale.
Among the sites of Yangshao culture, the village sites are the most complete, especially Jiangzhai. Jiangzhai site was established from 4600 BC to 3690 BC, located in Jiangzhai in the north of Lintong County, Shaanxi Province, with an area of 5,500 square meters and a circular shape. There is a 2-meter-wide village protection room around the village, and the central residential area of the village is a square. The village is divided into clans, with five groups of buildings * * */room 0/00. Each clan has a large public house surrounded by small and medium-sized houses. There are three types of houses: crypt, semi-crypt and flat. Multi-rooms are becoming more and more popular. Houses are mostly paved with three roads of mud, with wooden bones and mud walls. The whole family lives in the middle room with the old mother as the center. Women of childbearing age receive their boyfriends in small rooms, and adult men generally live in large public houses, which is a typical matriarchal clan. At this time, agriculture has been highly developed. Yangshao culture is mainly distributed in the Yellow River Basin. Although the climate here is dry and the annual precipitation is less, the rain is mostly concentrated in summer, which is beneficial to the growth of drought-resistant crops. In addition, due to aeolian reasons, the loess here has a uniform and loose soil structure, good water retention and water supply performance, and the soil contains high natural fertility. These conditions make it easy for the grain grown here to get a bumper harvest. The appearance of primitive agriculture is a great success for human beings to transform nature. The emergence of civilization is closely related to the development of agriculture. So Yangshao culture laid the foundation of Chinese civilization. The ancients living in Yangshao culture period were undoubtedly the ancestors of China people.
Anthropologists' research also shows that the ethnic characteristics of China people have largely adapted to the geographical environment in the middle latitudes of East Asia, and their medium stature and skin color correspond to the sunshine and temperature in the middle latitudes. The "Mongolian eyes" and nose collapse may be related to the cold and windy climate in Central Asia.
However, the ethnic composition of China people is not single. The inhabitants of Dawenkou culture in the lower reaches of the Yellow River may have Polynesian elements, while Hemudu culture and some human bone fossils found in Guangdong have obvious Australian and nigro elements. The human skulls found in Yin Ruins of Shang Dynasty also contain people of several different races. Because, before the Stone Age, human beings were in a long-term large-scale migration. Only when mankind enters the historical era and forms a regional nation can human life be relatively stable. Therefore, in the process of the Chinese nation and Chinese civilization forming an independent whole, there are always many elements that need to be integrated, and even after the formation of the Chinese nation, new elements are constantly being absorbed.