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BBC 100件藏品中的世界史010:Jomon Pot绳纹陶钵

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BBC 100件藏品中的世界史

010:EPISODE 10 - Jomon Pot

第十集——绳纹陶钵

Jomon pot (made around 5,000 BC). Clay, found in Japan

绳纹壶,粘土陶器,距今约五千年,出土于日本。

Thousands of years ago, one of our ancestors must accidentally have made their first pot. We can imagine that a lump of wet clay somehow ended up in the fire, dried out, hardened and formed a hollow shape; a shape that could hold things, in a tough material.

数千年前,我们某一祖先在偶然间创造出了首件陶器。我们可以想象一块湿泥巴最后在火上烧制,烘干,变硬,形成一件形状中空的器皿,材料简陋,不过可以盛放东西。

Until now, for the Ice Age cook, leaves were soggy, baskets and skins leaked and burned, and meat charred. Suddenly, when that wet clay hardened, a whole world of culinary possibilities and ceramic design opened up.

从冰河时代的厨师们,到此之前,人类学会了浸渍树叶,编制篮子,革制兽皮,烘烤兽肉。然而当人类掌握了用火烤硬湿粘土的技术,忽然之间,开辟了一个新兴烹饪技术与陶瓷设计的崭新世界。

The miraculous accident that produced pottery coincided with some great developments in human history. In the previous four programmes, I've been looking at the way humans began to rear animals and to cultivate plants. As a consequence, they started to cook differently, to eat new things and therefore to live differently - they settled down. Today, we're in Japan, about seven thousand years ago, with an ancient pot made in a tradition that goes back almost ten thousand years before that.

这化腐朽为神奇、偶然间的陶器制作,正好与人类历史上其他伟大的发展相呼应。之前的四集节目里,我一直在介绍人类是如何驯化牲畜、培育作物。因此,他们开始采用不同的方式来烹制食物,吃的方式也改变了;然后过上了一种全新的定居生活。今天,我们来到了大约七千前年的日本,来寻找一件无意间创造出来的陶器。然而制作似类陶器的历史,却可以追溯到万年之前。

'The earliest dates we've got for pottery are around about 16,500 years ago, and that in itself has caused quite a fuss because this is still what most people recognise as the Old Stone Age - with people hunting big game animals. We don't really expect to find pottery quite as early as that.' (Simon Kaner)

“迄今为止我们发现的最早陶器大约16500年的历史。这发现本身真是一石激起千层浪呵,因为那是大家公认的旧石器时代,当时原始人类还在依靠狩猎大型野生动物谋生。我们根本没料到居然会出现那么早期的陶器。”西蒙·康尔说道。

It was in Japan that the world's first pottery was born - and with it, possibly the world's first stew.

世界上第一件陶器是在日本诞生的,也很可能相应地促成了世界第一钵炖汤的出现。

You'll find pots in museums all around the world and in the Enlightenment Gallery of the British Museum, we have pots from all over the world; Greek vases with heroes fighting on them, Ming bowls from China, pot-bellied African jars and beautiful Wedgwood tureens.

你会在世界各地的博物馆以及大英博物馆的启蒙展馆找到各种各样的盆钵锅罐;我们收藏有来自世界各地的展品,来自希腊的陶罐,上边描绘了战斗中的英雄,来自中国的明代古碗,来自非洲的大腹罐,还有美丽的韦奇伍德砂锅。

The world's pots are so ubiquitous that we take all of them for granted, but human history is told and written in pots perhaps more than in anything else; as Robert Browning put it: 'Time's wheel runs back or stops; potter and clay endure'.

这世界上的锅碗瓢盆、罐头钵头随处可见,我们都已经习已为常了;然而这些盆盆罐罐可以讲述或记录的人类历史,却可能比其他任何物品都要多。下如罗伯特·布朗宁说的:“不管沧海桑田、时光流逝,陶器与粘土生命永恒。”

This Jomon pot is an extremely important pot. It's pretty underwhelming to look at - in fact it's quite dull. It's made of brown-grey clay, a simple round pot about the size of the bucket that children play with on the beach, about six inches high, six inches across at the top, and its got it's got straight sides and a flat base, and it was made about seven thousand years ago in Japan.

这件绳纹钵极其重要。其实它本身令人印象相当之深刻。虽然它颜色其实很暗淡,原料是棕灰色的粘土,简简单单的圆型深钵,大小就像孩子们用在沙滩上玩耍的那种小塑料桶一样,大概六英寸高,上边端口直径也差不多六英寸,两侧是笔直的直线,还有一个平底。它大概是制造于七千年前的日本。

When you look more closely, you can see that it was built up with coils of clay and then, into the outside, fibres have been pressed, so that when you hold it, you feel as though you are actually holding a basket. It looks and feels like a basket in clay.

当你再仔细一点观察,你就可以发现它其实是用一圈圈的粘土圈先绕成型的,然后外边压上绳索般的花纹。当你拿起它的时候,就感觉像是在举着一个篮子。其实它看起来就像一个粘土制成的篮子。

The basket - like markings on this and other Japanese pots of the same time, are in a cord pattern and that's in fact what their name is in Japanese. They are Jomon - or 'cord-pattern' pots.

这种仿照竹篮纹理的花纹,在这件陶器及其同时期日本陶罐上都可以找到,被人们称之为绳纹,事实上它们的命名在日文里就是这意思。它们就是绳纹陶器。

And the word Jomon has come to be used not just for the objects, but for the people that made them, and even the whole historic period in which they were lived. It was the Jomon people living in what is now northern Japan, who created the world's first pots. Simon Kaner, of the University of East Anglia, is a specialist in ancient Japanese culture:

现在绳纹一词,已经不仅仅是这些物品的名称,那时代的人类,及他们生活的整个历史时期都被称之为绳纹。正是这些生活在如今日本北部的绳纹人制造了世界上的首件陶器。东英吉利大学的西蒙·康尔是古日本文化的专家,他说道:

'In Europe we've always assumed that people who've made pottery were farmers, and that it was only through farming that people were able to stay in one place, because they'd be able to build up a surplus that they could then subsist on through the winter months, and it was only if you were going to stay in one place all the year round, that you'd be making pottery, because it's an awkward thing to carry around with you.

“在欧洲,我们一向认为制作陶器的古人类肯定是农耕人类,因为只有依靠农业,人类才能定居下来,他们可以长年停留在同一地方,渐渐积蓄起余粮,培养起一种可持续的生活方式,能保证他们顺利渡过寒冬里那几个月。而且只有长年居住在同一地方,才有制作陶器的必要,要不然如果你得东奔西跑,这种东西搬来搬去可真是不方便。”

'The Japanese example is really interesting, because what we have here is pottery being made by people who were not farmers, and it's one of the best examples that we've got from anywhere in the world really - from pre-history, of people who subsisted on fishing, gathering nuts and other wild resources, and hunting wild animals - that they also had a need for cooking pots.'

“日本这例子真是相当有趣。因为这些陶器不是农民做出来的。这绝对是我们在全世界范围内收集到的关于史前文化的最好例子。这些人类捕鱼、采集坚果及其他野生植物,同时也狩猎野生动物,同时他们也需要煮东西的盆钵锅罐。”

The Jomon way of life seems to have been pretty comfortable. They lived near the sea and they relied on fish as a main source of food, that is, a food that came to them, so they didn't have to move around as land-roaming hunter-gatherers did.

绳纹人似乎生活得挺舒适惬意的。他们当时居住在海边,所以主要就以捕鱼为生,所以就没必要像世界其他地区的陆地狩猪采集者一样到处奔波迁徙。

They also had easy access to abundant plants with nuts and seeds, so there was no imperative to domesticate animals or to cultivate particular crops. Perhaps because of this plentiful supply of fish and food, farming took a long time to establish itself in Japan, compared to the rest of the world. Simple agriculture, in the shape of rice, arrived in Japan only two thousand five hundred years ago, but in pots, the Japanese were very much ahead of the game.

同时绳纹人也能很轻松地找到数量又多种类又全的坚果和种子植物,所以也没必要驯养动物或培育特定的农作物。也许也就是因为这些资源丰富的鱼类与充足的其他食品供应,,与世界其他地区相比,农业在日本的建立时间是相当之缓慢。简单农业,比如稻米的种植,二千五百年前左右才流传到日本;然而在制造陶器方面,日本的表现绝对是全世界领先了。

Before the discovery of the pot, people stored their food in holes in the ground or in baskets - both vulnerable to thieving creatures and, in the case of the baskets, to wear and to weather. Putting your food in sturdy clay containers that you can cover, keeps freshness in and mice out and, as for the shape and decoration of the new pots - well, having no pottery tradition to learn from, the Jomon looked at what they already had - baskets.

在发明这些陶罐陶钵以前,人类只能将食物储存在地洞里或者树皮树藤编织的篮子里,这样很容易被老鼠之类小动物偷吃,同时也很受天气影响。比如篮子吧,磨损得快,也容易受干受潮。但如果把食物放在坚固的粘土容器里,再加上个盖子,这样食物不大受天气影响,老鼠也无从下爪或下嘴了。而且看看这样新出现盆钵锅罐上的造型与装饰,由于制陶是史无前例的新经验,绳纹人就自然而然借鉴了他们编篮的习惯了。

So it's not surprising that they make pots that look like baskets, and indeed, look like each other. Professor Takashi Doi is Senior Archaeologist at the Agency of Cultural Affairs in Japan:

因此这些陶罐陶钵造型外观居然那么像篮子,也就毫不奇怪了。日本文化事务局的高级考古学家隆土井教授说道:

'For Jomon people the decorations are derived from what they saw around them in the natural world - the motifs were inspired by trees, plants, shells, animal bones.

“对于绳纹人,这些装饰花纹的灵感源于他们周遭的大自然界,这些主题都是受到树木、植物、贝壳、兽骨等等的启发。

The basic patterns are applied using twisted plant fibres or twisted cords, and there is an amazing variety in the ways you can twist your cords - there is an elaborate regional and chronological sequence that we have identified. Over the years of the Jomon period we can see over four hundred local types or regional styles. You can pin down some of these styles to 25-year time slots, they were so specific with their cord markings.'

最基本的模式是捻搓缠绕的植物纤维或绳索形状,而捻搓绳索的方式可谓是千变万化。事实上根据我们已经发现的,那些花纹在相当明显而精致的区域性与时间顺序上的特点。通过观察整个绳纹文化时代,我们已经发现了四百多种地方类型或者区域风格。你甚至可以根据花纹把时间精确到二十五年左右这样的时间段。这些人类捻绳的技巧真是炉火纯青了。”

As well as making attractive and stylised storage pots, the Jomon must have been also thrilled at the leak-proof, heat-proof properties of their new kitchenware. The menu would have included vegetables and nuts, but they also cooked shellfish - oysters, cockles and clams. Meat was pot-roasted or boiled - and so Japan appears to be the birthplace of the soup and the stew. Simon Kaner again:

除了能创造出好看美观的储物罐,那些绳纹人肯定也十分得意于他们这种新型器皿的防漏性与隔热性。他们的菜单肯定包括了各种蔬菜和坚果,也可能会需要烹煮各种贝类,牡蛎、蛤文蛤等等。肉类也可以用锅烤或者水煮。所以日本似乎也是汤与炖品的发源地。西蒙·康尔又说道:

'We're quite lucky they weren't very good at washing up, these guys - and so they've left some carbonised remains of foodstuffs inside these pots, there are black deposits on the interior surfaces.

“我们走运了,看样子这些绳纹人似乎不太擅长清洗厨具,所以在这些陶罐陶钵里头还残留有一些已经碳化了的食物残渣,就是这种器皿内部表面存留的黑色沉淀物。

In fact, some of the very early ones, some of those ones that are now dated to about 14,000 years ago - there's black incrustations, and its that carbonised material that has been dated - we think they were probably used for cooking up some vegetable materials?

事实上有些器皿中的黑色陈淀物差不多了一万四千年历史了。这些黑色碳化物已经被科学家年代定位了,我们在猜想也许当初绳纹人是在烹饪一些蔬菜汤?

Perhaps they were cooking up fish broths? And it's possible they were cooking up nuts, using a wide range of nuts - including acorns - that you need to cook and boil for a long time before you can actually eat them.'

或者是鲜鱼汤?也有可能是在炖坚果,像橡子之类的,那种东西可真是要熬很久时间可以吃。”

I think that this is a really interesting point - that pots change your diet. New foods become available and useable only once they can be boiled. Heating shellfish in water forces the shells to open, making it easier to get at the contents, but also, and no less importantly, it sorts out which ones are bad - bad ones stay closed. It's alarming to think of the trial-and-error involved in discovering which foods are in fact edible - there must have been plenty of horrible accidents along the way - but it's a process that was going on all over the world.

说起来真是有趣,这种罐头钵头可以改变你的饮食。通过煮沸,就出现了很多可食用的新食物了。把贝壳类水煮一下,壳就打开了,吃里头的肉就轻而易举。而且,同样重要的是,人类是摸着石头过河,一路试吃试过来的。历史上不乏第一个吃螃蟹的人的例子。不过在这过程中,这种盲目性很强的冒险行为肯定导致了相当多的意外事件;然而这在全世界各地都是一种不可避免的过程。

The Jomon hunter-gatherer way of life, enriched and transformed by the making of Jomon pottery, didn't radically change for over 14,000 years.

绳纹陶器的制作,丰富与改造了绳纹人这种狩猎与采集的生活方式;而后在一万四千年的漫漫岁月中,一切没有多大的改变。

Although the oldest pots in the world were made in Japan, the technique didn't spread from there.

虽说日本人制造出世界上最古老的陶罐陶钵,这种技术并不能从那里蔓延开来。

Pottery seems to have been invented in different places at different times right across the world. The first pots known from the Middle East and North Africa were made a few thousand years after the earliest Jomon pots, and in the Americas it was a few thousands of years after that.

制陶似乎是在世界各地不同时期、不同地区独立发明的。比最早期绳纹盆晚了几千年,在中东与北非出现了当地第一批陶器,而在美洲,那是还要再晚几千年的事。

But almost everywhere in the world, the invention of the pot was connected with new cuisines and a more varied menu.

然而在全世界各地,锅碗瓢盆的出现,毫无例外地促成了新烹饪与人类更加丰富多样的菜谱。

Nowadays Jomon pots are used as cultural ambassadors for Japan in major exhibitions around the world. Most nations look back to imperial glories or invading armies - and I think it's extraordinary that a technologically, economically powerful nation like Japan proudly places the very origins of its identity in the early hunter-gatherers.

如今绳纹陶器已经充当起日本文化大使的角色,在世界各地的大型展览与人们见面。大多数国家都以自己帝国时代的辉煌或军队的入侵略扩张为荣,我认为像日本这种技术领先、经济实力强大的民族可以很自豪地向世人展示最早期的狩猎采集者身份,无疑是件了不起的事。

As an outsider, I find the meticulous attention to detail and the patterning of the surface, and the long continuity of Jomon traditions, already very Japanese. Professor Takashi Doi again:

作为一个局外人,我发现绳纹陶品上那种对细节一丝不苟还有精致的表面图案,再加上长期连续的绳纹传统,真是相当的日本。隆土井教授说道:

'Japan has the longest pottery-making tradition in the world. The fine porcelains made by Japan's top craftsmen and women today have an inheritance lasting over 17,000 years. Jomon pots and culture have great resonance for many Japanese people today, perhaps because it speaks of the distinctive nature of Japanese culture that often stresses continuity through change.'

“日本拥有世界上最长的制陶传统。由日本顶尖工匠与妇女们制造出精细瓷器是一种长达一万七千年的传统。绳纹陶器与文化在许多当今的日本人民心头仍然可以产生强烈的共鸣,也许是因为它叙说了日本文化的独特性质,强调改变需要在传承性与连续性中进行。”

But the story of our small Jomon pot doesn't end here, because I haven't yet described to you what is perhaps the most extraordinary thing of all about it - that the inside is, when you look, carefully lined with lacquered gold leaf.

但是我们这小小绳纹钵的故事并不是就这么结束了。因为我还没开始告诉你这件物品中最不寻常的事情呢。来瞧瞧这钵的里头,仔细瞧瞧这精心贴上的漆金箔内衬。

What's fascinating about trying to tell a history through objects is that they go on to have lives and destinies never dreamt of by those who made them - and that's certainly true of this pot.

通过物品讲述历史最迷人之处就是,这些物品自身拥有的生命与命运,远远超越了当时制造人的想象。这件陶器也并不例外。这些漆金箔内衬大概是在公元十七或十九世纪贴上去的,当时古代陶器开始陆续出土,被日本学者们收集跟展览起来。

That gold leaf was applied somewhere between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries, when ancient pots were being discovered, collected and displayed by Japanese scholars. And it was probably a wealthy collector a couple of hundred years ago who had the inside of the pot lacquered with a thin layer of gold. After seven thousand years of existence, our Jomon pot then began a new life - as a 'mizusashi', or water jar, for that quintessentially Japanese ritual, the Tea Ceremony.

这件陶器可能在几百年前,曾经辗转落入一个富有的收藏家手中,他就在这陶钵内壁贴上了一层薄薄的漆金箔内衬。经过七千多年的历史尘封,几百年前我们这绳纹钵被重新赐于了第二生命,变成一个水サシ,或水罐子,运用于最典型的日本文化礼仪之一的茶道。

I don't think that its maker would have minded. We know there were all sorts of rituals and ceremonies involving pots in the time of the Jomon. In that society, as in virtually all others, pots quickly went beyond their functional purpose to become objects of desire and display.

我并不觉得它最初的制造者会介意这点。现在我们知道在绳纹时期,已经存在了各种与陶器相关的礼仪与仪式。在那个社会里,几乎像其他社会一样,陶器很快就超越了其最初的功能性价值,变成一种人类爱好与展示的物品。

In their many manifestations, pots resonate throughout human history, from the most primitive domestic meal or drink to the Last Supper; from a nomadic snack to an international banquet. If mealtimes are a microcosm of society, then pots are the very glue that binds hosts and guests, indeed the whole of society, together.

在它们众多的表现方式中,纵观人类历史,从最原始农耕时代的部落饮食,到“最后的晚餐”,从游牧民族简陋的一顿饭到国际盛宴,这些锅碗瓢盆奏响一曲永恒的绝唱。假如说进餐时间是一个社会的缩影,那么这些锅碗瓢盆便是粘合主人与客人,甚至整个社会的有机结合物。

This week we've traced the beginnings of farming and settlement; in the next programmes, we're with the consequences: the world's first cities.

本周我们追寻了人类农耕时代与定居生活的开始。在下期节目中,我们将继续探讨随之而产生的世界第一座城市。

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