The Tortoise Shell Which Set Off
a Mighty Chain Reaction

TE-KONG TONG
 

IN 1899 when the Boxers were beginning to rebel in north
China, a man by the name of Wang was sick with malaria in
Peking. In the folk medicine, which his doctor ordered for
him, was a piece of "rotten tortoise-shell" which he was supposed
to cook with other drugs and then to drink the broth. While
examining the drug, Wang was astonished to note that the
shell had been inscribed with some ancient Chinese characters.
Being a noted connoisseur of ancient Chinese arts, he inunedi-
ately recognized that these characters were older than any he
had seen before. Instead of cooking the shell for its beneficial
qualities, he got together a group of scholar friends and made
a careful study of it. They all realized that Wang had made
an important "find" — the discovery of a rare relic from
some antique period which e\'en Confucius ne\'er laid eyes on.
They soon exhausted the supply of such shells from all of the
medicine shops in Peking. Still not satisfied, they searched for
the original suppliers. Not until 1914, however, was it deter¬
mined that the latter had been peasants living in a village in the
district of Anyang, Honan province, in central China. This
area had long been suspected of being one of the capitals of
the Shang-'\'in Dynasty (1751-1112 B.C.) It had remained a
public burial ground for over a thousand years, and only in
fairly recent times was it re-inhabited.

For some twenty-eight years the farmers continued their
occasional diggings, but it was not until 1928 that a really scien¬
tific exploration of the site began. By the summer of 1937,
when the Japanese army attacked north China and exca\ations