The Mengzhuang site lies on a terrace east of Mengzhuang town in southeastern Huixian city, Henan, and occupies an area of 300,000 sq m. It was excavated in 1992-1995, which led to the revelation of remains of the Peiligang, Yangshao, Longshan and Erlitou cultures. Those of the Longshan culture include one city-site, 16 house-foundations, numerous ash-pits and four wells. Among the unearthed Longshan objects are: stone tools - the axe, spade, adze, knife, arrowhead, and chisel; bone implements - the arrowhead, awl, chisel, and spoon ; shell artifacts - the knife and arrowhead ; and pottery-the jar, yah steamer, jia tripod, gui tripod, urn, zeng steamer, basin, vessel stand, cup, vessel cover, bowl, dou stemmed vessel, ring-foot dish, zun-shaped object, li tripod and ding tripod. The whole complex can be divided into two phases, which are dated to 2400--2300 and 2300--2100 BC respectively.
As one of the late middle Spring and Autumn tombs with nine ding - vessels and eight guifood containers, the Lijialou big tomb yielded gems of the bronze vessel of the Zheng State. After careful studies, this paper argues that the combination of the bronze vessels of the tomb might be 96 pieces and most of them reflected the influence from that of the Chu State to the south. Thus, the tomb represented the close relation- ships between the Zheng State and the Chu State.
