Young archaeologist Chu Xiaolong has had a fair share of achievements since starting field studies as a college student. However, he cannot contain his excitement when talking about the 450 ancient graves, under the southern banks of the Yellow River.

Chu's project is no ordinary archaeological excavation. It is a desperate race against time to rescue priceless Chinese history, which will soon be covered by the South-to-North Water Diversion Project. "This vast old cemetery will soon be turned into a canal that leads to Beijing," said Chu, who works at the Henan Archaeological Research Institute.

Aiming at mitigating water shortage in northern China, the important water diversion project involves three water supply routes, which total more than 4,000 kilometers. Construction of its eastern and middle routes began in 2002 and 2003 respectively, and will be completed in 2007 and 2010.

The waterways will submerge 710 historical relics, according to statistics with the State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH) far more artifacts covered by the Three Gorges Dam Project.

"The project has circumvented many immobile relics of great significance for the purpose of protection. But there are still a huge number of them we have to rescue out of it," said Shan Jixiang, the administration director.

Village life 4,000 years ago

Graveyards at Xue Village Relics, where Chu and his team have been working, date back 4,000 to 1,000 years. Most of them, of Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 220), have been robbed. "But we still had some nice findings, such as a community living in 4,000 years ago," said Chu.

It was a large tomb-like cemetery covering about 10,000 square meters, and producing more than 500 pieces of stoneware and porcelain, 17 derelict wells and tortoise shells, which should have been used to practice divination.

Sun Xinmin, director of Henan Archaeological Research Institute, said the discovery provided a "good model" to study "the village system" at that time.

This year, in some Han Dynasty graves, the archaeologists also unearthed more than 100 pieces of antiques, despite previous robbery.

However, with still more to uncover, archaeologists are running out of time, despite the dig continuing non-stop for past 18 months. "We only stopped for a week during Spring Festival," said Chu. "But we are still several months behind schedule."

The team of 40 archaeological technicians work eight hours a day with the help of local farmers.

"We have 260 people helping us at the maximum, who dig and clear soil away from graves," Chu said.

Chu's team has still 50 more graves to clear. "The schedule is too tight for us to make a better analysis about what we have found," Chu said.

All they are doing now is documenting every thing about the graveyards, sampling bricks and collecting antique sheds.

Chen Ailan, director of Henan Cultural Heritage Bureau, said 330 places of historic relics in the province would need to be rescued from the water diversion project. Chu's team is still lucky, compared to the team led by fellow archaeologist Pan Hongbin, who is working across the Yellow River.

Pan also focuses on a cemetery, which will be covered by the new canal. Covering an area of at least 80,000 square meters, the cemetery contains about 160 graves, mostly of the Warring States Period (475-221 BC), Han Dynasty and Northern Qi (AD 550-577) Dynasty.

According to historical records, it may include the grave of Cao Cao (AD155-220), a famous strategist in the Three Kingdoms (AD 220-280) who put his son on the throne of Wei controlling northern China.

"We don't even have time for excavation now, let alone analysis," said Pan. "The plan was to finish the assignment within this year, but there is little chance now," he said.

Labour shortage is one problem. For most of the time, there are fewer than 30 skilled workers at the field, as well as 100 local farmers helping too. "When the harvest season arrives, we only have about 40 farmers giving us a hand," Pan said. "And these graves lie pretty close to each other, or even one over another, which intensifies our job."

Fruits above and below

Labor shortages, however, are not an equally big problem for Zhang Chunchang and his team, who are assigned to excavation at Lin Village Relics in Hebei. Their major obstacle is a dispute with local farmers.

"The cemetery has been an orchard for years, so before any archaeological work, there is a need to remove those fruit trees first," said Zhang, who works at Hebei Archaeological Research Institute.

This triggered a bidding war between the farmers and the bone collectors. "We could offer 30 to 50 yuan (US$3.8-6.3) for each tree, but farmers bargained for 500 yuan (US$63)," the team leader said.

"Moreover, some locals even snatched our tools away."

So the team had to begin digging in sparsely planted areas.

The archaeologists had planned to clear more than 10,000 square meters of the graveyards, which spread in Handan of Hebei Province, within a year. They have only completed 1,150 square meters so far because of the dispute with farmers.

Zhang Wenrui, a senior staffer with Hebei Cultural Heritage Bureau, said a request for compensation was sent to State authorities. "But we haven't got any response yet, so the problem still has to be suspended for a while," he said.

Another problem is the grave soil itself. "It becomes solid when dry and muddy when wet. Wind can break it, and water can pulverize it," Zhang Chunchang described.

Not only does it hamper digging but the topsoil on the graves can also crash easily because of the excavation.

"It spares us little time to document and takes us more energy to protect the site," he said.

Despite the tight schedule and the challenging obstacles, the government believes that "construction must give way to relic conservation".

More than 1 billion yuan (US$126 million) has been allocated to conserve historic relics affected by the water diversion project.

According to Hebei South-to-North Water Diversion Project Office, once new relics are found during the construction, all work must be suspended until archaeologists complete the excavation.

Cao Guichen, a senior archaeologist in Henan, said any passive protection was to some extent "a destruction to our heritage."

"History is irreversible. So there is no room for giving in," he added.

In addition to local archaeological research institutes, skilled persons around the country have all participated in the emergency rescue.

In Henan alone, there are 34 qualified excavation teams involved in, including 19 from outside the province.

Tong Mingkang, deputy director of SACH, said the national rescue mission would also prepare important documents for the upcoming third national canvass of cultural heritage.

"It is a tough job, but it also offers good opportunity. We can only grab at it, and make it end well."

(China Daily October 12, 2006)