Chariots in late Shang burials
During the later second millennium BCE, burials at Yinxu in Anyang included chariot-and-horse pits. Wooden vehicles largely decayed, but impressions, horse skeletons and bronze fittings allow reconstruction. Two-wheeled horse-drawn vehicles introduced new possibilities for movement and combat. They depended on trained horses, vehicle makers and drivers. Technologies travelled across Eurasia, while Yinxu provides evidence of their particular use within late Shang royal society.
A connected set of skills
Wheels, axles, bodies and harness had to withstand forces together, making materials and joints essential to reliability. Feeding and training horses required continuing resources. Some pits also contain human remains associated with royal sacrificial practices. Chariots were therefore both technical objects and resources of power. Fittings, burial context and inscriptions connect manufacture with users and ceremonies, revealing how transport technology created demands for specialized and coordinated work.
Mobility and royal resources
Vehicles served royal journeys, hunting and military activity, while their burial expressed status. Their expense concentrated access among resource-rich groups. Zhou societies subsequently developed chariot institutions associated with elite rank, ceremony and warfare. Late Shang chariots connect Eurasian technological exchange with the reach of early states. Changes in mobility involved supplies of horses and craft labour as well as the question of who could command those resources.