After a hearty WESTERN breakfast (special for us) we headed off to an museum that was opened in 1958 (during a very tumultuous time for China - the beginning of the communes and Great Leap Forward).  Ban po is named after the village where the ruins were found near Xi'an but originally was created over 6,000 years ago!!!  Reminded me of Native American ruins I have visited.

  

The entrance provided many pieces of pottery, tools and other relics from the period.

  

The thatched building is a little hard to see but the angle allowed me to use flash - very dark inside.

 

So here is the excavated ruin of the house area ...

 

Very interesting sets of bones, pottery and tools unearthed in different rooms around the main room.

             

A portion of the village is modeled above.  There was a moat around the village (about 500 meters, I believe) to keep out wild animals.  The big room picture is below - quite amazing, to say the least!

 

A little more from the China Highlights website linked here:

Banpo site is a typical Neolithic Matriarchal community of the Yangshao culture( 5000-3000 BC) around 6000 years ago.  About 400 sites of this type have been discovered around the Yellow River Basin and the Banpo site is the largest one. The site was discovered in 1953 when constructing a power factory and the excavation work lasted four years from 1953 to 1957. The Banpo site was first opened to the public in 1958 and since then, two million people have visited it.