Abstract: The Xihoudu site is located at Ruicheng County, Shanxi Province in North China. The lithic assemblage was discovered from the fluvial deposit belonging to the Lower Pleistocene contex in 1960. The formal excavations were conducted in 1961 and 1962. A total of 32 stone artifacts were described in detail in the monograph 《 Xihoudu ( Hsihoutu)—— a Culture Site of Early Pleistocene in Shanxi( Shansi) Province》 . A Lower Pleistocene mammalian fauna associated with the lithic remains includes Erinaceus sp. , Trogontherium sp. , Lepo rids, Hyaena sp. , Stegodon sp. , Archidiskodon planifrons, Palaeoloxodon cf. namadicus, Coelodonta antiquitatis, Elasmotherium cf. inexpectatum, Hipparion sinense, Equus sanmeniensis, Sus cf. lydek keri , Elaphurus bifurcatus, E. chinnaniensis, Euctenoceros boulei, Ax is rugosus, A. shansius, Gazella cf. black i, Bison palaeosinensis, Leptobos crassus.
Some scholars suspected that the stone specimens might have been modified by hydrodynamic process for the presence of clear traces of water polishing on these artifacts. They argued that the lithic assemblage could have been the products of strong fluvial activity.
It is well known, however, that the stone artifacts from the fluvial terrace deposit are usually abraded to varying degrees by running water. So long as stone artifact abraded remains to show character of human agency , the nature of the specimen should not be doubted at all. A total of 14 stone artifacts from the Xihoudu site (including 11 which w ere published in the Jia 's preliminary report) were examined as follows ( see table 1 in text).
Some stone artifacts were made using a variety of technique procedures and clearly show anthropogenic attributes. It is difficult to regard these artifacts as hydrodynamic origin. Analysis, in fact, concludes that the stone artifacts from the xihoudu site are doubtless human products.

Key words: Artifacts, Lower Pleistocene, Xihoudu site