There is such a treasure in the exhibition hall of "Jinguo Hegemony" on the second floor of the Shanxi Museum, which is one of the "treasures of the town hall" of the Shanxi Provincial Museum, and was listed in the "Third Batch of Cultural Relics Catalogue prohibited from exporting for exhibition" by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage in 2013.
She is this jade group pendant about 170 cm long, she is the largest combination of jade ceremonial vessels found in the cemetery of the Marquis of Jin, and it is also the largest jade group pendant found in China so far in the Western Zhou Dynasty, this set of jade group pendants is composed of jade huang, jade heng, jade pipe, material beads, agate pipe, etc., a total of 204 pieces, of which the number of jade huang alone reached 45 pieces. You can see the jade geese and jade silkworms at the lower end, which are crystal clear and vivid, expressing the tomb owner's desire to break through the cocoon and be reborn. This set of jade group pendants not only expressed people's pursuit of beauty, but also represented the highest level of jade making at that time.
During the Western Zhou Dynasty, the aristocracy was popular among the a plurality of jade consortia, hanging on the body of the ornament, that is, today's jade group pendant, since ancient times thought that there is a "gentleman must wear jade" said, jade has become a ceremonial system in the Western Zhou Period, is a symbol of social hierarchical order, only people with status can wear. And they believe that after death, the soul will be placed in another world, believing that the use of jade can protect the body of the deceased from decay, and gradually formed a system of funerary jade. The jade group we saw can be covered directly from the neck of the tomb owner to the foot surface, which shows that the identity of the tomb owner is not ordinary.
Qucun, Quwo County, Linfen City, Shanxi Province, here is called "Jinguo Royal Cemetery" by archaeologists, that is, today's Jinguo Museum, where there are 9 groups of 19 tombs of Jinhou and his wife, 8 groups are monogamous, only one group is a monogamous, only one group is a monogamous, it can be seen that the rule at that time is that the wife can enter the Zhao domain, and the rest of the ladies are not eligible to enter the Zhao domain. Why did this prince make an exception to bury two wives at that time? Who the hell is he?
It is the Marquis of Jinmu, who buried two wives, one of the main lady and one of the second wives, it is possible that the main lady died, and the Jin Muhou married a second lady. This second lady can not be directly a "Chinese type" tomb, we all know that the tomb owner level in the Shang Zhou Dynasty to see the tomb road, the more the higher the level of the tomb road, even Jin Muhou can not use the "medium" type tomb road, his second wife used, but what is more strange is that the second lady has funerary items, a total of 4280 pieces, including nearly 800 pieces of jade.
Judging from the jade excavated from the tomb of this second lady, it seems that she was a jade collector in her lifetime, not only possessing jade from the Western Zhou Dynasty at that time, but also jade from the former Shang Dynasty. In a bronze square box in the northwest corner of the tomb, it is filled with various small jade artifacts, including jade people, bears, cows, eagles, léi[ turtles, etc., which are the playthings of the tomb owner.
Jade Man
White jade carving, one large and one small two praying mantises, the large one is on top, slender, large abdomen and wide tail, curved limbs obliquely extended, with claws caressing the top of the small mantis below. The little one is bent over, head and tail to the ground, and his limbs and claws are bent. Both have rounded eyes and a slightly convex abdomen. The limbs are represented by only a few single yin lines, and the style is simple. Scholars believe that it is a scene when male and female praying mantises are mating.
In a broken copper casket, the archaeologists also found a string of pearls and agate beads. They are bonded together by mud, agate beads are arranged in rows, originally necklaces, pearls are still about 4 mm in diameter, and some visible drill holes are still shiny and shiny despite erosion over time.
The earliest pearl hanging ornament is the pearl ornament in the sarcophagus of the Persian royal noblewoman in 520 BC, and this string of pearls, dating from about 770 BC in the late Western Zhou Dynasty, should be the earliest surviving pearl charm in China.
Jade Drum (Western Zhou) Height: 5.7 cm Width: 6.2 cm
Yellow-green round carving. The shape is flat and wide, and the ornamentation is engraved with a single line. The upper part is a perforated round crown for easy attachment. There is an animal head on each side of the drum cavity, and there is a square foot under the drum. Drums are the things that are ordered by the military, and they are rare in jade.
Yang Jiao pot
What is the origin of this second lady?
We find the answer in two copper pots found in the tomb, which are 35.8 cm high and 12.4 cm in diameter. On the outer wall of the lid and the inner wall of the neck of the pot, there is an inscription of 9 characters: "Yang Jiao for the shame of lily [lǐ] pot Yongbao", people call this pot "Yang Jiao pot". The owner of the tomb is "Yang Jiao", during the Zhou Dynasty, the woman of the monarch married abroad, and the country was called by the name and surname of her home country, such as the Qin state as the winning surname, and the daughter of the Qin state married to the Jin state called her "Qin Win"; the state of Qi was surnamed Jiang, and the daughter of the state of Qi married to other countries called her "Qi Jiang"; the state of Jin was the surname of Ji, and the daughter of the monarch married to another country called "Jin Ji".
The same is true of Yang Jiao's name, "Yang Jiao", which means that this daughter is the daughter of Yang Guo, and "姞" is the surname of Yang Guojun, which means that the princess of Yang Guo married into the Jin Kingdom. Various historical records of Yang Guo are very few, perhaps "Yang Guo" is a very small country, and the owner of the tomb, that is, this second lady, may be the last princess of Yang Guo.
The story goes like this: Not far northwest of the capital city of Jinguo is a small yangguo surnamed Yang guo, which is today's Hongdong County, Shanxi Province, where the "Jiao" surname Gu Yangguo people live in the Fenshui River, the men fish in the river, beautiful girls hold clay pots to fetch water by the Fenhe River, they have been living such a life for generations, one day Yang Guo is celebrating the whole country, because Jin Muhou wants to marry the princess of Yang Guo, Jin Muhou is very fond of this princess named Yang Jiao, and the princess thinks that she can always be so happy.
But soon, the powerful and barbaric xiǎn yǔn people, that is, the ancestors of the Xiongnu as we later called, attacked the "Yang Kingdom", and thus the Yang State unfortunately fell. Soon, King Xuan of Zhou counterattacked the Yan and recaptured the yang state's homeland, but the entire clan of the "Yang state" had been destroyed. King Xuan of Zhou enfeoffed this land to his son "Eldest Father" and appointed a very experienced minister who was very experienced in the conquest of the fox to assist his son.
In this way, in the years to come, Yang Jiao looked at the kingdom she was born into with sorrow and disappeared irreversibly. Perhaps Jin Mugong saw that his beloved was sad and gave her thousands of favors, even if he came to another world in the future, he would do his best to let this beloved lady have everything she wanted. Only when we see the super tomb can we see the abundant funerary products.