Following the demise of the brief but brilliant Qin Dynasty, the powerful Western Han Dynasty was ushered in. In many systems, the Western Han Dynasty followed the Qin, but there were some adjustments. Therefore, later generations often said: "Han inherited the Qin system, and there were losses and losses." "As far as the feudal dynasty is concerned, the tombs of the emperors and their systems are one of the most concerned issues for the rulers, and the imperial tombs of the Western Han Dynasty are also slightly simplified and have achieved certain development due to the Qin system.
In the 215th year of the founding of the Western Han Dynasty, the eleventh dynasty, most of the imperial throne was inherited by father and son, except for the deposed emperor, there were twelve emperors before and after, and eleven imperial tombs were built. Among these emperors, the situation of Liu Bao, the late emperor of the Western Han Dynasty, was more special, he was abolished by Wang Mang and then restored, and eventually killed by the Gengshi Emperor, and could not be buried according to the ceremony. The eleven imperial tombs of the Western Han Dynasty can be roughly divided into two major areas: one area is the Xianyang Plain on the north bank of the Weishui River, and the other area is the southeast of Chang'an City. There were nine emperors buried in the original, from east to west, Yangling (Emperor Jing), Changling (Gaozu), Anling (Huidi), Yiling (Emperor Ai), Weiling (Emperor Yuan), Kangling (Emperor Ping), Yanling (Emperor Cheng), Pingling (Emperor Zhao), and Maoling (Emperor Wu); there were two emperors buried in the southeast of Chang'an City, namely Baling (Emperor Wen) on the White Deer Plain, and Duling (Emperor Xuan) on the Shaoling Plain.
Distribution of the Western Han Dynasty Emperor's Mausoleum
Although the tombs of the Western Han Emperors have not yet been excavated one by one, according to the surveys of the past years, among the eleven imperial tombs, except for Emperor Wen's tomb, which did not have a sealed soil, the rest had tall sealing soil. This point is obviously influenced by the mausoleum of the First Emperor of Qin, indicating that the mausoleum system of the Western Han Dynasty was influenced by the Qin system. However, why is it that Emperor Wen of Han's tomb did not have a sealed land, which seems so special?
To understand this problem, we also need to talk about the thick burial style of emperor Wen of Han and his people and the Han Dynasty.
Emperor Wen of Han (202–157 BC) was the fourth son of Liu Bang, the ancestor of Emperor Hui of Han, and his biological mother was Bo Ji. Bo Ji was originally a concubine of Wei Wangbao, and after Liu Bang defeated Wei Wangbao, he saw that Bo Ji was quite beautiful, so he included her in the harem. Han Chu Bo Ji has acted in many film and television works, but the characters in the play are often plain-looking, which seems to be inconsistent with historical facts. After Bo Ji entered the palace, she gave birth to Liu Heng soon after, but because Liu Bang spoiled Lady Qi, Bo Ji was not favored in the harem.
Bo Ji in the film and television drama
Just as the so-called blessings and misfortunes depend on each other, the unloved Bo Ji was saved after Liu Bang's death, and was not cut by Lü Hou, and was lucky to go to Daidi with Liu Heng. After Lü Hou's death, the old ministers of the court launched a coup d'état to destroy the lü kings and proclaim Liu Heng the emperor as emperor, as Emperor Wen of Han. In this way, Liu Heng, who was originally born, became the Son of The Great Han and achieved a turning point in his destiny.
Before Emperor Wen ascended the throne, he served as the acting king of the northern daiguo for fourteen years. Daidi is far from the capital, located on the northern border of the Han Dynasty, bordering the Xiongnu, and the conditions can be described as harsh. However, Liu Heng, who has grown up in such an environment, has formed a good quality of diligence and love for the people. As far as Liu Heng succeeded to the throne, he insisted on implementing benevolent government, implemented many policies of persuading the people to be peasants and gently dispensing with thin endowments, and even exempted the country's land tax after the restoration of national strength.
Portrait of Emperor Wen of Han
According to historical records, during the reign of Emperor Wen of Han, his life was extremely simple, and he hardly built any palaces, gardens, and even palace utensils. Of course, Emperor Wen was not completely devoid of desire for pleasure, but compared to many emperors, he was indeed quite frugal, and often restrained his selfish desires because of the consideration of thrift. For example, Emperor Wen once wanted to build a terrace, but when he thought of spending hundreds of dollars, he canceled this plan. In addition, Emperor Wen also led by example, not wearing ornate costumes, and strictly required the queen concubines not to be too luxurious.
It is precisely because of this quality of thrift and love for the people that Emperor Wen fully considered the love of the people when planning his mausoleum. At that time, thick burials became popular, and the luxurious imperial tombs represented by the mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang in the previous dynasty also affected the construction of the tombs of Gao Zu and Emperor Hui. Therefore, Emperor Wen decided to reduce costs and made a clear demand: the tombs should be ruled with tiles, not decorated with gold, silver, copper and tin, and not to treat tombs, but to be a province and not to annoy the people (Records of Filial Piety). Similar records are also reflected in the Book of Han, and the Book of Han and the Records of Emperor Wen also have the saying that "because of its mountain, it does not bear a grave". These records show that when Emperor Wen planned his mausoleum, he had the idea of putting the people first.
Stills of Emperor Wen of Han
However, in the design of Emperor Wen's mausoleum, it did not completely abandon the old system of setting up sealing soil, but built near the mountain, symbolizing the sealing of the soil with the mountain, so it omitted the process of building the sealing soil with the people's strength. Because of this, the unsealed Tomb of Emperor Wen is different from the other ten Western Han Emperor Tombs with tall fiefdoms, and its specific location has become a mystery that has plagued future generations for many years.
Previously, the academic community had long speculated that the Baling Tomb was located in the mouth of the Phoenix, and the mausoleum was built according to the steep slope on the east side of the White Deer Plain, which was also the most popular recognition. However, on December 14, 2021, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage held a major project of "Archaeology china" in Beijing, at which three important archaeological achievements were announced, including the Jiangcun Tomb in Xi'an, Shaanxi, and officially announced that the tomb was the tomb of Emperor Wen.
Gangchon Tomb
In fact, before the official briefing, many archaeologists who are fighting in the front line have realized that the Jiangcun Tomb may be the real Baling Tomb, and scholars have written articles to expound the relevant ideas. Among them, Yang Wuzhan and Cao Long co-authored the "Discussion on the Tomb Shape System of the Emperor Mausoleum of han baling", which discussed related issues. The article was published in archaeology's top journal "Archaeology" magazine (2015.08 issue), and it also introduced the situation of the Gangchon Tomb that was already in control at that time:
(Jiangcun Tomb) is located on the east side of Jiangcun, the west side of Empress Dou's mausoleum, the length and width of the tomb are about 40 meters, the depth is about 30 meters, there are three cloisters, close to the tomb wall has a week of brick walls, the wall is the outer rafter built by the tomb, the outer corridor between the outer rafter and the second week of the fir wood wall is about 2 meters wide and high, the cloister is piled up with a large amount of charcoal, the second week the fir wood wall is equipped with a door, and the door is the second and third cloisters...
The Gangchon Tomb was stolen in 2001 and nearly 300 artifacts were stolen, including 6 black clay figurines. Before and after the investigation of the case, some experts discussed the tomb, and one of them believed that the owner of the tomb may be Princess Guantao, that is, the daughter of Emperor Wen of Han and Empress Dou, the lord of Dou. However, according to the Han Dynasty mausoleum system, the status of the eldest princess is the same as that of the princes, and the tomb regulations should be equivalent, and the burial chamber of the Jiangcun Tomb is much larger than the tomb of the princes. Because of this, some scholars began to speculate that this large tomb located on the south side of the phoenix mouth may be the real Tomb of Emperor Wen.
Black pottery figurines were unearthed from the Gangchon Tomb
Today, this speculation has been confirmed. According to the latest archaeological findings, the tomb of Baling is in the shape of a "Ya" shape, the edge of the burial chamber is about 72 meters long, and more than 110 external burial pits have been found around the burial chamber, and the periphery is paved with pebble cemetery facilities. The so-called "Ya" glyph tomb refers to a large tomb with four burial passages, and it is also the highest level tomb. At present, 8 external burial pits have been excavated, and more than 1,500 cultural relics have been excavated, including pottery figurines, copper seals, copper carriages and horse ware and pottery.
Artifacts excavated from the Gangchon Tomb
Of course, although more archaeological information has yet to be disclosed in the future, the confirmation of Emperor Wen's tomb can be described as a heavyweight discovery in the archaeological community, and will also strongly promote research on the tombs of western Han emperors.
Returning to the question we discussed earlier, Emperor Wen's planning of his mausoleum without sealing the soil is particularly special, is it just because of compassion for the people's strength?
In fact, this is only one aspect of it, and it is by no means the only reason why the tomb is not affordable.
In fact, Qin Shi Huang's practice of building luxurious mausoleums had a great influence on the early Han Dynasty, and Han Gaozu and Emperor Hui of Han built their own mausoleums with magnificent seals. According to modern archaeological surveys, the existing sealing soil of Gaozu's Changling tomb is covered in a bucket shape, the bottom is about 160 meters long from east to west, the width from north to south is about 134 meters, the top is about 49.5 meters long from east to west, the width from north to south is about 17 meters, and the height is about 30 meters, while the mausoleum of Emperor Mao of Emperor Wu and the mausoleum of Pingdi Kang, etc., the edge length has even reached more than 200 meters, which can be described as magnificent to the extreme!
MaoLing
In the depths of Emperor Wen's heart, he also hoped to build a strong and majestic mausoleum, and when inspecting the construction project of Baling, he also boasted in a high profile: "Oh! Take the north mountain stone as the rafter, and use the silk to paint it in the middle, how can it be moved! ”
However, when Emperor Wen was complacent, Zhang Shizhi, who was then the general of Zhonglang, poured a basin of cold water on him: "In the beginning, there was desire in it, although there was a gap in the South Mountain; so that it was desirable to die, and although it was dead, what was the relationship?" ”
Zhang Shizhi's words are translated very bluntly, just one meaning - there are too many rare treasures in the tomb, and no matter how strong the repair, it will be stolen.
Emperor Wen was very clever, and although he wanted to compete with Qin Shi Huang and Han Gaozu, he also understood the cunning of tomb robbers. Therefore, Emperor Wen made the decision not to set up a fiefdom, and at the same time trumpeted that he pursued a thin burial, and did not use valuable materials and utensils such as gold and silver when building the Baling Tomb, in order to hide his eyes and ears. But in fact, Emperor Wen's mausoleum is still very luxurious in terms of scale and the use of burial items.
What is touching is that although Emperor Wen took pains to protect the tomb forever, he did not even set up a seal of land, but he was still patronized by the tomb robbers. Fortunately, due to the timely discovery, the overall loss of Baling cultural relics is still small. Nowadays, the truth of Emperor Wen's mausoleum is revealed, which is also a great blessing for this person!