In the three generations of the ancient Xia and Shang dynasties in China, the wise ancestors invented the smelting technology of bronze, and also used this technology to create many beautiful artifacts. Among them, a very important artifact was cast - Ding.
When many people think of it, their first reaction is solemnity and solemnity. Because the symbolic meaning of Ding is the state and the society, such as the Central Plains and the Emperor Dingye. But in fact, at the beginning, Ding was the utensils used by the ancients to cook food, that is, the pots and pans we use now, because later it was used to hold fish, pigs, beef, mutton and other foods during sacrifices or ceremonies, and gradually brought the color of "ritual".
Bronzes similar to Ding are also available in two types: Jue and Gui. It is a wine vessel used for drinking and warming wine, while a bottle is used to hold rice. Plus a basket, even if it is a classic "dining table four-piece set".
Among the artifacts that have been unearthed in China today, there are two dings that can be called the most bronze vessels.
One of them is Mao Gongding, which is very large, with a height of 53.8 centimeters and a weight of 34.7 kilograms. On the inner wall of Ding, there is also an inscription of nearly 500 words densely packed, which is the longest known inscription in China, recording the origin of Ding - King Xuan of Zhou entrusted his uncle Mao Gong to govern the government, which is why it was named Mao Gongding. Nowadays, Mao Gongding is collected in the National Palace Museum in Taipei, ranking among the top ten town halls.
Qi County, Shanxi. It is an extraordinary place, and the people here can often find some bronze fragments when they work in the fields or plant trees in front of and behind the houses to plan the soil. Many of the valuable bronzes were cut out by these farmers with a hoe.
In 1849, just when the sensation caused by the excavation of Da Lu Ding had not yet dissipated, then a rare cultural relic was unearthed here, this rare treasure is still a Big Ding, and its name is called Mao Gongding. The excavation of this rare treasure has brought about one storm after another, changing hands several times in just one hundred years, experiencing twists and turns, and even going into exile overseas.
Shortly after Dong Chunsheng, a villager in Dongjia Village, shaved Mao Gongding out of the field when he was cultivating the land, an antique dealer came to the door and wanted to buy the Mao Gongding. Although the two men finally negotiated a deal at a price of 300 taels, the other villagers obstructed the merchants from shipping out out of a red-eyed mentality. This can be angry with the antique dealer, decided to use money to pave the road, bribed the local Zhi County with heavy money, the little man villagers were soon convicted of hiding national treasures, and the antique dealer got Mao Gongding as he wished.
After Ding arrived, it was transported to Xi'an non-stop and sold at a high price to the brothers Su Yinian and Su Zhaonian, the owners of The Beijing antique shop Yonghezhai. The two of them looked at it, this is a rare good thing, ''strange goods can live'", hurriedly transported to Beijing, want to find a good home for it.
To say, these two brothers really have a set of antiques to do this. As soon as this Baoding arrived in Beijing, it was sent to the home of Chen Jieqi, the editor of the Hanlin Academy and a gemologist, and called it "Let the public appreciate and visit". As a epigrapher, Mao Gongding's allure to Chen Jiefu was naturally much greater than that of ordinary people. Finally, unable to stand Mao Gongding's all-day prodding, in the second year of Xianfeng, Chen Jiefu bought it from the Hands of the Su Brothers for 1,000 taels of silver.
As a collector, Chen Jiefu is of course happy to show others his collection of cultural relics, and he would like to print them into a catalog so that you can all have a good look at what treasures I have. However, Chen Jiefu knew very well that there were regulations on the "organization", and all precious cultural relics unearthed from the ground could not be privately hidden, and Mao Gongding, as a national-level precious cultural relic, once publicized, he could not protect Mao Gongding, not to mention, maybe there must be "the disaster of imprisonment", this treasure is destined to be only his own "lonely fang self-appreciation".
For the sake of this cultural relic, Chen Jiefu can also be said to be open-minded. The people of the capital are full of miscellaneous mouths, and it is not easy for such a place of right and wrong to stay for a long time, so they resigned their officials and returned to their hometowns. After returning to his hometown, he was still not at ease, worried that someone had leaked the news that he had Mao Gongding in his hand, so he locked Mao Gongding up and did not see anyone on weekdays. Only in the dead of night, do you quietly take it out to appreciate and study. And this collection, that is, for thirty years, until the time of Chen Jiefu's death, this Ding was still hidden in the Chen family.
Unfortunately, the descendants are not angry, Chen Jiefu's son Chen Xiaosheng after the death of his father, know that he has such a treasure in his family, he began to flutter, the business field often shows off to others, and soon everyone in the city knows that the Chen family has such a good thing. ''Don't be afraid of thieves stealing, you are afraid of thieves worrying about''', Chen Father's hiding is still too late, but his son is stupid to take it out as capital to show off. When this news reached DuanFang, who had coveted Mao Gongding for a long time, the words "disaster came out of the mouth" were truly fulfilled, and the fate of Mao Gongding and the Chen family was destined to change.
In the second year of Xuan reunification, Duan Fang, who had once been the overseer, was now idle at home, and after knowing that Mao Gongding was in the Chen family, he immediately took action. First, he sent his good friend Chen Zijiu to lobby the Chen family and let them sell Ding to him. As soon as Mother Chen heard this, she was angry at the time, for the sake of this Ding, the old man in my family was not even an official, can I sell it to you so easily? He threw Chen Zijiu out of the Chen Mansion with a scolding.
Duan Fang ''There is a lot of ink in his stomach'', seeing that the road on this surface is not feasible, he immediately made a plan. Bypassing Mother Chen, he sent someone to send a letter directly to Chen Xiaosheng, promising that as long as he was willing to give him the Ding, not only would he have twenty thousand taels of silver, but he could also recommend Chen Xiaosheng as the director of the Silver Dollar Bureau, who was extremely rich in oil and water.
After Chen Xiaosheng got the letter, he was immediately moved. The director of this silver dollar bureau is not everyone, and with this official position, glory and wealth and so on are not a problem. Therefore, despite his mother's obstruction, He asked Duan Fang to show a certificate of appointment with a private seal plus 20,000 taels of silver, and let Duan Fang take Ding away.
After Ding took it away, Chen Xiaosheng waited at home every day for the appointment letter to come down, dreaming of becoming an official and getting rich, but the left and right could not wait. In a huff, he took the voucher given by Duan Fang to duan fu theory, but was told that the private seal on the paper was a waste seal, to put it bluntly, what he was holding as a treasure was a piece of waste paper.
After Chen Xiaosheng knew that he had been tricked by Duan Fang, he fainted on the spot and was ill from then on. Duan Fang, who had deceived Mao Gongding with a piece of waste paper, had not yet warmed up the treasure and was killed on the way to Sichuan to suppress the Baolu Movement. Although Duan Fang was killed, Mao Gongding was always hidden in the Duan family.
There is such a national treasure in the family, but the life of the family is not good.
When the family died, the Republic of China replaced the late Qing Dynasty, and for a while there was no main bone and no dependence. It can only sit on the mountain and eat empty, and it does not wait for a few years to fall into a state of living in a state of short supply. There is no money in the family, but the luxury in the bones of the upper class cannot be changed, and the life of the poor cannot be lived. Since the possibility of "throttling", the Duan family started mao gongding's idea, wanted to take the road of ''open source'' and began to find a new owner for Mao Gongding.
Soon, the Duan family took a fancy to one, Duan Qirui, the army chief of the Beiyang government. Mrs. Duan called him and wanted to sell the ding for 30,000 taels of silver, but in the end the sale was not negotiated.
Ding didn't sell it, and this day still has to go by. By around 1920, the life of the Duan family had reached the point of no end, and Mao Gongding could not find a buyer. There is no way, the Duan family can only take it to mortgage first, in exchange for some money to spend. When they arrived at a Russian-Russian Daosheng Bank opened in Tianjin, the bank took a breath of cool air when it heard that it was Mao Gongding who wanted to be charged. For the sake of prudence, the Hua-Russian Daosheng Bank specially sent someone to collect evidence from Chen Jieqi's descendant in Shandong Province, to understand the details of the situation at that time, and to confirm that what the Duan family wanted to pawn was indeed the real thing, and only then did it pay 30,000 taels of silver and agree on the date of redemption.
In the autumn of 1926, the Hua-Russian Daosheng Bank in Tianjin was closed for liquidation due to the bankruptcy of the head office. The Duan family was notified to come and redeem Mao Gongding in order to retrieve the pawn silver. As a result, the Duan family was difficult to change, and as soon as the thirty thousand taels of silver arrived, they were squandered, and there was no money to redeem Ding. A British journalist named Simpson learned of the news and bid the Duan family fifty thousand taels of silver to buy Ding. Duan's family, who was full of poetry books, gave him a trick of "wanting to get away with it", saying that he felt that the other party's bid was too low, and "resolutely" refused to sell the ding.
Just when the Duan family was waiting for the other party's second round of price increase, the news of selling Ding Ding was not far away. When the public heard about it, they were not happy. Before you sold Ding, the other party was also a Chinese no matter what, and this Ding was also in the hands of his own people. Now if you sell Ding again, it is a foreign country that you have sold, and the treasure handed down by the ancestors of China can only stay on the boundary of China, go out, and not a step can be achieved.
Soon, someone stabbed the Matter to the Beiyang Government and demanded that the Government thoroughly investigate the matter. After receiving the report, the Beiyang government also attached great importance to this matter, and immediately ordered the Department of Etiquette and Customs to send a letter to the Taxation Department to strictly investigate the export of Mao Gongding. Upon receiving the notice, the Ministry of Taxation strictly inspected all customs customs gates, and as long as it looked like Mao Gongding, it was not allowed to leave the customs.
This situation of strict investigation and strict crackdown can be saddened by the Duan family, just at this time, the general manager of the Mainland Bank of Beijing, Tan Lisun, took the initiative to come to the door. After learning the origin of the Duanjia's sale of Ding, Tan Lisun expressed his willingness to redeem Ding for the Duanjia and remand it to the Mainland Bank. As if they had caught a life-saving straw, the Duan family entrusted Mao Gongding's relevant affairs to Tan Lisun.
Foreign people were eager to redeem Mao Gongding, and Ye Gongqi, a collector of the Beiyang government's chief of transportation, ransomed him in front of him, and successively stored Mao Gongding in Shanghai and Hong Kong. After the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, it was included in the collection of the Central Museum, and in this way, under the intervention of multiple forces, Mao Gongding finally avoided the fate of exile abroad.