Emperor Wen of Han We all know that the third emperor of the Western Han Dynasty, who created the rule of Wenjing, was one of the rare Ming Emperors in Chinese history with excellent reputation. He followed Lao Tzu's example, ruling by doing nothing, taking care of the poor, resting with the people, filial piety, frugality, governing the country well, being strong and soft, and returning to the heart of the world. The discovery of the tomb of such a great monarch certainly aroused great interest and widespread attention.
The tomb of Emperor Wen of Han is called Baling, which was very famous in ancient times, and it is located outside Chang'an City, which is the place where the people of the capital city send farewell to relatives and friends. Many literati have written about him in poems, and the most famous is the poem Li Bai's sentence: "Every year LiuSer Baling Hurts Farewell" refers to this place.
However, it is such a famous place that after more than two thousand years, its specific location has been lost in the dust of history.
How was Emperor Wen of Han's tomb discovered this time?
It was a fortuitous opportunity, starting with an auction in the United States in 2002. The auction brought an ancient tomb called the "Jiangcun Tomb" to Chinese archaeologists. At that time, six Western Han pottery figurines stolen from the "Jiangcun Tomb" appeared on the auction catalogue of the Sosby Auction House in the United States and were about to be auctioned.
China made timely representations through diplomatic channels, and urgently withdrew the six figurines from the auction list two hours before the auction began. Archaeologist Jiao Nanfeng, commissioned by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, answered eleven questions posed by Sosby's auction house:
Why are these six terracotta figurines Chinese?
How to prove that they come from Shaanxi?
How many such clay figurines have been unearthed in that place of yours, and so on.
The solid evidence held by the cultural relics experts left the other party dumbfounded. After many efforts, these six pottery figurines finally returned to the motherland and returned to Xi'an in 2003.
Subsequently, the relevant departments investigated the origin of these six pottery figurines, and finally determined that the tomb robbers excavated them from the "Jiangcun Ancient Tomb" on the White Deer Plain outside Xi'an.
The location of the "Gangchon Tomb" is a wheat field, and there is no mound of sealed earth above the ground. At that time, as soon as the wheat was harvested, the two holes appeared very obviously, and they could even be seen on satellite pictures later. After determining that the figurines were from the ancient tomb of Gangchon, archaeologists conducted an archaeological survey of the site in 2006, and the results of the exploration surprised the archaeologists that there was a sub-zigzag tomb with four burial passages hidden here.
So who is the owner of this tomb?
At that time, some scholars thought that it was not the tomb of Dou Taizu, who was buried with Baling?
Empress Dou and Emperor Wen of Han were the daughters of Empress Dou and Emperor Wen of Han, and her status was also relatively high, and it is clearly recorded in the history books that she was buried near Baling. However, further archaeological exploration found that the total length of the east-west tomb of Gangchon Tombs exceeded 250 meters, which could not be the size of the princess tomb.
What is the tomb passage?
The tomb passage is the slope passage from the surface to the bottom of the tomb, and the ancient tomb also needs a road when burying, and the heavy coffin and funerary goods are transported down, which is indispensable to the tomb.
From the shape of the tomb, the total length of 250 meters is definitely a top configuration, surpassing princesses and even princes. Moreover, this sub-glyph tomb was mainly a tomb form used by emperors in ancient society.
What is a sub-glyph tomb?
From the air, the shape of the tomb is like an Asian sub-character, and it generally has a tomb passage in the four directions of east, west, south and north. After the discovery of the Jiangcun Tomb, although there was speculation at the time that he might be the Tomb of Emperor Wen of Han.
However, since the Yuan Dynasty, relevant records and research generally believe that the tomb of Emperor Wen of Han is two kilometers north of the Jiangcun Tomb, a place called Fenghuangzui is not in Jiangcun, and the ground of the Jiangcun Tomb is not sealed with mounds, and the remains of the buildings attached to the Imperial Tomb cannot be seen on the surface.
For doubtful speculations, the archaeological community pays attention to the need to use a series of evidence to confirm the speculation, which is called the chain of evidence.
So what is the chain of evidence that the Jiangcun Tomb is the tomb of emperor Wen of Han?
First of all, the sub-glyph shape and scale of the curtain, which clearly points to this as an imperial tomb. Secondly, within 4,000 meters northwest of the tomb, there are dozens of zigzag-shaped tombs, which should be the funerary tombs of the imperial tombs. In addition, many "outer wall pits" were found around the tomb, among which many official seals such as "Zhongsikong Seal" and "Zhongsikong City" were cleared.
Zhongsikong Seal, Zhongsikong City and other official seals
Sikong is the name of the official in charge of the central government office of the Han Dynasty. These burial artifacts and official seals represent a complete underground dynasty, which can only be used by emperors or princes. Therefore, from the above three points, it is enough to show that the Jiangcun Tomb is the mausoleum of the Emperor of the Han Dynasty. ，
However, emperor Wendi of Han's tombs have been repeatedly excavated in history, and the loss of cultural relics may be more serious. At present, archaeological excavations are still underway, so let us look forward to the appearance of evidence that can directly indicate the identity of Liu Heng, emperor of the Han Dynasty, and look forward to the archaeology of Baling to bring us new discoveries.