To this day, the museum of the University of Pennsylvania in the United States still displays the "second horse" of the Zhaoling Liujun, which was stolen and sold by Chinese cultural relics dealers in the early 20th century: "Salu Purple" and "Fist Hair".
The two national treasure-level artifacts were stolen from the Zhaoling Tombs in Shaanxi Province, and the man who sold them to foreign countries was named Lu Qinzhai, the largest chinese cultural relics dealer in the 20th century.
Because the infamous Lu Qinzhai has been stealing and trafficking cultural relics from the tombs of his ancestors all his life, he has become a "shameless traitor" denounced by the Chinese people.
A domestic servant appreciated by Zhang Jingjiang, he opened an antique company in Paris as an adult
In 1880, a baby boy was born in an ordinary family in Lujiadu, Huzhou, Zhejiang, and his parents first named him Lu Huanwen, and a few years later, changed the name of the child to Lu Qinzhai.
Xiao Qinzhai's life was not too good, his parents died one after another when he was very young, and in desperation, his uncle had to raise him in his own home.
After growing up, Lu Qinzhai came to the Nanxun area of Huzhou to look for job opportunities, and it happened that the home of Zhang Jingjiang, a huge wealth in Nanxun, happened to be short of servants, so Lu Qinzhai became a domestic servant of the Zhang family.
After entering the Zhang family, Lu Qinzhai was diligent and studious, and soon gained the trust and recognition of the Zhang family.
In 1902, Zhang Jingjiang, the young master of the Zhang family, was appointed as the commercial counselor of the Qing court in France on the orders of the emperor, because it was a long way to go to france, so Zhang Jingjiang wanted to select several domestic servants to accompany him to France to perform his duties. Among the many domestic servants, Zhang Jingjiang saw that Lu Qinzhai had a calm personality but did not lose his alertness, so he took him to France with him.
After arriving in France, Zhang Jingjiang in addition to completing the business tasks well, gradually found that the French who love art are very fond of cultural relics and handicrafts from all over the world, so Zhang Jingjiang, who is quite business-minded, opened a transportation company in Paris to do antique cultural relics business and also sell Chinese native silk silk tea.
In order to help the business, Lu Qinzhai became an apprentice in the Yuntong company, because of his appearance and sharp hands and feet, so Zhang Jingjiang was often happy to take Lu Qinzhai out to talk about business.
Lu Qinzhai, who knew that his limited ability, in order to live up to the high expectations of his boss, secretly worked hard, he learned French, learned English, learned to identify various cultural relics and antiques, and improved his ability to do business rapidly.
Because Lu Qinzhai was the most capable of the apprentices, he was quickly promoted to the head of a storefront.
In 1912, Zhang Jingjiang planned to return from Paris, so he closed the Yuntong Company. Considering the frequent wars in China at that time, Lu Qinzhai did not choose to return with Zhang Jingjiang, he stayed in Paris and used his savings to open a small antique company.
The reason for the decision to invest in the establishment of an antique company is the result of Lu Qinzhai's overall calculation and several practical considerations.
At that time, China was in the late Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the people, the state of political turmoil, internal and external troubles of this and so on made the people's lives doubly impacted, many warlord leaders, tomb robbers hope to make a fortune by excavating ancient tombs, so in that period the domestic tomb robbery incidents appeared in an endless stream, because no one managed and banned, resulting in thousands of precious cultural relics and antiques flowing to the domestic and foreign cultural relics market in large quantities.
It was precisely because Lu Qinzhai learned about this market and business opportunities when he was working under Zhang Jingjiang's staff, that he boldly took out his savings to open an antique company in Paris, specializing in buying and reselling cultural relics and antiques from China, and then selling them to foreigners at a high price in exchange for a huge difference in price.
Through continuous study and contemplation, Lu Qinzhai has a strong ability to identify literary objects. He is clever, fast and fierce, as long as it is a valuable cultural relic, almost all of them can be included in the bag.
Lu Qinzhai has its own exclusive suppliers and supply channels in Shanghai and Beijing, and the energy continues to deliver appropriate and rare treasures to Lu Qinzhai's cultural relics company.
Lu Qinzhai's "shrewd" behavior allowed him to obtain huge economic benefits in the chaotic torrent, according to statistics, more than half of the Chinese antiques lost overseas were "out of the country" by Lu Qinzhai's hands.
The national treasure-level cultural relics he sold include both the "Zhaoling Erjun" mentioned in the opening chapter and the "Shang Dynasty Dish Heaven QuanFang". Unfortunately, the Shang Dynasty's Pan Tianquan Fangyan has now returned to the embrace of the motherland, and the return date of Zhaoling Erjun is still out of reach.
Marry a young wife of 15 years old in order to be able to stay with her mother-in-law for a long time
Although Lu Qinzhai made a fortune by reselling cultural relics, he was still despised as a rich man for two reasons: one was that Lu Qinzhai did not hesitate to sell cultural relics; the other was that Lu Qinzhai's marital history was indeed unbearable, and he married a 15-year-old foreign petite wife at the age of 30, but it had another purpose.
At the age of 28, Lu Qinzhai met Orga, a middle-aged woman who opened a hat shop, in the Marland Square in Paris. The undiminished Olga is more than 4 years older than Lu Qinzhai, and although she was single at the time, she was dependent on her daughter Mary. Mary, on the other hand, was the child born to Olga when she was a maid in a rich man's house, because she was insulted by her husband.
Since meeting Lu Qinzhai, Olga has developed an attachment and admiration for this Chinese man. Lu Qinzhai was impressed by Olga's charm and soon developed an underground relationship with him.
Later, Olga had a very rich lover, but this middle-aged woman was reluctant to cut off her love affair with Lu Qinzhai, so after some consideration, Olga decided to marry her 15-year-old daughter Mary to Lu Qinzhai.
Because in this way, Lu Qinzhai became his own relative, and Olga could safely and boldly meet with him.
In the spring of 1910, the 30-year-old Lu Qinzhai successfully married the 15-year-old Mary, and then continued to maintain an unclear relationship with her "mother-in-law" Olga, everything was so seamless that even Mary did not notice anything unusual.
He has 4 mixed-race daughters, but in his later years he does not dare to fall back to his roots
After marriage, Lu Qinzhai was very protective of his wife, and he gave his safe keys to his wife Mary for safekeeping, letting her live the luxurious life that a Parisian lady could have every day.
Mary's stomach is also very contentious, and after marriage, she has been pregnant 4 times in succession, and has given birth to a total of 4 beautiful and dignified mixed-race daughters.
Although Lu Qinzhai loved his 4 daughters, he never thought that his daughters were Chinese, and he never taught his daughters to learn Chinese, let alone expose them to Chinese culture.
Because Lu Qinzhai had no sons in his life, he also expected that the wealth accumulated in this busy life would most likely be inherited by his son-in-law's family, so he was not so desperate to sell cultural relics in his later years.
Lu Qinzhai's life was mainly made by selling cultural relics of the motherland, and he was afraid of being reprimanded by the people of the motherland, so when he was alive, he also made some "beautification" and "justification" for himself from time to time, claiming that he was doing antique business at the same time promoting Chinese culture to the world.
However, the eyes of the masses have always been bright, and the world knows that lu Qinzhai's purpose in selling and reselling cultural relics and antiques is to obtain personal wealth.
In 1957, when the gossamer Lu Qinzhai finally began to repent of the sins of his life on his deathbed, he murmured: I am guilty, and I am ashamed, because I am the culprit who lost the national treasure to foreign countries.
In his later years, the selfish Lu Qinzhai was extremely eager to return to the mainland of his motherland, but he did not dare to return to China after all, and eventually died in his private house in Switzerland.
No matter how much he defended his theft and sale of cultural relics, he could not hide his ugly face of hypocrisy, falsehood, and crazy pursuit of profits.
This Chinese, who can be called the "godfather of antiques" in the eyes of Westerners, is actually a cultural relics dealer with no bottom line and an ancient sinner of the country.