01. Super Tomb
In July 2015, the Luoyang Wildlife Park at the foot of Wan'an Mountain began land acquisition and demolition, and when the workers were leveling the land, they inadvertently found that there were tomb traces underground...
In the land of Luoyang, there are many underground ancient relics, and if you are not careful, you will dig up ancient tombs, which also gives local residents a very strong sense of cultural relics protection.
Therefore, the news also quickly spread to the Luoyang Archaeological Research Institute.
This suspected ancient tomb is located on a dirt platform called Nangang in Xizhu Village, Koudian Town.
The staff went through the shoveling and made an amazing discovery!
Just about 10 meters underground, there is a "super tomb" with a total length of more than 50 meters!
Such a scale, even in the Luoyang area full of imperial tombs, is by no means ordinary...
In the end, the tomb was discovered to be 33.9 meters long from east to west, 9 meters to 9.4 meters wide, and the opening of the pit was 18.2 meters long from east to west and 14.6 meters wide.
According to the fact that the tomb has no sealing soil and the east-west orientation, archaeologists have preliminarily concluded that this is a large tomb from the Cao Wei period!
This conclusion made everyone very excited.
Because, there are only two "great tombs" that have been excavated during the Cao Wei period:
One is Cao Cao's Gaoling Tomb, discovered in 2009 in the village of Xigaoxiao in Nanyang, Henan. One is the tomb of Cao Xiu, a great General of Cao Wei, discovered in Mengjin County, Luoyang, Henan Province, in 2010.
This time, this large tomb found in Xizhu Village in Luoyang is on a scale comparable to that of "Cao Xiu's Tomb"!
Cao Xiu was Cao Cao's nephew. He went to defect when Cao Cao raised an army against Dong Zhuo, and was called "QianliJu" by Cao Cao.
According to historical records, Cao Cao regarded him as a parent and made him lead the tiger and leopard to ride the guard. In the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and other historical books, Cao Xiu appeared repeatedly because of his military achievements, and he was an important figure in the Three Kingdoms period when heroes were born and the storms suddenly changed!
If the xizhu village tomb and the cao xiu tomb are similar in specifications, does this also mean that the owner of the tomb may have been a hot general during the Three Kingdoms period?
02, tragic tomb robbery
However, in the process of excavation, the tomb has already appeared traces of theft,
The archaeologists began to worry that its fate would be as miserable as the tomb of Cao Xiu excavated a few years ago...
It turned out that when the tomb of Cao Xiu was excavated, the situation at the scene was very "tragic".
In the large-scale burial chamber, the tomb robbers swept empty. Even the tomb bricks weighing 50 pounds were torn down and stolen by tomb robbers one by one, even the floor tiles...
In the end, the careful archaeologists found a small copper seal, which confirmed that there was the word "Cao Xiu" on it, which concluded the identity of the owner of the tomb...
Sure enough, this tomb in Xizhu Village, its tomb bricks also show signs of being stolen,
This made the archaeologists present feel nervous...
When the excavation reached a location of more than six meters from the surface, the tomb bricks appeared, but the scene was very tragic.
It can be seen that when tomb robbers excavated tombs, they not only valued gold and silver, but even this kind of "durable, quality guaranteed" tomb bricks were also "tight goods"...
03, "Blood Perch" small cute
However, in the end, the tomb was left with surprises.
Above the floor of the burial chamber, there are still many pottery artifacts, as well as many exquisite stone tablets of regular size.
The reason why these things were "abandoned" by the stolen tomb robbers may not have actual value at the time.
Among these scattered "worthless" cultural relics, a small blood-red object appeared unexpectedly...
A closer look revealed that it was a 3.4 cm long and 3.5 cm high "Blood Sculpture", and a stone plaque was unearthed right next to it, which read, "One Hundred Paintings Ride a Sheep.".
Eventually, this cute little thing was also named "Blood Po Riding Sheep Figurine".
Amber is the product of the geological changes of the resin during the geological change period, with a resin luster, and some are pearly, transparent or translucent.
Among them, the most superior product is this blood-red "blood persecus".
The appearance of this small and exquisite blood sculpture undoubtedly adds a touch of comfort to the regret of the theft of this tomb...
Of course, the most important excavated cultural relics in this tomb are none other than the "stone tablets"!
These stone tablets are hexagonal in shape, with a circular perforation on the upper part, and the description is very rich, including clothing, furnishings, stationery, toiletries, ornaments and funeral rites.
The stone tablets excavated from the xizhu village tomb are very similar to the stone tablets found in the tomb of Cao Cao in Anyang, which further proves that it is a tomb of similar age and level to Cao Cao's tomb.
04. Who is the owner of the tomb?
However, despite the excavation of more than 200 stone tablets with written words,
Unfortunately, there is still no conclusive evidence of who the owner of this tomb is...
However, everyone agreed that the owner of the tomb was most likely a member of the Cao Wei royal family.
Xizhu Village is located in luoyang in the Wan'an Mountains, where there is a tomb of The Cao Wei Emperor in the historical records, the Cao Rui Gaoping Mausoleum of the Wei Ming Emperor.
Cao Rui (曹叡) was Cao Cao's grandson, Cao Pi's eldest son, and the second emperor of the Cao Wei regime.
Today, this huge tomb in Xizhu Village is also on The Wan'an Mountain. This gives archaeologists reason to believe that the owner of the tomb and Cao Rui have a close relationship.
After a few years since the end of the excavations, the relevant archaeologists have explored through various studies.
In the end, the identity of the owner of the tomb was pointed to a Princess Cao Wei and Cao Cao's great-granddaughter Princess Pingyuan.
Emperor Cao Rui of Wei had his only daughter, named Cao Shu, but the child died before she was a month old, and Cao Rui was so distraught that she was named "Princess of the Plains" and given the nickname "Yi".
Among those stone tablets, there is also a burial artifact called "Dove Car".
And this kind of "dove car" is a car for children to play, and the ancients will use the term "dove cart bamboo horse" to refer to childhood.
In fact, the cute "blood perl" carving unearthed from the tomb already had a foreshadowing.
These delicate and cute little hanging ornaments were the beloved objects of aristocratic children in ancient times.
This "Bloody Sheep Figurine" has now been called by many as "a gift from a father to his daughter a thousand years ago..."
In fact, a year after the excavation of the xizhu village tomb, the archaeologists have found another large tomb more than 400 meters near it.
The scale of the tomb is grand, and it belongs to the specifications that have reached the level of the Cao Wei Emperor's mausoleum.
Therefore, many experts believe that the tomb is likely to be the Gaoping Tomb of the father who lost his beloved daughter, the Wei Ming Emperor Cao Rui.
According to historical records, Cao Shu died 7 years after her death.
The location of the tomb of the two is close at hand, which is even more lamentable to the father's love.
Of course, China has relevant regulations, the imperial tomb can not be excavated casually, so it is suspected that the tomb of Gaoping Mausoleum has not been excavated, everything is only in the joint speculation of experts...