On September 17, 2010, in the downtown area of Heze, Shandong, the International Trade Building was digging the foundation, and suddenly two migrant workers dug up several porcelain bottles, thinking that they had dug up an ancient tomb, who knew that it was a big ship.
Migrant workers dug out the porcelain bottle after the surprise, quietly cleaned, ready to take home, unfortunately just happened to be the head of the project department Zhang Wenchang bumped into, he wanted to go over for half a day, guessing that it may be cultural relics, asking where the migrant workers came from, honest migrant workers did not dare to hide, told the truth to Zhang Wenchang, Zhang Wenchang thought that there may be an ancient tomb under the foundation, so he immediately reported the situation to the cultural relics department.
After carefully inspecting the site, the experts who heard the news immediately stopped the construction site, circled the scene with a cordon, and immediately organized people to carry out excavation work. Excavation of the foundation to excavate the ancient tomb occurs, but the excavation of large ships is still relatively rare.
This wooden boat is a river boat, the hull is 21 meters long, 4.82 meters wide, 1.8 meters high, a total of 10 cabins, due to the age, the left side of the boat wood is basically decayed, the bottom and right side are basically well preserved, can be restored, the wood used is preliminarily determined to be cypress and catalpa wood.
Experts searched carefully in and around the shipwreck and found more than 110 exquisite cultural relics, mainly pottery, porcelain, lacquerware, jade, agate, stoneware, ironware, bronze, gold jewelry and so on. There are also several valuable Yuan Dynasty blue and white dragon pattern plum vases, Jun kiln shadow blue glaze cups and cups. One of the wooden rulers, 49cm long, provides important physical evidence for the study of ancient weights and measures.
Among all the cultural relics unearthed this time, the most pleasing to experts is a blue and white dragon pattern plum vase of about 42 centimeters high, which is worth almost hundreds of millions of yuan, which is very rare in the country.
Why is the blue and white porcelain of the Yuan Dynasty so valuable? The original Yuan Dynasty was the era of the budding of blue and white porcelain, the number was originally very small, coupled with its artistic level and ornamental value is extremely high, so it has been handed down for hundreds of years, and the value of blue and white porcelain has been soaring. According to incomplete statistics, only two or three hundred yuan qinghua have survived in the country, and only a dozen have been preserved in Shandong, and this nearly complete yuanqinghua found in the ancient shipwreck of Heze is definitely a treasure.
The discovery of shipwrecks and a large number of exquisite cultural relics has aroused widespread concern from all walks of life in China, and Lu Zhangshen, director of the National Museum, rushed to Heze, and when he saw these exquisite and rare cultural relics, he gave them high praise.
So why does a large wooden boat full of treasure appear in the center of Heze? When exactly did it sink here?
According to the analysis of excavated relics, the river boat should have sunk during the Yuan Dynasty, and since the ship contained so many treasures, the owner of the boat should be a high-ranking official or a rich merchant.
Around 1351, the Yellow River was once diverted to Heze, which can be found in the Heze Local Chronicle and the map of Shandong, when the ship should have sailed on the Heze Yellow River Ancient Road, somehow causing it to overturn and sink, covered by river water and sediment, sleeping underground for six or seven hundred years, until today it is not discovered.
Heze City hired experts to do a complete restoration of the shipwreck, becoming the most complete preserved ancient ship of the Yuan Dynasty in Shandong, which provides exquisite specimens for the study of the wooden boat making process of the Yuan Dynasty, and the Chinese of the ship has very important archaeological value for the study of the cultural life and customs of the upper class of the Yuan Dynasty.