Ancient tombs of the Liao Dynasty in Hebei Province
In a Liao Dynasty tomb unearthed in Hebei, archaeologists found that there was a delicious dish of the Liao Dynasty period a thousand years ago, and the good wine and good dishes on this table shocked the archaeologists, and the crowd also found a very strange human face mask, behind this human face mask, what kind of huge secrets are buried, what kind of food people ate a thousand years ago, and what kind of difference do we have after a thousand years, and what kind of identity does the owner of the tomb buried in this tomb have? Next, let's take a look at what kind of secrets there are in this ancient tomb of the Liao Dynasty.
Lower Bali Village
This matter still has to start from the Xuanhua District of Zhangjiakou City, Hebei Province, in the western suburbs of Xuanhua District, Zhangjiakou City, there is a village called Xiabali Village, in the spring of the late eighties of the last century, because in this season of the year, it is also the day of spring to water their own farmland, so a local villager Yang Guifu and his family came to their own fields together to plan to work, originally this matter is not so complicated, only need to open a corner of the canal, Then the water is irrigated into the field, and then the water canal of the irrigated field is on the line, but in the spring of 1989, it is different from the previous years of irrigated farmland, after Yang Guifu and others dug up the canal and released water, Yang Guifu and his family waited for a long time next to their own fields, but the water level of their own fields did not show the slightest sign of rising, such a situation has never appeared in previous years, so Yang Guifu thought that there should be something that has not been handled well.
Maybe a certain place in the field leaked water, so Yang Guifu went all the way to the canal to investigate, but this investigation does not matter, after seeing the actual situation, Yang Guifu and his family were startled by the scene in front of them, it turned out that the reason why the water level in this field did not rise was because in his own field, there were two large whirlpools inexplicably, and the water flowing out of the canal was all gushed into these two large whirlpools, after seeing this situation, Yang Guifu immediately blocked the canal to cut off the water source, Yang Guifu originally wanted to fill in the two large pits, but driven by curiosity, Yang Guifu took a shovel along the pit in the field all the way to the depths, as Yang Guifu excavated more and more deeply, and then in the deep soil of the farmland, Yang Guifu actually found two ancient tombs buried under the ground. After Yang Guifu discovered the two ancient tombs, he did not show much panic, but instead informed the relevant local departments of the news at the first time, and protected the scene.
Murals in the tomb
Perhaps some netizens will wonder why Yang Guifu seems so calm when encountering such things, and even has some professionalism in calmness? Because such a thing Yang Guifu has not encountered for the first time, as early as 1971, also in irrigating farmland, Yang Guifu is almost fifty meters away from the mouth of this cave, accidentally found an ancient tomb, when this ancient tomb was named Tomb No. 1 by archaeologists, and speaking of this No. 1 tomb, Yang Guifu's impression of it is also very profound, because in this No. 1 tomb, not only did it clean up and excavate more than seventy precious cultural relics such as iron, pottery, stone tools, etc. And also found some bright colors, strange content of the precious murals, the content of these murals is also very exquisite, and these murals not only made Yang Guifu feel very surprised, but also made all the archaeologists present feel very shocked. According to the description of the epitaph found in the tomb, the owner of the tomb was named Zhang Shiqing, a naturalized person of the Liao Dynasty.
mural
According to the contents of the epitaph, this person named Zhang Shiqing was not an ordinary person at that time, he was still a relatively famous person in the local area, this person was a rich gentleman before his death, he was not only very rich at that time, but also had his own granary, in 1088 AD, when the Liao Dynasty was in a time of disaster, the people everywhere were also miserable, and then Zhang Shiqing took the initiative to open his granary to relieve some people in difficulty. Later, after the Liao Emperor knew about this matter, he rewarded Zhang Shiqing with an official position to let him hold, these are the things that Yang Guifu, who found the ancient tomb at that time, knew, but in fact, there were things he did not know, that is, in this No. 1 tomb unearthed such a precious cultural relic, and the excavation of this cultural relic has also been plaguing the archaeologists at that time for eighteen years, it is a human face mask, this human face mask is a mask made of wood found in Zhang Shiqing's tomb.
Face mask
A human face mask
Its overall size and the proportion of real people are relatively close, and its overall shape is also very realistic, so realistic that people even think that it is a real human face, and in this tomb also cleaned out a wooden foot, and let the archaeologists see strangely, whether it is on the face mask, or on this wooden foot, there are holes that have been artificially chiseled, and this discovery also makes archaeologists speculate that this wooden face mask and this wooden foot, Originally it is likely to belong to an ancient wooden figurine, and this wooden figurine after decay, the mask of the head and one foot remained, the rest of the parts were not preserved, because in Zhang Shiqing's tomb, archaeologists also found the wooden figurines of the zodiac signs and soldier figurines, according to these discoveries, the owner of the tomb had a very obvious habit of using wooden figurines for burial, but it was not long before the archaeologists overturned this speculation. Because this human face mask and the wooden foot, they all have a very clever tenon structure, but looking at the wooden figurines, their overall production shows a lot rougher.
And coupled with the fact that this ancient tomb has been stolen by tomb robbers before this, so there is no way to continue the investigation when the clue arrives here, but after eighteen years of time, not far from the original Tomb No. 1, Yang Guifu has found the ancient tomb again, and it is still two different tombs, so what will archaeologists find in these two tombs? And will the mystery that has plagued archaeologists for nearly two decades get a clue in these two tombs? After the archaeologists also put the hope of unlocking the secret on the mask of the human face, all placed in these two tombs, after the decision made by the archaeologists, they will be found by Yang Guifu and the previous No. 1 tomb together to excavate together, in April 1989, the archaeologists in the approval of the relevant state departments, the two ancient tombs found in yang Guifu field began formal archaeological excavation work, after preliminary investigation, The results were very surprising to the archaeologists, because the archaeologists did not see any signs of theft by the stolen tomb thieves in the two tombs.
Liao Dynasty tombs
Enter the tomb
And the overall situation of these two tombs is also relatively well preserved, in these two tombs, the shape of the tomb of the second tomb is a single-room hexagonal burial chamber, the shape of the tomb of the third tomb is a single-room circular burial chamber, and the most critical of these is that these two tombs are the same as the first tomb found before, using a brick structure, after some cleaning by archaeologists, the tomb door of the second tomb was first cleared out by archaeologists, and the color of the second tomb door is more conspicuous. And the brick seal of the tomb door is also relatively complete, after some effort, the archaeologists opened the tomb door of the second tomb, but after opening the tomb door, the situation that appeared was to make the archaeologists confused, the original archaeological personnel surveyed, did not find that the two tombs have been stolen traces, but after everyone saw the situation inside the second tomb, it was very strange to see that the tomb at this moment was a mess, very chaotic.
There are no coffins in the tomb
Because at that time, a lot of the water in the canal poured into these two tombs, so at this time, in the tomb chamber of the second tomb, all the cultural relics appeared in the silt, and due to the impact of the water flow at that time, many cultural relics were also washed out from the original position for a distance, but in such a chaotic situation, the archaeologists found something wrong after careful observation, in this second tomb, it seems that something is missing, archaeologists take a closer look, Found in the tomb of this tomb, there is no tomb owner's coffin, and then archaeologists after a detailed investigation, to determine that the tomb has not suffered from tomb robbery theft, because the tomb has a huge number of precious cultural relics, and there is no room to place the tomb owner's coffin, after seeing this situation, the archaeologists at the time are also very confused, and then in the process of cleaning the tomb, they found new clues.
There are no coffins
Some archaeologists found a large number of wood debris on the north side of the burial chamber, but although there are many wood debris, but if it is used as a coffin material, it is still a little too little, from the location of this tomb to analyze, it is located and the previously discovered Tomb No. 1, only less than fifty meters apart, from the overall structure of this tomb, it is also a brick structure of the tomb, from the current archaeologists found clues, This Tomb No. 2 is also supposed to be an ancient tomb from the Liao Dynasty, but the script used during the Liao Dynasty is Chinese characters and Khitan scripts, while the wooden fragments found in this tomb are in Chinese characters and Sanskrit. This point is also confusing to archaeologists, just when archaeologists are confused, there are new clues in the excavation work in Tomb No. 3, in Tomb No. 3, archaeologists have cleaned up and unearthed a rectangular wooden box with a length of about one meter, a width of about sixty centimeters, and a height of about sixty centimeters.
Wooden chest
On this wooden box, there is a very significant feature, that is, like the wooden fragments found in Tomb No. 2, the characters used on this wooden box are also Chinese characters and Sanskrit characters, and this can explain the puzzles of the fragments found in Tomb No. 2, they were not originally detached from the coffin, they are actually the same thing as the wooden box in Tomb No. 3, after the archaeologists opened the wooden box, they found that there were some black unknown substances in it. But archaeologists experienced archaeologists, at a glance to recognize the true face of these black substances, these black substances are the appearance of human bones after being cremated, so the role of this wooden box has become clear, it is used to place ashes of a large wooden urn, in addition, after the archaeologists consulted the relevant information, everyone found that in the previous Tomb No. 1, the same situation also occurred, but this time the problem appeared, in ancient times, People are buried in a very neat dress, and buried in the form of a coffin.
There is text on the box
Relic
But what is the reason why the owner of the tomb buried in this tomb has such an abnormal behavior? After archaeologists found the truth in the text on this wooden box, archaeologists recognized that the Sanskrit written on this wooden box is similar to the Sanskrit sutra such as the "Dravidian Sutra", before the Tang Dynasty, the common burial method used in the Central Plains of China is to take the coffin as the main, although there was also a form of cremation at that time, but the people who used this method were ethnic minorities in some remote areas, and then Buddhism slowly introduced to China, and became popular in the Central Plains. Among them, the founder of Buddhism, Shakyamuni, left behind one thing after his death, that is, we are more familiar with the relics, and the specific source of the relics is that Shakyamuni was cremated after his death. It is precisely for this reason that the custom of cremation slowly began to prevail, and the Liao and Jin dynasties that believed in Buddhism were naturally also deeply influenced by it, and after archaeologists found the epitaphs of Tomb No. 2 and Tomb No. 3, the crowd found a clue that surprised them.
That is in the previously discovered Tomb No. 1, and the two tombs are related, but it is precisely because of the connection between these three tombs, so that the mystery on the face mask found before has become more confusing, after the archaeologists opened the epitaph, they found that the four corners of the epitaph are all pressed with copper coins, and the age of these copper coins are all from the Song Dynasty, after some research on the epitaph, archaeologists found that the newly excavated two tombs, Not only does it have some relationship with Zhang Shiqing, the owner of the tomb in Tomb No. 1, but zhang Shiben, who is buried in Tomb No. 3, and the owner of the tomb in Tomb No. 1, are still the same generation, but this is a new problem that arises, since the owners of the tombs in these two tombs belong to the same generation, but why are the funeral customs of the two tomb owners different after death? Why was the human face mask found in Tomb No. 1 not found in the same generation of Zhang Shiben, that is, Tomb No. 3? As the archaeologists cleaned up, the work continued.
The murals that exist in these two tombs have also slowly revealed their true faces, the colors of these two murals are gorgeous, the content of the murals depicts the pictures of the nobles living in the Liao Dynasty, the frescoes of tomb No. 2 depict the "Bijing Map", this mural depicts the picture of the owner of the tomb learning Buddhism during his lifetime, in another "Bicha Map", this mural is also used for archaeologists to study the reference for the Liao Dynasty people to drink tea, in Tomb No. 3 The mural found by the archaeologists is a female lamp drawing, which looks like a scene depicting the peaceful and indifferent life between the nobles, and the archaeologists are most amazed by the algae wells in the two tombs, which look like radial circular patterns, in which there is a very exquisite twenty-eight star map, as well as the zodiac pattern from ancient Babylon, in the previous tomb No. 1, archaeologists have also seen similar patterns.
And such a pattern is still the first time in China's archaeological community, so what does such a pattern mean? In the excavation of these two tombs, archaeologists for the first time found a strange shape of the star pattern, at first people did not know what kind of role such a pattern has, so the archaeologists began to read a large number of related information, after a period of time, archaeologists found useful clues, in ancient times, people at that time will be such a star map depicted the top of the tomb, the reason is that people at that time believed that after the death of a person, They can see in another world where they have lived before, and this is a special funerary custom that symbolizes faith, and other murals in the tomb embody the ancient concept that people died as if they were alive. Although these murals made archaeologists aware of many things, they still did not solve the mystery of the face mask for archaeologists.
Liao Dynasty regime
Until four years later, on a certain day of the year, in the field of yang Guifu, who was also a villager, or not far from the first tomb, two more tombs were found, but it is a pity that after the archaeologists arrived at the scene, they found that the two tombs had been stolen, and the murals found in these two tombs were also the same as the murals in the first tomb, and five Liao Dynasty tombs were found in this small land. This discovery has also attracted the attention of the relevant departments of the state, because the Liao Dynasty has not existed for too long, so there are still many gaps in the history of the Liao Dynasty, since five tombs have been found in this place, will there be more ancient tombs here? In 1993, the local archaeological department conducted a large-scale ancient tomb exploration for this area, and after a period of archaeological action, archaeologists did find several tombs under this land, and the owners of these tombs were surnamed Zhang.
There is a table "feast" in the burial chamber.
And in the seventh tomb of these tombs, there is a scene that shocks all the archaeologists, in this tomb there is a wooden door from a thousand years ago, and the chain on the wooden door is still locked very firmly, just when the archaeologists do not know how to open the wooden door, this time suddenly an archaeologist found that directly above the wooden door, there is a key, and this key is the key that opens the wooden door, after seeing this situation, The archaeologists present also felt a strange atmosphere, the owner of this tomb thought that he had long known that someone would come, and left a key here, but the archaeologists did not think so much, and then they entered the wooden door with a nervous mood, after entering the burial chamber of Tomb No. 7, the archaeologists actually found that there were two tables and two chairs here, and their placement was also very neat, and on the table were placed various ancient utensils, plates, bowls, Items such as oil lamps and kettles.
At this time, archaeologists suddenly found that this is not a table that has existed for a thousand years? This table feast is very well preserved, even like its owner just left the seat not long after the appearance, the table not only has a prepared food, but also a dragon handle bowl, there are actually some chestnuts, at first when the archaeologists found this table of thousands of years ago, all were startled, but in addition to the shock, archaeologists are more happy, because this is undoubtedly a very important archaeological discovery for archaeologists to study the culture of Liao Dynasty food. Later, archaeologists found a sealed chicken leg bottle in Tomb No. 7, and then after testing by the relevant departments, they found that the chicken leg bottle contained wine more than 900 years ago, a delicious meal plus wine, why would this tomb be placed like this, and what kind of secrets exist in the face mask found before? It is believed that with the detailed investigation of archaeologists, these mysteries will surface soon. The above is all the content of this issue, if you have anything you want to say, welcome to leave a comment in the comment area below!
A thousand-year-old tomb in Hebei, in which a table of food was found, what did the meal look like a thousand years ago?