introduction:
In our impression, the convenient way of travel of "taxis" seems to have been introduced to China from the West decades ago. And the West also has a taxi taxi in the past hundred years with the development of mechanical technology. In contrast, in China, for thousands of years, there have been carriages very early, but we have always believed that ancient people did not carry a palanquin, take a rickshaw, or rely on their legs to walk.
But if you really think so, then it is a big mistake, in fact, China as early as BC, that is, the Han Dynasty, there was a "taxi"! So is this true?
Han Dynasty taxi ----- "Jili Drum Car"
In fact, in the Han Dynasty, there was already a "taxi" in China, and people named this crossing thing as "Jili Drum Car", so who invented it? And who named it?
Due to the lack of information, it is impossible to verify who the drum car was made in the end, but we can summarize it in "Lu Ban", because the ancient "Lu Ban" represented a large number of folk craftsmen.
More historical records record that the appearance of the "Jili Drum Car" is related to the Ancient Yellow Emperor, it is said that when the Ancient Yellow Emperor fought xuanyou, in order to crack the fog of xuanyou, creatively issued a guide car, thus rushing out of the fog array of xuanyou, and finally won a complete victory.
The technology of the guide car has been handed down, and gradually improved into the "Jili Drum Car", it is said that in ancient times, the land of the world was measured, it was completed by using the Jili Drum Car, and the drum car in the postscript was difficult to produce because of the high technical requirements.
It has become a rarity, only the ancient Tianzi can have, in the ancient Tianzi out of the tour, the drum car is one of the honor guards, but also a major ceremonial activity, there must be a little ceremonial car,
The source of power for the drum car is the four horses in the front drive, usually its position, behind the guide car made by the Yellow Emperor. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the Keiri drum car underwent a great development, and the appearance of various decorations made the Keiri drum car luxurious.
To the Tang Dynasty and Song Dynasty. The drum car still appeared in the honor guard that accompanied the car, and the score of the people continued to increase from more than 29 to more than thirty.
Of course, according to the current statement, this kind of car can carry people, but it can not get passengers along the way, and the current concept of taxi is different, but if according to the concept of taxi, it is the world's earliest "taxi", so it is worthy of the name.
Because the "kee drum" on its car is the earliest metering equipment!
So how is the "Jili Drum Car" calculated?
First of all, its power comes from four horses, strictly speaking, it is a carriage, but its wheel size and diameter, unlike the ordinary carriage in ancient times, are carefully calculated, and the metering method mainly relies on wheels.
In ancient times, in fact, in the Shang Dynasty, there were carriages, and by the Western Zhou Dynasty, carriages had matured, and from the bronze carriages of the Qin Dynasty unearthed from the Terracotta Warriors, we can see that many parts on the carriages in ancient times have been very complete.
Therefore, the wheels of the drum car, as long as every 100 turns, the carriage can travel exactly one mile; its structure, according to the current restoration, comes from a special gear between the wheel and the wheel, but the speed of rotation of this gear is much slower than the wheel, and the craftsmen have calculated many times that the wheels have just turned 100 times, and the carriage has just driven 1 mile, and the gears have just turned a full circle.
So how did people know at the time that it had turned 100 times and walked 1 mile? As a passenger and coachman, I certainly don't count this number!
In fact, this is the clever place of the ancients, craftsmen in order to solve the problem of mileage, in ancient times without a calculator, the use of drums as a tool to report mileage, as long as the record of how many drums sounded, you know how many miles have been walked, which can be said to be high-tech in ancient times
Considering that even the Greek civilization, thousands of years ago, did not find this kind of high-tech taxi, or even recorded, it shows how high the scientific and technological content of this thing was in the world at that time.
So this drum can't be played by human power, right? In fact, the drum in the record is also combined with the gear of the wheel, when the wheel rotates 100 times, the gear will turn, driving the two dolls holding drumsticks on the car, the drumsticks in the hand, the winter, the small drum.
May now think that this is very simple, but in ancient times, science and technology is not developed in the era, the production and research of the "Jili drum car", has been a breakthrough high technology,
And the people in the carriage, as long as they hear the drums, know that the carriage has traveled a mile. So at that time, it was named "Jili Drum Car" meaning, and the role of "Jili Drum", its accuracy is no less than the current taxi, each kilometer of driving is calculated, so that passengers have a number in mind, more convenient for both sides to know how much to walk, is indeed an epoch-making tool,
And its role, but also became the measurement of the world's land and travel to and from the time, some of the size of the city is indispensable equipment, for the ancient Chinese management is outstanding.
However, later, due to various reasons, the technology of the Jili drum cart was lost, and the physical objects of the Jili drum cart that were handed down were less and less, resulting in the jili drum car appearing in historical documents for a time, and in the 1930s, Mr. Wang Zhenduo, through ancient documents, made and restored the "Jili Drum Car" of the Western Han Dynasty by himself. Later, a model of the drum car was collected in the National Museum of China.
When visitors see other museums and see the "Jili Drum Car", they are all amazed by the wisdom of this invention of the ancients. But you think that in ancient China, there were jili drum cars everywhere, then it is wrong, the jili drum cars are not everywhere, but concentrated in some more prosperous cities, but the keiri drum cars rarely carry passengers.
In order to solve the problem of transportation travel, the Tang Dynasty appeared an epoch-making means of public transport, "oil bi car"
The "oil bi car" of the Tang Dynasty can be said to be the earliest recorded "bus" in the world!
So why does it have such an odd name? How did it come about and work?
The source of the oil wall car is related to the ancient noble women, it is said that the most oil wall car at that time was the noble woman, and at that time, these cars were covered with a turquoise oil curtain, so it was also called "oil bi car". It is a kind of carriage painted with paint, in the "Qiantang Su Xiaoxiao Song", it is mentioned that the oil wall car, there are also records of oil wall cars in ancient poems, such as: ... Like crying eyes, nothing knots concentric, fireworks can not be cut. Grass is like a yin, pine is like a cover, the wind is a dress, and the water is a pendant. Oil wall car, wait for each other at night. Cold green candles, labor brilliance. Under the Xiling Tomb, wind and rain, etc., there are "concubines riding oil wall cars, Lang riding green horses", it can be seen that the oil wall car was the favorite of everyone's bridesmaids at that time, and there were many legends around this oil wall car.
In fact, the oil bi car, can also be regarded as a kind of horse-drawn carriage, after all, in ancient times, before the emergence of the steam engine, the horse is the global traffic power, the Tang Dynasty's Chang'an City, was the world's largest city at that time, from the current archaeological sites found, the scale of Chang'an City is several times larger than the current Xi'an,
And the distribution of Chang'an's neighborhoods is very reasonable, are all tic-tac-toe division, but also distinguish between the east and west of the two cities, so that because the city is too large, Chang'an's population is also very large, in order to solve the problems that arise,
There was an oil car, the oil wall car its power, requiring 6 to 8 horses, the body of the Hutchison drum car is different, the car is very long and there are carriages, in order to ventilate and breathe, but also opened a few windows on the wall, so that the passengers sitting inside the experience is excellent. The scope of its transportation is in the Chang'an area,
So how did the Chang'an people of the Tang Dynasty rent a car?
In the Tang Dynasty, due to the Tang Dynasty's external development, the horse problem has been solved, so Chang'an and Luoyang, people with some identity, will ride horses or take horse-drawn carriages, but Tang Dynasty cities are planned, so in the Tang Dynasty to rent horses or carriages, you must go to the "car workshop".
In the "YuanGui of the Book", it is recorded: "Empress Dowager Zhang Jing died, and hundreds of officials performed incense at the Xingtang Temple. The temple attendant Chao En Zhai was written outside the temple in the merchant car workshop, Yan Zai and the taiwan provincial officials to eat", it is recorded that the "merchant car shop" is near the Xingtang Temple, it can be seen that in the prosperous place at that time, there would be a shop that rented a carriage. Of course, the people who can drive a car in the bustling area must be extraordinary people.
So how many people can the oil wall car carry at one time?
And the modern sense of the bus is different, the oil wall car at that time is also divided into sizes, the large oil wall car can carry more than ten people to dozens of people at a time, and the small one carries 6 to 7 people, the benefits of the oil wall car are many, one to facilitate the travel of passengers, the second is convenient for tourists to play, and the price at that time is not cheap, so it appears grand and exquisite, and it is also a symbol of status.
To the Song Dynasty, especially the Southern Song Dynasty, Lin'an Province (is now Hangzhou), the oil bi car has undergone a great development, the Southern Song Dynasty, the English economy is relatively rich, for this oil wall car is also decorated very luxurious, the window is hung with exquisite curtains, the carriage has added satin mattress pads, passengers can not only ride, but also lie in it!
Because the economy of the Song Dynasty was more developed than that of the Tang Dynasty, and the economy was good, people traveled everywhere, and correspondingly there were more complete rental services for car workshops and boat mills, and they were larger and more developed than those of the Tang Dynasty.
In the "Map of the Upper River of the Qingming Dynasty", we may see the grand situation of Kaifeng in the Song Dynasty at that time, and in the picture, there are also shops that operate car workshop rentals.
However, the oil wall car arrived later, the Ming and Qing dynasties were still in operation, but it was very rare to do more than a dozen people to dozens of people, and the West introduced rickshaws at the end of the Qing Dynasty, opening another era.
However, you will be curious, how did the ancients calculate mileage and price when making taxis or oil wall cars? In fact, this is not very casual to drop a few silver so simple, but after rigorous calculation, at that time, whether it is one-way or round-trip, there are prescribed pricing methods,
Therefore, when the ancients got on the oil wall car or called a taxi, they must also be like modern people, first explain to the driver where to go, and both sides calculate the approximate mileage and fare. Negotiate a good price for each other before you can start your journey. But even so, the ancients, like modern people, would occasionally encounter some coachmen, and there were moral problems that greed led to overcharging.
After reading the way the ancient people traveled, did you increase your knowledge again?
Now it seems that the ancient people's way of travel is very backward, but to understand that any mode of transportation, is through the continuous accumulation of history and slow development and improvement, it is impossible to achieve overnight, in fact, the way of life of the ancients is not without the backwardness we think. Because each era has its own unique characteristics and pleasures of life, we cannot use modern methods to judge the lives of ancient people, and at the same time, we should not use modern technology to comment on the wisdom of the ancients. Instead, it is to excavate the useful places of ancient culture, inherit and develop, so that Chinese civilization can be passed on for a long time.