Dingling Underground Palace
As we all know, Guo Moruo is the scholar who most supports the state's initiative to excavate the tomb of emperor Wanli of the Ming Dynasty.
Although there is currently a theory that the person who advocated the excavation of the Dingling Tomb of Emperor Mingshen was Wu Han, the vice mayor of Beijing at the time, Guo Moruo was only one of the few people who supported Wu Han in excavating the Dingling Tomb.
This argument ignores the point that among the leaders who supported Wu Han's excavation of Dingling, only Guo Moruo had an academic background, and only he knew what it meant to excavate Dingling.
And because of Guo Moruo's academic background, his support undoubtedly played a decisive role in the game of "excavating Dingling".
In other words, if Guo Mo does not support the excavation of the Dingling Tomb, then Wu Han alone may not be able to promote the relevant departments to make up their minds to excavate the Dingling Tomb.
Therefore, although Guo Ruomo was not the initiator of the excavation of the Dingling Tomb, he did play a decisive role in the process of national excavation of the Dingling Tomb.
So, why did Guo Moruo support the excavation of Dingling?
Of course, Guo Moruo knew that at that time, the archaeological technology was still very backward, and the cultural relics could not be well preserved.
However, Guo Moruo hopes to excavate some materials and archives from the Dingling Tomb that have never appeared.
This was directly related to the confrontation between the old and new historiography at that time.
In fact, the old and new views of history are not correct.
It is mainly the conflict between historical materialism and traditional historiography.
Guo Moruo personally visited the excavation site of Dingling Tomb
Compared with the traditional history represented by historians such as Chen Yinke, materialist history pays more attention to revealing the universal laws of things, and it is inevitable that there will be a situation of "emphasizing history rather than historical materials".
This is also an important part of the traditional historians represented by Chen Yinke who often criticize materialist historiography.
As a leading figure in materialist historiography, Guo Moruo, on the one hand, should make a big eye for the new historiography, criticize traditional history for attaching too much importance to historical materials, and regard "historiography is historical materials" as a wrong view; on the other hand, Guo Moruo, as a scholar who has received a deep education in traditional Sinology, still has the deepest desire to completely overwhelm the traditional historians represented by Chen Yinke in the possession of "historical materials".
In the final analysis, Guo Moruo still wants to "defeat" Chen Yinke, and is there a more magnificent victory than defeating Chen Yinke in the field of "historical materials" that chen Yinke and other traditional historians are best at?
Guo Moruo himself did not hide this.
Cultural relics excavated from Dingling Tomb
After the excavation of Dingling began, teachers and students of the Department of History of Peking University wrote to Guo Moruo, asking him to talk about the problem of "thick present and thin ancient", and he wrote a reply, which was published in the "Guangming Daily" and the 7th "Archaeological Newsletter" on June 10, in which he said: "Bourgeois historians only focus on information, we do not seek to blame such a person, as long as he has a skill, we can use his strengths... In terms of historical research, we have surpassed Chen Yinke in terms of data possession in a not very long period of time. I can say this to Chen Yinke's face. 'Don't give in to the teacher'. Chen Yinke's work, why can't those of us who have mastered Marxism-Leninism still not be able to do it? ”
Guo Moruo also advocated that "the scope of history is very wide, and it is necessary to know some correct methods, and it is necessary to possess a large amount of information." The collection, collation, analysis, etc. of data must be done as hard as possible, and it must not be tricky at all. Possess as much first-hand information as possible and, when compelled, critically accept second-hand information. The most important thing to do here is to work honestly and honestly. He also said: "It is true that historical data cannot replace historiography, but in the study of history, there is only the general principle of historical materialism and no historical data, which is empty and empty... History cannot be studied without historical data. Therefore, the work of collecting and examining historical materials cannot be denied in its entirety. ”
In fact, judging from Guo Moruo's public speech before and after the excavation of Dingling, he was of course very willing to excavate some documents in Dingling that had never existed in the world.
Because in this way, "in a not long period of time, even in terms of data possession, it will surpass Chen Yinke." ”
To sum up, although Guo Mo was not the initiator of the excavation of the Dingling Tomb, he was definitely the person who played the most key role in the decision to excavate the Dingling Tomb; therefore, it is not wrong to say that he advocated the excavation of the Dingling Tomb by the relevant parties.
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