Western Xia, is a country that is very strange to most people, friends who have seen "Tianlong Babu" may think of the Princess of Xixia who married the false bamboo, those who have seen "Ghost Blowing Lights" may remember that Partridge Whistle once went to steal the Western Xia Black Water City, and those who have watched "The General is on the Top" may remember the wild Li Yuqi, and there is no Hidden Pang and other strange western Xia characters.
Less than 200 years old, the Western Xia Dynasty was a short-lived dynasty that rose up during the Song Dynasty and was destroyed by the Mongols. The short history of The Western Xia has left a mystery that has not been solved for nearly 500 years, that is, the Western Xia script.
Western Xia text, the author photographed at the Yinchuan Western Xia Museum
The Western Xia script is a script created by Li Yuanhao, the founding emperor of the Western Xia Dynasty, who ordered the chancellor Ye Li Renrong to create a script that is close to Chinese characters in shape, but the strokes are complex and complicated, and there are symmetrical characters, interchangeable characters, synthetic characters and other mechanisms. Complex mechanisms and strokes make it difficult for future generations to interpret and learn The Western Xia script. Therefore, after the destruction of the Western Xia, the Western Xia script gradually declined, and by the Ming Dynasty, it had become a heavenly book, and no one could recognize it.
If the Western Xia script disappears into the long river of history, then a large number of Western Xia Buddhist scriptures and excavated documents will not be able to be interpreted, and the loss will be very huge. Fortunately, there is no invincible road in the sky, and Xi Xiawen reappears in the sky because of the accidental death of a scholar.
In 1804, the ninth year of Jiaqing in the Qing Dynasty, a scholar at the low point of his life was idle in his hometown of Wuwei. Shusheng's name was Zhang Shu (張澍), a native of Wuwei County, Liangzhou (present-day Wuwei, Gansu). Zhang Shu was a young man, a 23-year-old high school scholar, entered the Hanlin Academy, and then served in Yuping County (present-day Yuping County, Guizhou) Zhi County, but after only two years as an official, he resigned due to illness and returned to his hometown. Career has just improved, because of illness resigned, Zhang Shu is naturally depressed in his heart, idle at home is not a long-term solution, so he called a few friends, together to go to the Qingying Temple in the north of the city to relax. Several people wandered around the temple, and stumbled upon a monument pavilion in the middle of nowhere, and the front and back of the stele pavilion were sealed with bricks, and they did not know what was inside. Zhang Shujinshi was very accomplished, and his curiosity arose, so he called out to the abbot and asked, "What is the inscription in this stele pavilion?" Abbot: "I don't know, so the old legend says that this monument cannot be opened casually, and once it is opened, there will be a disaster of wind and hail." Zhang Shu thought to himself: Since I resigned from my official post and returned home, I have rarely traveled with friends, and this inscription is also an unexpected gain, just to see this rare object. So I had to unseal it. The abbot exclaimed, "No, no." Zhang Shu did not hesitate: "If there is a disaster in unsealing, I will bear it with all my strength, and it has nothing to do with the abbot." After saying that, he and his friend and servant began to break the bricks. The abbot saw that there were many of them, and had to give up his promise.
Wuwei Qingying Temple Gusai Pagoda and Dayun Temple Induction Pagoda
After the urn composed of bricks was removed, there was no imaginary change of color in the heavens and the earth, the wind and hail struck, nor the black gas that rolled out and scattered into a hundred and ten golden rays like the opening chapter of the Water Margin, and only a one-foot-tall stone stele was displayed in front of everyone. The inscription on the front of this stone tablet looks familiar at first glance, but on closer inspection, not a single word is recognized. The font is very square, but the strokes are complex, and they are different from the cursive seal text. Zhang Shujinshi was rich in knowledge, and there must be an explanation after judging this stele. So I looked behind the stele, and sure enough, there was an explanation of the script.
This stele is the famous "Rebuilding the Monument of the Guardian Temple", also known as the Liangzhou Stele, which is the only stone stele that exists at present where Western Xia and Chinese coexist, and through the comparative translation of this stone stele, the world can re-understand the Western Xia script after hundreds of years of loss.
Liangzhou Monument 1:1 replica, photographed at the Yinchuan Western Xia Museum
The story is very similar to the Rosetta Stone. Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs were gradually lost after the 4th century AD, and it was not until 1799 that the Rosetta Stone was unearthed and re-interpreted and translated. The Rosetta Stone records an edict from the Ptolemaic dynasty of ancient Egypt, especially in three languages, namely Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs, Ancient Egyptian Cursive, and Ancient Greek. Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs were sacred sacred books for sacrifice, ancient Egyptian cursive was written by commoners, and ancient Greek was because Alexander the Great conquered Egypt at that time, so Egyptian documents needed to add Greek translations. Because of the translation of ancient Greek, after more than a thousand years of loss, ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs were finally successfully interpreted. Therefore, it is no exaggeration to say that the Liangzhou Monument is the Rosetta Stone Monument in China.
Rosetta Stone, currently preserved in the British Museum
Finally, let's talk about Zhang Shu's follow-up story. After discovering the Liangzhou monument, Zhang Shu became very interested in Western Xia culture and was ready to write a history of Western Xia himself, so he began to collect and compile relevant materials. It took a lot of effort to collect six bundles of materials, but during a trip, they were burned by the family who thought it was waste paper. After zhang shu learned of this, he was so sad that he stopped compiling the history of Western Xia, and it was not until he lived in Xi'an in his later years that he re-compiled a brief history of Western Xia in the chronicle of Western Xia. In addition, he also made the "Records of Western Xia Surnames", which explored and studied the history and culture of Western Xia from the perspective of surnames. This amazing historical discovery of the Liangzhou Monument profoundly influenced Zhang Shu's life, making him deeply in love with the Western Xia culture, and spent his life studying the history and culture of the Western Xia, with remarkable results.