In the 1980s and 1990s, because the country had just broken the "stereotypes and dogmas", many cultural relics were lost to the people, and many people made a fortune by picking up leaks in antique markets or roadside stalls, and some also became large collections with rich families.
But after all, antiques are limited, and folk antiques are getting less and less as the price rises, but there are still people on the market from time to time who find leaks and find big treasures at a very low price.
Generally speaking, these lucky people who find leaks are either well-funded to keep the treasure in their own collection, or auctioned, and the price they auction is often a sky-high price.
A man in Fuzhou, Fujian Province, is the latter, after he spent 10,000 yuan to buy a dilapidated ancient book, he was going to sell for 5 million but did not sell, but he did not expect to sell 26 million at auction.
Spent 10,000 yuan to buy an ancient book of the Northern Song Dynasty
Mr. Wang, who is not confused in his recent years, is a wealthy businessman who usually loves to collect antiques and runs two antique shops in Fuzhou and Nanchang.
In the spring of 2012, Mr. Wang went to Nanchang to work, and when he was idle, he found a big treasure on the stall of an antique market.
At that time, Mr. Wang was not interested in looking at the dazzling antiques on the stalls, but he was very interested in a tattered ancient book in front of the stall owner in a plastic basket.
Mr. Wang has been playing antiques for many years, and he is well versed in the way of the antique industry, and after looking at the ancient books in the box, he pretends not to care, afraid that the stall owner knows that he is interested in such things, and takes the opportunity to raise the price or simply does not sell to him.
Therefore, Mr. Wang has been taking care of him the whole time, pretending that the cloud is light and light, picking it up and putting it down, but after only a simple glance, it is even more, and it is concluded that the contents of the basket are not simple.
In the end, he bought some other things first, and when he was about to leave, he took it down for ten thousand yuan.
After Mr. Wang bought the ancient book home, he found that its damage and pollution were very serious, and many places had even begun to drop paper and fall off, and there were many holes in the irregular shape of the fishing net, and the first few pages were very badly damaged, and it was almost impossible to spread out.
However, Mr. Wang believes that this ancient book is a real treasure, and under the advice of experts, he spent a lot of effort to lining each page of ancient books on rice paper, and then sandwiched each page of ancient books lined with rice paper in a brand new magazine to preserve, and finally framed them with a delicate paper wallet.
Mr. Wang's family is solid, originally he wanted to keep this ancient book in his collection, but then a business failure, or let him move the idea of selling ancient books for money.
In the autumn of 2012, Mr. Wang approached the leader of Jiangxi Province, saying that he had an ancient book of the Song Dynasty and asking if he had the intention of buying it for the collection.
After some appraisal, the leaders and experts of the Jiangxi Provincial Map did give a preliminary appraisal opinion - "It should be the Northern Song Dynasty's "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy", the possibility of authenticity is relatively large, but more authoritative experts are needed to do further appraisal to estimate." ”
At the same time, experts believe that it is most likely a unique book at home and abroad, the value is immeasurable, if you can take it first, it is definitely a town treasury collection.
The tattered ancient books are authentic, and 5 million people in Jiangxi Province have lost their arms
In order to further determine the authenticity of the ancient books and give a reasonable estimate, the leaders of the Jiangxi Provincial Map hung up the phone to the National Map, found Mr. Li Zhizhong, an authoritative expert, and Mr. Chen Xianxian of the Historical Documentation Center of the Shanghai Library, and invited them to come to Nanchang together to identify a long-lost ancient book.
The above two are the titan figures who study ancient books in China, and when they heard that another lost ancient book had been born again, both of them were excited, and they rushed to Nanchang.
Because the Map of Jiangxi Province repeatedly emphasized that they gave a purchase price after their appraisal, Mr. Li Zhizhong called his good friend Mr. Wei Li on the way and asked him to go to Nanchang together, saying that a long-lost orphan book was about to be born.
Wei Li is a top expert in the research and collection of folk ancient books in China, and he often has a superior grasp of the market valuation of ancient books.
One day in November 2012, at the invitation of Jiangxi Province, Li Zhizhong, Chen Xianxing and Wei Li and their party came to Nanchang Hotel.
Earlier, a group of people and the Jiangxi Province map and book owner agreed to conduct ancient book appraisal in the conference room of the Nanchang Hotel.
After eating breakfast, nearly eight o'clock, the three parties came to the conference room, and the owner of the book, Mr. Wang, came with his father.
After arriving at the conference room, Mr. Wang first told everyone about the history of his book, and then said that he was damaged by the real estate business, and wanted to sell the book to divert some funds to circulate, and then asked the three leaders and experts of Jiangxi Province to roughly introduce the judgment and general information on the authenticity of ancient books.
After roughly listening to the introduction of the book owner and the Jiangxi Provincial Map experts, Wei Li couldn't help but ask the leaders of the Jiangxi Provincial Map: "Dear leaders, what is the selling price of this book that you are talking about?" ”
The leader of the Jiangxi Provincial Map held out a slap.
"Half a million?"
The leader shook his head, then said word by word: "Five million!" That's why I have to ask experts to clap their eyes. ”
Wei Li listened, inhaled a cool breath, this price even if he has been immersed in ancient books for many years is rare, he is more curious about what kind of book is worth this price.
At this time, Mr. Li Zhizhong asked Wei Li what he thought.
Wei Li was more anxious, and he thought that it was a bit funny to talk about the price before seeing the book, so he proposed that the owner of the book first take the book out for everyone to see, and then say something else.
At everyone's request, Mr. Wang's father took out the suitcase under the table and pulled out a paper wallet, which contained the ancient book "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy".
When I first saw it, the appearance of the ancient book made everyone sigh, because its surface was not only seriously defaced, but also the creases were very obvious, and it was set in the magazine with rice paper, page by page, and how to see it was not 5 million.
However, after all, the price of ancient books cannot be superficially discussed in terms of appearance, what is important is the historical and humanistic value contained in the words recorded on them.
Moreover, this ancient book is a lone book, and it is very likely that there will be new discoveries that break the tone of historiography.
After a careful study by the three of them, Mr. Li Zhizhong began to tell the history of this ancient book:
"Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy", in fact, in the 4th year of the Northern Song Dynasty Song Renzong Jingyou, was ordered by Ding Du and others to "publish the narrow rhyme thirteen places", and then published and revised the "Jingde Yunluo", which is actually a Northern Song version of the "Xinhua Dictionary" for students to use in scientific examinations. Judging from the results of the identification of the materials, binding, codification format, written records and imprints of the book just now, there is a possibility of authenticity. ”
When mr. Wang, the owner of the book, asked Mr. Li Zhizhong how much to make an estimate, the leaders of Jiangxi Province were very resourceful to ask Mr. Wang's father and son to take the book with them to avoid it.
When only experts and Jiangxi Provincial Leaders were left in the conference room, Mr. Li Zhizhong changed his tone and said emphatically: "There is no doubt that this book is authentic!" ”
Then the leaders asked Wei Li whether the value of 5 million was worth it, and Wei Li also affirmed: "If it is really a genuine manuscript as Elder Li said, then it is a Song edition book that has not been recorded, and this one is absolutely worth this price." ”
Unfortunately, Wei Li later learned that Tuyin in Jiangxi Province could not raise money for a while, and finally lost this lone book, and later when he heard the news of it again, it was already a sky-high price of 26 million.
Turning his head and taking it to auction, he sold it for 26 million days
Wei Li later recalled that after Jiangxi Province lost the Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy, he did not do anything because he had a gentleman's agreement with Mr. Li Zhizhong.
Li Zhizhong believed that such an orphan should have been donated to the national map to be better repaired and preserved, but because Mr. Wang was in urgent need of money at that time, Li Zhizhong's idea could not help but seem a little indignant to others.
Li Zhizhong wanted to include this book in the national map, and Wei Li, as a private collector, did not have the identity of a shot.
In the autumn of 2013, a foreign news from Beijing Kuangshi Auction Company Caused a Sensation in the Entire Circle of Ancient Books at Home and Abroad - "Beijing Kuangshi will auction the northern Song Dynasty's "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" in the autumn auction."
Kuang Shi is worthy of being the first in the auction of ancient books, in order to strive for a high auction price for "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" as much as possible, the early stage is very strong, and the kung fu is also very fine.
It not only held a special press conference to attract major media reports, but also deliberately produced a catalogue for the book.
In order to determine the authenticity of the book, Kuang Shi specially invited more than a dozen experts from the ancient book circle to hold a seminar, and even the names of the experts were also typed out, so that people did not even have the opportunity to question.
At that time, KuangShi's valuation of the book in the album was 8 million to 10 million, but on the day of the autumn auction on December 4, the starting price directly soared to 15 million.
In the end, after the competition of several big men, the book was finally auctioned by the Nanjing Library for a sky-high price of 26 million, plus the commission was 29.9 million, and Mr. Wang and Kuang Shi both made a lot of money.
Is "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" worth the sky-high price of 26 million?
Nowadays, the "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" has been collected by the Nanjing Library and called it "the biggest discovery in the ancient book world in the past two hundred years".
For this evaluation of the Nanjing Library, Lin Shitian, director of the Office of the National Center for the Protection of Ancient Books, said: "It is still pertinent, at present, excluding Buddhist classics, the number of Northern Song inscriptions passed down from generation to generation will not exceed 20, and the "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" is the latest discovery in recent years, it is equivalent to our "Xinhua Dictionary" today, which is the basic tool book for the Northern Song Dynasty students' examination, which can be brought into the examination hall, so its research value is very high. ”
Below, we will explain from the two aspects of historical and humanistic value and scarcity, why the value of "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" is so high.
First of all, there are historical and humanistic values.
During the Northern Song Dynasty, especially during the Song Renzong period, the economy flourished and the culture reached an unprecedented peak, so the historical value of the ancient books it handed down was extremely high.
In the Northern Song Dynasty, the imperial court's selection of students must not only test the scriptures, but also test the poetry, and while writing a good article, it is also necessary to keep in mind that the tone of the words must be in rhyme.
The most important thing is that the words in the text must not violate the main word, for example, words that are the same as the names of the emperors of the past must not appear, otherwise it is a major crime.
In order to standardize a set of character rhymes for students, and at the same time help to test whether they are guilty of mistakes at all times, the Northern Song Dynasty version of the "Xinhua Dictionary" - "Libu Rhyme Strategy" came into being, commonly known as "official rhyme".
Volume 1 of Wang Di's "Records of the YanYi Yi Conspiracy" once said: "At the beginning of the country, the jinshi section was still wide, and the etiquette was not different from that of the prefecture and county. In July of the second year of Jingde's reign, the Rebbe Gongyuan said that except for the book case, it was forbidden to bring tea cooks and candles to people, and except for the official rhyme, it was not allowed to carry the book strategy, and the offender was helped out of the temple. ”
It can be seen that in the second year of the Northern Song Dynasty, the imperial court has allowed candidates to bring "official rhyme" ("Libu Rhyme") into the examination room to take the exam.
The second volume of the "Continued Performance and Prosperity" written by Cheng Dachang of the Song Dynasty also says that "before raising the son, this Xu Shu shu, to the end of the sample, xu with the "Libu Rhyme""
Chen Zhensun's "Zhizhai Shulu Solution" Volume III "Ritual Rhyme Strategy" note: "Its daily sketches are commonly used in the poetry of juzi, and the rhyme of the gaizi book is also the slightest rhyme".
It can be seen that this book is almost a copy of the Northern Song Dynasty Examination Zi, and students use it to test whether they are rhyming and whether they are guilty, which has a great effect on the study of the Northern Song Dynasty, the study of the students' writing, and even the rhyme of the Northern Song Poetry.
Second, there is scarcity.
The Northern Song Dynasty engravings of the four books that have been handed down to the world will not exceed 20, and their scarcity value is already extremely high.
Previously, the earliest surviving "Rebbe Rhymes" was found to be in the collection of Shinfuku-ji Temple in Japan, but the Shōfuku-ji book was incomplete because of its damage.
The "Rebbe Rhyme Strategy" held by Zhenfu Temple should be a publication of the Northern Song Dynasty and song Zhezong, which is at least 50 years later than the "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy", and the content of the "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" just makes up for the scarce part of the Zhenfu Temple.
The "Jingyou Libu Rhyme Strategy" that Mr. Wang found is not only the oldest and most comprehensive, but also the only orphan book at home and abroad, and its value is naturally immeasurable.
To a certain extent, Mr. Li Zhizhong believes that it is reasonable for such ancient books to be donated to the national map, because only the most professional people know how to repair and preserve it.
On the other hand, only by collecting it on the national map can it be guaranteed that it will always be a country, and if it is eventually sold abroad, it will be a loss of treasure for the mainland.
Resources:
The "Rebbe Rhymes" that I missed – Wei Li
2013 Beijing Kuangshi Autumn Auction