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The Yuanmingyuan is a famous royal garden built during the Qing Dynasty of the mainland, and it is also the integrator of the classical gardens of the mainland.
But this garden, which gathered the country's financial resources, with the best craftsmen and the best designs, was severely damaged by the British and French forces in the Second Opium War in 1860.
After that, although the Yuanmingyuan was restored, it was far less brilliant than in its heyday, and eventually declined in the subsequent wars, most of the cultural relics and treasures in the garden were looted, and most of the buildings and landscapes were burned and destroyed.
After the founding of New China, in order to protect cultural sites and remember the historical shame, the government organized archaeologists to carry out many conservation excavations of the Yuanmingyuan.
During an excavation of the ruins of the Yuanmingyuan Dagongmen River Channel 160 years after the Yuanmingyuan was burned down, experts dug up a rare cultural relic in the silt of the river channel, which is a gilded bronze elephant head.
This gilded bronze elephant head, which has been sleeping at the bottom of the river for many years, still has a dazzling golden light, and it also represents the highest level of Gilding technology in China.
A royal garden destroyed by war
The Yuanmingyuan is located in the pattern of three mountains and five gardens in Haidian District, Beijing, and is a collection of royal gardens founded in the Qing Dynasty.
Now we call the Yuanmingyuan, in fact, the General Name of the Yuanmingyuan, Changchun Garden and Qichun Garden in the Qing Dynasty, also known as the "Yuanming Three Gardens", covering a total area of 350 hectares, of which the Yuanmingyuan is the largest, covering an area of 200 hectares.
The Yuanmingyuan was founded in 1709 (that is, the 48th year of the Kangxi Dynasty), and during the Yongzheng period, the Yuanmingyuan roughly formed the pattern of its heyday.
Although the Yuanmingyuan was a palace, the emperor spent most of his time in the Forbidden City to deal with imperial affairs, and only used it during the summer or some special times, but until the Jiaqing period, the Three Gardens of the Yuanming Dynasty were still being built one after another.
The Yuanmingyuan not only has the grand scale, but also draws on the beauty of Jiangnan private gardens, and also integrates Western architectural features such as Western-style buildings, representing the highest achievement of the harmonious unity of ancient Chinese architecture and horticulture.
Qianlong wrote in the "Records of the Yuanmingyuan": "The grand scale, the depth of the hills and ravines, the cleanliness of the terroir and trees, and the possession of high-rise buildings and rooms can also be called guan stop." The area of the Heavenly Treasure Spirit, the land where the emperor yu travels, is no more than this. ”
However, during the Second Opium War, the British and French allies stepped into the park in 1860, and the once glorious Yuanmingyuan was destroyed, and after the Invasion of China by the Eight-Nation Alliance and the warlord melee, the Yuanmingyuan has long been a ruin.
After the founding of New China, under the care of Premier Zhou, the cultural relics department carried out the work of protecting the Yuanmingyuan, and with the development of the economic level, the historical value of the Yuanmingyuan was gradually valued.
In January 1988, the State Council listed the Yuanmingyuan as the third batch of national key cultural relics protection units, and in June of the same year, the Yuanmingyuan Relics Park was officially opened to the public, and the Yuanmingyuan also became an important historical and cultural treasure house and patriotic education base on the mainland.
The large-scale archaeology of the Yuanmingyuan ruins began with the excavation of the Mooyuan ruins in 1994, followed by the excavation of the ruins of the Tianwang Hall of Zhengjue Temple and the Royal Road on the south side, the Changchun Garden Palace Gate, the Tanghuai Hall, the Hanjing Hall, the Peach Blossom Cave, the Xinjingxuan, and the Kyushu Qingyan.
These archaeological excavations have become a strong support for the planning, protection, research and utilization of the Yuanmingyuan site.
After that, the excavation of the ruins of the Grand Palace Gate in the Yuanmingyuan became the focus of the mainland cultural relics department.
A rare artifact found in the Omiyamon Mikawa ruins
Yuanmingyuan Grand Palace Gate in history is the main gate of the Yuanmingyuan, the Qing Dynasty emperors and ministers mainly through the Grand Palace Gate in and out of the Yuanmingyuan, while the palace gate has a royal road directly connected to the Summer Palace East Palace Gate, the Great Palace Gate is also distributed around the Northeast Yiyuan, Chengze Garden, Changchun Garden and other important historical relics of various historical periods, the Grand Palace Gate is the most important node in the "Three Mountains and Five Gardens" pattern in history.
The Yuanmingyuan Dagongmen area is located in the southwest of the Yuanmingyuan Ruins Park, with the Chia Tai Guangming Ruins on the north side, the "shantytowns" undergoing demolition and transformation on the east and west sides, and the Xijingyuan Cemetery on the south side.
For many years, the Omiyamon area has been located outside the park walls, lacking effective management and control, reasonable protection and display, and is in a state of being "forgotten".
In order to further strengthen the overall and long-term planning and protection of the Yuanmingyuan Ruins Park, from 2013 to 2015, the Beijing Municipal Institute of Cultural Relics specially organized experts to conduct archaeological excavations in the Dagongmen area.
The rise and fall of the entire Omiyamon area in history is also the epitome of what the Yuanmingyuan encountered in modern times.
During the Kangxi Period when the Yuanmingyuan was first built, the Dagongmen area was not yet moved, and later the Yuanmingyuan became a royal garden during the Yongzheng Period, and then the construction of the Dagongmen area was completed.
Since then, the Omiya Gate has been used as the main palace gate of the Yuanmingyuan, and many palaces and gardens have been built around it, as well as the rotating rooms of many official government gates such as the Zongren Mansion, the Cabinet, the Ceremonial Department, the History Department, and the Military Department, which can be described as very important.
To the north of the Dagongmen area, there is a Xianliang Gate, also known as the Ergong Gate, which was a necessary place for Qing officials to listen to their wills and present their instructions.
To enter and exit the Xianliang Gate, you must pass through a royal river shaped like a crescent moon, and there are three stone bridges built on the river, also known as the Xianliang Bridge.
The area between Xianliangmen and Yuhe was not only a place of leisure and entertainment for the Qing dynasty royal family, but also a necessary place for many Qing officials to meet the emperor, so it is recorded in detail in various historical records.
In the Xianfeng Decade, that is, in 1860, when the Anglo-French army invaded the Yuanmingyuan, the area around the Dagongmen was occupied by the French army and seriously damaged by the French army.
Later, when Empress Dowager Cixi and the Tongzhi Emperor rebuilt the Yuanmingyuan, they also repaired the area around the Grand Palace Gate, but it was not long before the Eight-Nation Alliance invaded Beijing in 1900, and the Grand Palace Gate was destroyed again.
Today, archaeological excavations are being carried out in the area of the Omiya gate, and the Mikawa ruins are also a very important part of it.
At that time, the bustling Royal River and the Xianliang Bridge had long been destroyed by the war, and the river no longer existed, leaving only the ruins of the river.
In the entire river ruins, in addition to the remaining traces of waterways, there are also the mooring shores of the moored ships in the past, as well as the locks and bridge foundations are still faintly visible.
The direction of the entire course of the Royal River is east-west, parallel to the wall of the Yuanmingyuan, and the bottom of the dried up channel is black silt, the middle layer is yellow fine sand mud, and the lower layer is larger sand and pebbles.
In order to excavate the entire Yuhe site clearly, archaeologists dug up all the silt at the bottom of the entire river in spite of the dirt and hard work, and because of this, they found a precious cultural relic.
At that time, the experts were working at the bottom of the river, when suddenly someone shouted, and found a big guy, which immediately aroused everyone's interest.
When salvaging at the bottom of the river, although some cultural relics will remain, most of them are fragments or small objects, and rarely encounter the entire complete large cultural relics, and everyone surrounds them to see the true face of this thing.
When it was first dug up from the bottom of the river, this thing looked like an ordinary mud lump, wrapped in mud and could not see what it looked like, if it were not for the careful excavation of experts, it would be easy to be missed as an ordinary stone.
When transported up from the bottom of the river, everyone found that it was very heavy, dead and heavy enough to tire the workers, and the texture was also very hard, it should be a metal product.
In order not to damage the artifacts, the archaeologists did not wash it immediately by the river, but sent it to a special laboratory, where it took half a month to clean the silt on its body.
At this time, what appeared to archaeologists was a gilded bronze elephant head, which was also a very rare treasure among the cultural relics excavated in the Yuanmingyuan.
So, what is the process of gilding, and what is the peculiarity of this gilded bronze elephant head, which makes it a rare treasure by experts?
Precious gilded bronze elephant head
Gilding is a very unique craft in traditional Chinese culture, and China is also the first country in the world to invent this craft.
From ancient times to the present, gold has always been the most recognized precious metal, but also symbolizes wealth and status, so the dignitaries also like to use gold products on various occasions, even with golden yellow has always been considered a noble color.
But gold is rare after all, even the ancient palace nobles, can not use a lot, and in various ceremonies, in order to show identity and status, gold is necessary, the lack of gold has caused certain troubles.
It is precisely because of this that the industrious and intelligent working people of the ancient mainland invented the process of gilding to replace the lack of pure gold.
The so-called gilding, that is, in the case of insufficient gold, the gold fragments are heated and melted, mixed with mercury in a certain proportion, and then continuously stirred to completely melt the gold liquid in mercury, so that a paste-like gold clay can be applied, and then the gold clay is applied to the copper utensils, which can make the bronze look as golden as the gold, almost to be false.
When applying gold clay to copperware, the requirements for the smoothness of the surface of the copperware are also very demanding, and the surface needs to be repeatedly wiped and applied with charcoal in advance until it is smooth like a mirror.
When applying, it is also necessary to add salt and mercury to the gold clay, and after mixing, it is repeatedly applied and pushed on the copper ware many times to make the gold clay tissue become tight and can be firmly adhered to the surface of the copper.
After this, it is also necessary to roast it over a charcoal fire, brush it repeatedly with a special potion, and sometimes grind the surface of the utensils with agate jade to make the bronze really glow like gold and not fall off and fade.
Such a complex technology of gilding is a treasure in the traditional crafts of the mainland, according to the cultural relics now unearthed, the working people of the mainland, as early as the Warring States period, initially mastered this technology, at that time, some bronzes, there was the emergence of gilding technology.
With the development of the times, the demand for gold by the feudal ruling class has also increased, and the gilding process of "pointing copper into gold" can be cheap bronze has also evolved continuously, reaching the peak of the realm.
This gilded bronze elephant head found in the Dagongmen River channel of the Yuanmingyuan is also the master of the ancient Chinese gilding process, and the gilding on its body, after years of river immersion and silt corrosion, is still not damaged at all, as smooth as pure gold, and also shows the superb level of gilding technology on its body.
Since its excavation, the gilded bronze elephant head has been stored in the Yuanmingyuan Ruins Park for archaeologists to study and investigate, until it was first displayed in front of the public at a special exhibition of the successful excavation of cultural relics in the Yuanmingyuan Archaeology in 2017.
At this time, the gilded bronze elephant head was no longer the mud lump that had just been dug out of the silt of the Oyagu Gate Imperial River Ruins, let alone the ugly appearance of the whole body.
Under the illumination of the exhibition hall, it has regained its former radiance, shining with dazzling light like gold, and its exquisite workmanship and smooth lines are all amazing.
This gilded bronze elephant head is created according to the shape of the elephant's head, but it also takes the charm of the god-like and dissimilar in traditional Chinese art, and the whole elephant head is a long strip, which is not exactly similar to the shape of the elephant head.
Although the overall shape is different from the real elephant head, on the gilded bronze elephant head, the typical characteristics of the elephant's head are all clear at a glance, and the long and curly trunk, sharp and conspicuous ivory, and two wavy elephant ears are all wonderful in the hands of the master craftsmen who create this cultural relic.
After the baptism of wind and frost, this gilded bronze elephant head, vivid eyebrows, serene and natural appearance, is also a rare treasure among the countless cultural relics excavated in the Yuanmingyuan for more than 20 years.
Elephants have been auspicious symbols since ancient times, and in important ceremonies in ancient China, they are used as beasts that can bring good luck, according to archaeologists, at that time, in the many palaces at the gate of the Yuanmingyuan Grand Palace, there should be a large hall dedicated to the entire elephant ornament symbolizing auspiciousness.
And this gilded bronze elephant head is an accessory in the entire elephant ornament, and there are four small holes that are still clearly visible in the rear of the elephant head, which should be used to connect the elephant head to the elephant's body.
So, how could this precious gilded bronze elephant head run to the bottom of the Royal River, and where was its body?
Based on the available materials, archaeologists have also put forward the most likely guess, that is, the entire elephant ornament must be transported to another place in its entirety before it is moved out of the palace of the Grand Palace Gate of the Yuanmingyuan.
However, when passing by the Imperial River in front of the Omiya Gate, there may have been an accidental collision, causing the elephant head to break away from its body and fall into the Imperial River, sinking into the silt at the bottom of the river.
The reason for removing the elephant ornaments is because of the chaos of the soldiers, or because of the ordinary repairs, there is no way to verify it at present, and can only wait for the excavation of more archaeological relics in the future, and it is precisely the yin and yang that fell to the bottom of the river, but let the gilded bronze elephant head escape the war and wait at the bottom of the river to see the day again.
Now that the entire body of the elephant ornament is temporarily missing, the gilded bronze elephant head can only stay alone in the exhibition hall of the Yuanmingyuan Ruins Park, waiting for the day of reunion with the body.
bibliography:
"The Yuanmingyuan exhibited for the first time more than 20 years of archaeological discoveries, 106 precious cultural relics have stories", Beijing Evening News, June 9, 2017
"Briefing on archaeological excavations in the Dagongmen area of Yuanmingyuan Ruins Park", Beijing Wenbo Wencong, November 2016