The Tomb of the Long Scroll of Chinese Historical Civilization

The following issues introduce the funerary forms and systems of the mainland dynasties. The layout and shape of their own cemetery, I hope you like it.

Chapter I Primitive Period Tombs

As one of the most common forms of expression of primitive religion in ancient society, funeral is a manifestation of the worship of the dead, which also contains people's understanding of another unknown and mysterious world, and is one of the manifestations of ancient social ideology.

In the era of ignorance of human society, the level of productivity is very low, and people's thinking ability is also very limited, so they are confused about life, old age, illness and death, and cannot form the concept of soul and funeral. Therefore, "Mencius Teng Wen Gongshang" said: "In the last life, those who did not bury their relatives, and when their relatives died, they were entrusted to them." This practice of discarding corpses in the wild is the way humans disposed of similar corpses in the early days. However, the concept of human beings in this period may have already had a boundary between life and death.

After a long period of development, human beings have slowly grown themselves in the struggle with nature. Around the middle of the Paleolithic age, the concept of the human soul gradually developed. Although human beings at that time had no knowledge of their own body structure and no scientific understanding of disease and death, they would reproduce themselves and others in their dreams, which made them feel that human beings had an invisible and untouchable illusion in addition to the flesh, which had vitality and power beyond the flesh. Thus, human beings have developed the concept of the soul. Judging from archaeological findings, the urn coffins in the Neolithic Yangshao cultural sites in mainland China have a small hole, which is believed to be a hole that people used to leave for the souls of the dead.

After human beings have the concept of the soul, they have the concept of ghosts, which believe that the soul is attached to the human body and only moves away from the body when people dream, such as the ancient Romans believed that the soul is the "reincarnation" of the human body, the soul can leave the human body, and the soul becomes a ghost after death. In this view, the ghosts of the dead are more powerful than the souls of the living and can bless mankind. Based on this understanding, human beings have developed the concept of worshipping the dead, that is, ghost worship, which has led to a set of rituals for sending ghosts and burying the dead.

From unconsciously disposing of the dead to consciously burying the dead and forming a funeral custom, this has gone through a long process. Extant tombs show that in the middle of the Paleolithic age, humans have produced the germ of funerary burial. This shows that with the progress and development of mankind, there is a new relationship between people and people, and under the system of common labor and common sharing within groups or clans, a scene of mutual care and fraternity has arisen for each other. They will show great sorrow and nostalgia, and will use the things used by the deceased in their lifetime as burial objects, wishing the souls of the deceased eternal life. In the late Paleolithic period, the burial of the dead was observed in many parts of the world.

The continent saw the emergence of funerary customs around the late Paleolithic period. In 1933, archaeologists excavated the site of the cave at the top of The Dragon Bone Mountain in Zhoukoudian, Beijing, and found the remains of the tomb, and after a series of excavations, complete skulls, skull fragments, mandibles and some sporadic torso bones and teeth were unearthed. According to the analysis, it was found that there was "one male elderly person, one middle-aged and one mature person, and one five-year-old child and one newborn baby". This combination of elderly men, young and middle-aged women, young and young children and newborn babies at different ages indicates that it is a public cemetery in the form of a secondary burial, and that the blood relations of the members of the clan are treated equally and the same law is equal. The bones of elderly men and young and middle-aged women were sprinkled with hematite powder, and they had worn ornaments made of animal teeth, mussel shells and fish bones, as well as flint stone tools. Unfortunately, the tomb was seriously disturbed by some animals, and the bones were scattered, and it was no longer in its original position, and it was impossible to fully explore the funeral rites at that time. Lujiao will cost two goods only

The sprinkling of hematite powder on or around the deceased was a common burial custom in the late Paleolithic period. Red means blood, and blood is the source of life, sprinkling hematite powder on the corpse, indicating that it gives new blood to the deceased, gives new life, or hopes that the souls of the dead companions can continue to survive in another world. Some scholars also believe that wild beasts are afraid of red, so they sprinkle hematite powder on corpses to prevent the beasts from harming the dead.

The reason why older men and middle-aged and young women are given burial goods is because women in matriarchal societies, especially elderly women, are often the commanders and leaders of labor production in clan society, and they have rich experience and knowledge, which are particularly respected by everyone. When they are buried after death, they are buried with ornaments that they used during their lifetime, which is the hope that they will live the same life in another world as the human world. This feature is a form of reflection of the affection of clan members for clan chiefs or elders.