A special triangular bronze product has been excavated at the Sanxingdui site, which not only reflects the ancient Shu people's love for bronze, but also shows the shortcomings of the cultural relic. What's going on here? If you want to know, let Xiaobian reveal the secret for you:
Located on the banks of the Yazi River in Guanghan City, Sichuan Province, sanxingdui ruins are more famous sites in the southwest region of the mainland. The Sichuan Basin has always had high mountains and steep cliffs, forming a unique terrain that is easy to defend and difficult to attack, so it is easy to form the remnants of ancient human activities with a relatively independent civilization. The first discoverer of the Sanxingdui site was a farmer, but he only found a large pit full of jade and did not really excavate the core area of Sanxingdui. It was not until the arrival of archaeologists that the Sanxingdui site showed its true appearance and has since become a highlight of the mainland archaeology community.
There are many kinds of cultural relics excavated from the Sanxingdui site, including bronze, jade, bone, gold, etc., but if you look at it in terms of quantity and quality, bronze can be ranked first. The bronze ware of the Sanxingdui site is known for its hard material, large shape and intricate pattern, such as the famous bronze sacred tree, bronze Da Liren, bronze mask, etc., all of which show the glorious atmosphere of sanxingdui civilization. As we all know, in the glorious period of Sanxingdui civilization, the Central Plains civilization was just in the Shang zhou era, and the Central Plains at this time was also the golden age of bronze development, but it is not difficult to see that the two are compared with each other, and although the bronzes excavated from the Sanxingdui site are not as dignified as the shangzhou bronzes, they seem to be more exquisite and beautiful, highlighting the ingenuity of the ancient Shu people.
We take the animal-faced patterned cow head excavated from the Sanxingdui site in the early years as an example, the artifact is 52.6 cm high, the caliber is 47 cm, the whole body of the utensil is covered with green patina, but it still reflects the luxurious atmosphere, the upper and lower parts of the utensils are finely patterned, the grain is clear, and the three-dimensional sense is formed by the yin and yang patterns, which provides a clear development context for the prosperity of the Sanxingdui bronze culture.
The same is true of the bronze statue of the kneeling bronze figure of the top statue, which is only 15.6 centimeters high, but in terms of etiquette, clothing, sitting posture, etc., it comprehensively interprets the sacrifice customs of the ancient Shu people, and lays a theoretical research direction for the study of Sanxingdui culture in later generations of archaeology.
The bronzes unearthed at the Sanxingdui site have their own characteristics, and the back of each cultural relic is full of stories. It is worth mentioning that when archaeologists excavated pit two, they found a particularly peculiar artifact. The artifacts are triangular in shape, the surface is smooth, obviously a hand-polished finished product, and their exposed areas are all covered with a layer of patina, so that archaeologists have to clean and process them. More importantly, in the middle of the three prisms, there are still many round copper beads with small holes.
What exactly are these copper beads used for? Archaeologists disagree on this, each with their own ideas. Some experts believe that the copper beads in the middle of the triangular artifacts are likely to be the launchers of ancient slingshots, specifically for hunting or war. However, other experts are opposed, in their view, since the beads in the three-edged artifact have holes, it means that it should have a purpose in itself, and the most likely is that the copper beads are hand-strung ornaments of the ancient Shu people.
But at this time, a question arises, if the copper bead is a kind of ornamental cultural relics, then will the ancient Shu people really wear it? This is clearly possible. Readers may not know, in fact, in the ancient period, the ancients divided the metal into grades, of which gold, silver, bronze and other metals for the US dollar, and iron is evil gold, so the ancients will choose gold, silver, bronze metal to make jewelry. But at this time, there is a problem that is still difficult to avoid, that is, the problem of rusting of the bronze itself.
The ancients once described money as "copper stink", which is not an image metaphor, but an objectively existing natural phenomenon. Bronze and air contact for too long will occur oxidation reaction, resulting in the artifact itself will produce a large amount of basic copper carbonate, and basic copper carbonate will react with the oil on human skin, and eventually produce a pungent irritating gas. Because of this, the ancients gradually discarded bronze jewelry when bronze ware was prevalent, and instead focused on creating gold and silver.
But then again, we can't look at the problems of ancient times with the eyes of modern people, let alone evaluate the ancient Shu civilization from the perspective of the Central Plains civilization, maybe the ancient Shu people liked the smell of copper, and even this taste may have been a fashion at the time, and it is entirely possible.
References: The Mystery of Sanxingdui published by Liu Ming, published by Sichuan Publishing House
Wen xiucai, editor-in-chief of Wenlan Hairun Studio, written by: Special history writer: Changshan Zhao Zi worm