"The world is big, there is nothing strange" - "The Strange Situation Witnessed in Twenty Years"
Friends who have been to the Hangzhou Museum must remember the "treasure of the town hall" of the museum, and even be surprised, because the "treasure of the town hall" of other museums are mostly some precious calligraphy and paintings or rare cultural relics, only the "treasure of the town hall" of the Hangzhou Museum is a "glass"!
Looking at the era of the existence of this "treasure of the town hall", it is actually the Warring States more than 2,000 years ago, is this true or false? Could it be that there are glass products in the Warring States?
Don't worry, and listen to me slowly, don't look at this "glass" and "its appearance is not proud", but it is indeed a cultural relic that existed in the Warring States period, and has gone through more than two thousand years of ups and downs! Its rarity is that although it resembles a glass, it is not a glass!
Let's step back to October 1990!
First, discover the Warring States Crystal Cup
In late October 1990, a worker in the Workers' and Peasants' Brick and Tile Factory in Shitang Village, Banshan Town, Hangzhou City, was taking soil to burn bricks, and suddenly the shovel was light, and a large hole with a diameter of about one meter appeared on the ground, and there were many underground tombs in Mid-Levels Town, since the 1980s, almost every year there were Qin and Han tombs found, and the locals were accustomed to it, so the workers who took the soil immediately reacted that this was the discovery of ancient tombs again!
The workers immediately stopped the operation and reported to the leaders of the brick and tile factory, and the leaders immediately sent someone to notify the local cultural relics department after learning about it, and the cultural relics department reacted quickly and immediately sent staff!
After preliminary exploration, the staff concluded that this suddenly appearing large hole belonged to the late Warring States period, and this large hole must not exist in isolation, and around this big hole, there must be a large-scale Warring States tomb!
To this end, the staff carried out a large-scale excavation around the cave entrance, and sure enough, they found a Warring States tomb not far from the cave entrance!
The tomb has appeared, the next is the protective excavation, just when the staff dug to a depth of one meter from the ground, something in the dirt emitted a dazzling light under the sunlight, the staff slowed down the excavation progress, carefully emptied the surrounding soil, and after a while, a "glass" appeared!
At the moment of seeing the "glass", the first reaction of the staff is that this Warring States tomb has been "visited" by the tomb robbers, and this "glass" is what they left behind. For the sake of safety, the staff still carefully put away the "glass" and sent it to Beijing for testing.
The next excavation was very smooth, and the staff finally excavated a large tomb 15 meters long and 5.4 meters wide, and named it "Shitang Warring States Tomb No. 1", followed by 51 funerary objects unearthed! It is worth mentioning that the staff did not find any signs of the tomb being stolen, which made them full of curiosity about the "glass" sent to Beijing for inspection!
Soon, news came from Beijing that the vessel found by the staff was not a "glass", but a Warring States crystal cup!
In a Warring States tomb for more than two thousand years, a "glass" was surprising, which is really too bizarre, difficult to accept, the only "reasonable" explanation is that this "glass" belongs to the tomb robbers, but the results of the test are shocking, this glass-like vessel is really a Warring States cultural relic, but its texture is not glass, but crystal!
Second, what is the curiosity of this Warring States Crystal Cup?
In terms of modern industrial technology, making a glass is very simple, but in the Warring States more than 2,000 years ago, it is amazing to produce such a cup, so the rarity of this Warring States crystal cup lies in its raw materials and superb production process!
This Warring States crystal cup is made of a whole piece of crystal polishing, such a huge crystal is the largest in the early Chinese crystalware, craftsmen in the processing of this crystal, using the arc polishing process and polishing technology, theoretically, the Warring States period jade processing technology has reached its peak stage, has the ability to handle such a piece of crystal.
But the outer wall is easy to polish, the inside is difficult to touch, how did the ancients grind the inner wall and bottom of the crystal cup so smooth and smooth when the hand could not reach the inside of the cup? This is really incredible, can only say that the wisdom of the ancients can not be underestimated, the skills of the ancients also have their own unique features, these are worthy of our further exploration!
All in all, both in terms of raw materials and craftsmanship, this crystal cup represents the most advanced level of production in the Warring States period, and experts speculate that such a precious thing should not be used daily, but is likely to be used for some kind of grand ceremony!
In addition to the material and manufacturing process of the crystal cup, there is another thing that shocks us even more, that is, the "aesthetic" of the ancients on the "glass" is the same as that of modern people, otherwise the crystal would not be used to create a vessel that is extremely similar to the modern glass!
From the perspective of modern technology, the glass into a narrow shape of upper width and lower width can reduce the difficulty of production and achieve beautiful and practical effects, is it as early as the Warring States period more than two thousand years ago, the ancients had such advanced ideas? If this is the case, then we have underestimated the wisdom of the ancients before!
All in all, this Warring States Crystal Cup has unique features in terms of raw materials, manufacturing processes and shapes, and there are many puzzles that have not yet been solved, which can be called a treasure, so it is reasonable for the Hangzhou Museum to regard it as the "treasure of the town hall"! Not only that, according to the People's Daily, on January 18, 2002, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage included the Warring States Crystal Cup in the "Catalogue of the First Batch of Cultural Relics Prohibited from Going Abroad (Border)".
brief summary:
The ancients made the crystal cup into a shape that is very similar to that of modern glasses, which seems to be an accident, but it is like an inevitability, from the perspective of reducing the difficulty of production and achieving beautiful and practical effects, it is undoubtedly most appropriate to make the vessel into a wide and narrow shape.
Although the ancient production technology is far behind the modern, but the wisdom of the ancients is not necessarily lower than that of modern people, nothing else, at least without the help of machines, it is difficult for modern craftsmen to polish the inner wall and bottom of the glass like the Warring States Crystal Cup in the case that the hand cannot reach into the cup!
The world is so big that there is no surprise, a Warring States tomb actually has a crystal cup shaped like a modern glass, the "truth" reflected behind this is incredible, is history really a reincarnation?
References: People's Daily, The Strange Situation Witnessed in Twenty Years