On February 25-26, 2022, the seminar on "Discovering China's Earliest Golden and Bronze Buddha Statue", jointly organized by the Shaanxi Institute of Archaeology and the University of California, Los Angeles, was launched online. More than a dozen Chinese and foreign scholars from the Shaanxi Institute of Archaeology, the Hanjing Diyang Mausoleum Museum, UCLA, the University of Chinese of Hong Kong, the University of Chicago, Yale University, the University of Southern California and the National University of Political Science and Law of Thailand joined the talks. The seminar is divided into two sessions: Archaeology and History, Buddhist Studies and Art History. This is the summary of the first meeting.
Webinar poster
The first day of the Symposium on Archaeology was opened by Professor Michael Berry, Director of the UCLA Center for China, and chaired by Professor Lothar von Falkenhausen. Sun Zhouyong, president of the Shaanxi Archaeological Research Institute, was invited to speak in English, pointing out that the two gold and bronze Buddha statues have an important position, not only because they are the earliest Buddha statues in China, but more importantly, they have a clear and clear background of excavation. The organization of the online academic discussion meeting is the result of mature cooperation, which is conducive to promoting the international exchange and promotion of archaeology in Shaanxi in a timely manner. Subsequently, two archaeologists from the excavation team introduced the excavation scenario, related ruins and historical background of the two gold and bronze Buddha statues in detail.
A gold and bronze Buddha statue from the late Eastern Han Dynasty excavated from chengren cemetery M3015
Next, Li Ming, vice president of the Hanjing Emperor Yang Mausoleum Museum, made a report on "Issues Related to the Excavation of Golden and Bronze Buddha Statues of the Eastern Han Dynasty from the Chengren Cemetery in Xianyang". The report includes three parts: the shape and era of the Eastern Han family tomb in the Chengren cemetery, the Original Tomb Group of Hongdu in Xianyang, and the burial items of the golden and bronze Buddha statue. The Xianyang Chengren Eastern Han Cemetery is located in the southeast of Chengren Village, Beidu Subdistrict, Weicheng District, Xianyang City, Shaanxi Province, China, 15.7 kilometers southeast of the ruins of Han Chang'an City and about 7.8 kilometers southeast of Anling. A total of seven tombs have been found in this group of family cemeteries with gold and bronze Buddha statues unearthed, arranged side by side in a north-south direction. These seven tombs are similar in scale and shape, and there are many Eastern Han family cemeteries with similar shapes and rows around the family cemeteries where bronze Buddha statues have been excavated, so Li Ming believes that they are family tombs. Li Ming based on the burial structure, the burial items, and the Zhu Shu chronology to argue the dating of the excavated family cemetery. The Zhushu clay pot excavated in M3019 has a clear date: the first year of the Eastern Han Dynasty Huan Emperor Yanxi, that is, 158 AD. This provides definitive evidence for the determination of the age of the family cemetery where bronze Buddha statues have been unearthed. The family tomb with bronze Buddha statue is one of the series of excavations of the Xianyang Hongduyuan Tomb Group, and then Li Ming introduced the basic situation of the Xianyang Hongduyuan Tomb Group. The Hongduyuan Tomb Group is located in the plain between the Jing River and the Wei River in the eastern part of Weicheng District, Xianyang City, Shaanxi Province. Since June 2020, in the 20 months of excavations, the tomb group has more than 3,800 ancient tombs in the Warring States, the Two Han Dynasties, the Western Jin Dynasty, the Sixteen Kingdoms, the Northern Dynasty, the Sui, the Tang, the Song, the Jin, the Ming, and the Qing Dynasty, and the tomb age has lasted for 2,200 years, and more than 16,000 cultural relics (groups) have been excavated. From the late Warring States period until the Tang Dynasty, it was the highest-ranking group of tombs near the capital. The Hongduyuan tomb group is orderly distributed from the Warring States to the Western Han Dynasty popular "centralized cemeteries" and the family cemeteries that were popular in the Eastern Han, Western Jin and Sixteen Kingdoms periods. Another major discovery of this tomb group is the complete sequence of development of the Sui and Tang family cemeteries of the Northern Dynasty. The type of cemetery develops from single burial, couple burial or couple burial with different caves to children and fathers, until the grandchildren return to bury their ancestors, and the use of the cemetery even spans the historical dynasties and continues for hundreds of years, the continuation and change of this funeral system reflects the ideological concepts of the people at that time. Li Ming further analyzed the location of the robbery cave and the location of the excavated Buddha statue, pointing out that although the tomb was stolen, the pottery around the location of the Buddha statue was not disturbed, which could rule out the possibility of mixing in. Finally, Li Ming's inference on the trajectory of the development of the settlement after the Eastern Han Dynasty and the typological analysis of the Buddha statues unearthed in the Gandhara region believes that the gold and bronze Buddha statues unearthed in M3015 were used as funerary objects, which is in line with the analytical logic of Chinese archaeology.
Schematic map of the geographical location of chengren cemetery
Facsimile of zhushu clay pot inscription (M3019:2)
Zhushu clay pot (M3019:2)
Assistant researcher Zhao Zhanrui of the Shaanxi Provincial Archaeological Research Institute made a report on "Excavated Golden and Bronze Buddha Statues of the Eastern Han Dynasty from the Chengren Cemetery in Xianyang", which mainly includes two parts: tomb summary and scientific and technological analysis of gold and bronze Buddha statues. A total of six Eastern Han family tombs with gold and bronze Buddha statues were excavated, from south to north, M3014, M3015, M3016, M3017, M3019, and M3020. From the perspective of shape, these six tombs can be divided into three categories: earthen cave tombs, brick tombs and brick chamber tombs. M3014 and M3015 are earthen tombs, M3020 are brick tombs, and M3016, M3017 and M3019 are brick tombs. Burial items include pottery vessels, sacrificial vessels, model ming vessels, animal figurines, and a small number of bronze and iron vessels. According to the tomb shape system, the characteristics of the burial products, and the comparative analysis with the surrounding tombs of the Western Jin Dynasty and the Sixteen Kingdoms, it is believed that the tombs in this group are the late Eastern Han Dynasty, and the structure of the tomb chamber is mixed from earth cave to brick and earth to brick chamber structure. The owner of the tomb is a middle-level official or landlord in the nearby Anling County or around Chang'an, and the family has a certain degree of power and economic strength. The preliminary results of the scientific and technological analysis of the golden and bronze Buddha statues give us an understanding of casting technology, casting process, composition analysis and origin. These two gold and bronze Buddha statues belong to the copper-tin-lead ternary alloy and are cast by Tao Fan. The standing image is cast as the main body and the covered lotus seat, which is combined in a mating manner, and two protruding mortise heads can be seen in the corresponding position of the two feet at the bottom of the lotus seat. The five Buddhas were forged for Hun. From the analysis of casting methods and composition, it is believed that these two Buddha statues belong to China's native bronze smelting and casting technology products. Finally, Zhao Zhanrui showed the bronze Buddha statues of the Sixteen Kingdoms and the Northern Wei Dynasty found near Chengren Village for comparison, believing that the Buddha statues excavated from the Eastern Han Tombs in Chengren Village were not only the earliest independent gold and bronze Buddha statues in the era of domestic archaeological discoveries, but also of great value for studying the spread of Buddhism in the mainland and the development of Buddhist plastic arts.
After the archaeological report, the other four scholars in the group elaborated their ideas. He Yanxiao, a doctoral candidate in ancient history at the University of Chicago, pointed out that the gold and bronze Buddha statues of the Eastern Han Dynasty unearthed in the Xi'an area are in line with the existing understanding of the cultural exchange between the East and the West in the Eastern Han Dynasty, and discussed it from three perspectives. First, because China was a period of greater access to China by foreign cultures in the second century AD, the high monks Luo Jiachen, the Parthian prince An Shigao, and other monks brought Buddhism to Luoyang in the late Eastern Han Dynasty. It was also during this period that Rome and China had two officially documented contacts; especially in 121 AD, When Roman performers performed at a court New Year's banquet, they were loved by Emperor An of Han and his ministers, illustrating China's openness to foreign culture in the second century AD. And in the second century AD, political turmoil in the Middle East and Central Asia and the crusades of the Roman Empire led to the flow of people, to a certain extent, promoted the flow of culture and people. Second, early Chinese Buddhist studies often projected the important position of Buddhism in China into the early era, and He Yanxiao believed that we could abandon the hindsight that Buddhism later became the mainstream culture in China, and only regard Buddhism as a foreign culture that entered China and existed in the form of a subculture. The third is the second to third centuries AD, from a worldwide perspective, the Mediterranean, Central Asia, the Middle East and China are in the stage of cultural transformation, he listed a series of phenomena. For example, in 218 AD, the Syrian priest became the Roman emperor, Christianity subsequently became the state religion of Rome, and in the third century AD, Sassanid Persia replaced the Parthian dynasty, and Zoroastrianism, which represents traditional Iranian culture, became the true state religion. At this stage of China, the Han Dynasty was about to decline, and Buddhism as a foreign culture seized the opportunity to gradually develop from a subculture to a mainstream culture in the midst of political chaos.
A new book being completed by Minku Kim, an assistant professor of art at the University of Chinese in Hong Kong, argues that China, similar to early Buddhism in India, does not use statues. Therefore, he was skeptical of the appearance of Buddha statues during the Eastern Han Dynasty. From the analysis of the details of the Buddha statue, he believes that the wavy patterns on the Standing Buddha statue and the neckline of the Buddha's robe have nothing to do with the Buddha's clothes of the Kushan Dynasty period, and are more like the Buddha statues of the Gupta period. And the shape of the Dover statue is not found in mainland India and Central Asia. In particular, the five Buddhas wear "Izumi"," which have distinct characteristics of Matura Buddhist art in the Gupta period. Therefore, he believes that these two Buddha statues should be later than Cave 169 of Bingling Temple Grottoes, dating from about 420 AD. Then he compared the Buddha statues unearthed in the Northern Song Village in Shijiazhuang, Hebei Province, with the collection of Avery Brundage of the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, arguing that the Buddha statues in the Northern Song Dynasty Village did not belong to the Eastern Han Dynasty, and that the Buddha statues unearthed from the Chengren Cemetery were similar to those in the Northern Song Dynasty, so they were not Buddha statues from the Eastern Han Dynasty. He then analyzed the dating of the Buddha statues decorated on the trunks of cash cow trees excavated in Fengdu Trough Ditch in Chongqing, and he believed that King Kathaga may have been the first to promote Buddha statues in India and the Kushan Empire, and it was also during this period that Indian Buddha statues spread to China. According to this calculation, the age of the Buddha statue in the Grooves should also be later than the Year of the Kagya Sekya (127 AD). He also proposed that the chronological (125)-shaped base excavated from the tomb was similar to the base of the town tomb beast excavated in Chudi, and may not be the cash cow base judged in the report. The fragments of the money tree excavated from the tomb are incomplete and may be disturbed by future generations, so we should be cautious about such artifacts. Finally, he questioned the dating of an Indian Luwen inscription in the National Museum of China and the Sackler Museum of Archaeology and Art of Peking University, arguing that hundreds of pieces of Qiluwen materials unearthed in the Niya region of Xinjiang date from the third to fourth centuries, while only two pieces of The Luwen found in China itself are unreasonable to set the time to the Eastern Han Dynasty.
Min Li, associate professor of archaeological anthropology at UCLA, believes that in addition to the two gold and bronze Buddha statues, the stirrups in the lead harness combination excavated from the M3017 tomb are also an important discovery of scientific and technological significance in this cemetery, and there is a correlation between the two. Previously, scholars believed that stirrups appeared in the Western Jin Dynasty, a century later than the Chengren cemetery, and originally thought to be invented in the Central Plains. However, stirrups have now appeared in The Ruins of the Huns in the first to second centuries BC. Lead stirrups are now used as a burial vessel in the Eastern Han Dynasty of Xi'an, indicating that this technology has entered the world of a certain group of Eastern Han society through exchanges with the Western Regions and the Xiongnu, and appeared in this family cemetery together with crossbow machines and swords (M3019). This group of people should be an officer class with experience in fighting the western or northern regions, and stirrups may have become a very common thing for them, and even began to be buried with lead as a burial vessel, becoming one of the symbols of social identity. Such people should also be people who can come into contact with Buddhism in the Western Regions and Central Asia and bring them back to the Central Plains. Li Min pointed out that the clay pots containing quartz, cinnabar and lead people excavated from the M3019 tomb are also of great significance to early Taoist archaeology. He finally pointed out that the burial items unearthed from the family cemetery are quite simple, belonging to the typical Eastern Han artifact group, so the two Buddha statues are the remains of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and the possibility of future generations mixing in is very small. In the face of such sufficient evidence, the burden of proof should be borne by the dissenting party.
A combination of lead harnesses unearthed from the tomb of M3017
Professor Luo Tai of Archaeology and Art History at UCLA took the pottery building excavated from the Caiyue Cemetery in Xiangyang, Hubei Province, as an example to discuss the widespread circulation and localization trend of Buddhist architectural modeling in the late Eastern Han Dynasty society. The top of the pagoda has a seven-fold phase wheel, representing the Buddhist temple at that time, indicating that in some areas of China in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, There were already Sinicized Buddhist temples, and Buddhism existed in China in some form, and the archaeological findings of Chengren Village also provided relevant evidence for this. Luo Tai believes that the era of the Buddha statues unearthed by archaeology is accurate. What to consider at the moment is that previous art history queues may have been based on the perception of the wrong style. Such problems also occurred during the excavation of the Tomb of The Lady in the 1970s, when the academic community needed to re-queue the bronzes at the Anyang Yin Ruins site. The development of early Buddhism in Chinese art history now faces the same problem.
Hubei Xiangyang Caiyue cemetery excavated pottery tower
Professor Li Huishu of the Department of Art History at UCLA said that after listening to the excavation reports and situational analysis of front-line archaeologists, she felt that this was definitely a milestone! Even if Buddhist art is not its specialty, in terms of art history, especially the research methods of art archaeology, the archaeological materials and the works passed down from generation to generation can be mutually reinforcing and complementary. Therefore, this is definitely a key piece of evidence to further clarify and understand the origins of Buddhist art in China, and it deserves to be treated with humility and seriousness by scholars.
In the final brief summary, Li Min believes that the shaanxi archaeologist's report not only introduces the materials of the Eastern Han Dynasty, but also the western Jin Dynasty, the Sixteen Kingdoms, the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the Song, Jin, Ming, and Qing dynasties, so that the panoramic observation can give scholars the opportunity to think more comprehensively about various possibilities. Even scholars who oppose the discontinuation of Eastern Han Buddhist statues can have the opportunity to discuss their different views on the basis of evidence on the scene. This approach has made archaeological discoveries even more convincing, especially among Buddhist researchers who have little knowledge of archaeology. The first day of the archaeological symposium achieved the goal of establishing the age of the Buddha statue from the perspective of archaeology, laying the archaeological foundation for the next day's roundtable discussion around the newly emerged Buddha statue by Buddhist research and Buddhist art historians.
(The picture of this article is from the "Briefing on the Excavation of the Eastern Han Family Tomb in the Chengren Cemetery in Xianyang, Shaanxi", published by the WeChat public account "Archaeology Shaanxi" on March 2, 2022; "Xianren Good Louju: Xiangyang New Phase Wheel Pottery Building and China Futu Ancestral Hall", published in the Journal of the Palace Museum, No. 4, 2012, No. 162.) ）