In 2002, a tourist wandering around the antique market in Hong Kong, by chance, he bought back a rusty square vessel, what he did not expect was that his unintentional move had a profound and lasting impact on the Chinese historical community...
The Pearl of the Sea - a priceless treasure that fell into the Hong Kong market
In the summer of 2002, the Hong Kong antique market was regularly traded and bought and sold, with interested tourists, merchants who wanted to make money, and of course collectors who wanted to find the rare; people of all kinds of religion and nine streams gathered here for various purposes, and everyone wanted to harvest what they wanted in this market...
No one knows the name of the person who found the pearl, but from the scattered sources, one can only speculate that he was a staff member of the Poly Art Museum who came to the Hong Kong antique market in the summer of 2002 to find something in the market and bring some considerable collections to his unit.
An old artifact lay quietly in an inconspicuous spot in Hong Kong's antique market, its body rusty, and the thick rust shell had covered its original color, making it lie there more like an inconspicuous lump of earth.
People can only judge from its rough outline that it should be a container, it has neither the simplicity and elegance of bronze, nor the prosperity of gold and silver, and the pedestrians who pass by are hurried, and naturally do not stop much.
People won't notice such mottled patches of earth, just as people won't notice such ordinary workers, but when the two come together, they will burst out unexpected sparks and brightly illuminate the whole world.
The staff member passed by the collection, and unlike the others, he stopped in front of it, for he noticed at a glance the inscription inscribed on the inner sole of the vessel, and in that instant he felt the murmur of a thousand years ago.
He stopped in front of the artifact and eventually bought it at an ordinary market price, but the staff member believed that its value was by no means ordinary, so he approved it and sent the bronze to Beijing for a more detailed appraisal.
Rather than saying that his encounter with this unique treasure was a coincidence, it was rather a kind of fate, just like Wang Yirong discovered the oracle bone, these people who were chosen by fate always had some characteristics that no one else had.
This is also a story of Bole meeting Maxima, although the protagonist in the story does not know Maxima as well as Bole, he still sees the deep underpinnings behind it through its layers of mottled rust shells.
A thousand-year-old treasure returns to the world
The bronze flew to Beijing with several other pieces, where it would encounter its true Bole, Li Xueqin, a bronze appraisal expert at Tsinghua University.
However, in fact, at the beginning, Li Xueqin's eyes were not attracted by this small piece of soil, he did not look closely, so he hurriedly turned his eyes to those larger and more gorgeous bronzes.
After all, man depends on his clothes and horses, and so does the fate of bronzes, but real gold is not afraid of fire, and when the professor began to set his eyes on it, his eyes could no longer be removed.
In an instant, the expert concluded that the bronze was genuine!
For bronzes, as long as it is determined to be genuine, there are at least a thousand years of history, and the discovery of such cultural relics must be of great significance, and this is still a bronze with an inscription, which means that the research value in this is far greater than that of ordinary bronzes.
Dedicate a lifetime of pursuit, the mystery reappears in the day
However, despite the discovery of such a treasure, Li Xueqin at that time only showed the normal interest that an archaeologist should have, and the related research work was carried out step by step, and the School of Archaeology and Literature of Peking University, the Shanghai Museum and other units successively carried out scientific testing and restoration and protection.
After stripping it of its layers of rust, it revealed its patina skin, and birds and beasts swam on it, and this world-class treasure finally reappeared.
It is a rounded rectangular vessel, 11.8 cm high, 24.8 cm in diameter, weighing 2.5 kg, straight mouth, circle foot, abdomen micro-drum, the body of the body faintly appears tile grooves, the edge of the vessel is mottled tailed bird pattern, on both sides of the mouth there is a pair of animal ears, appear solemn and elegant.
Experts speculated that this cultural relic should be cast in the middle of the Western Zhou Dynasty, it was used to hold grain, but also the ceremonial vessel used by people at that time to sacrifice, at the same time, according to the rust of this artifact when it was first unearthed, experts also speculated that it should also have a lid, but when it was underground, the two were separated, and as for where the lid was flowing, no one knew.
Tracing back to the source, this should be a bronze ceremonial vessel unearthed in Henan, but somehow it ended up in the antique market in Hong Kong, perhaps it was repeatedly resold after several hands, and after several turns, no one found its true "identity" until the tourist appeared.
The source has been verified, the use has been determined, and the lines on the utensils have been clarified, but the inscription of 98 characters engraved on it has not yet been obtained, which is also the value of this cultural relic, and it is an urgent task to find out what the words engraved on the bronze ware say.
Despite this, Professor Li Xueqin at that time did not expect that in the future, he would spend nearly a lifetime translating the words that had been preserved for thousands of years on this treasure.
But judging from the later results, if he had to choose again, even if he knew that this matter would take his life, he would be willing to do it.
After working hard day after day, the gray-haired old professor finally deciphered the 98 words, and finally he made the little short story he deciphered to the world:
"The Mandate of Heaven yu shimed the soil, followed the mountains and rivers, set up a levy on the land, surrendered to the people, and became a parent...
Just 98 words, even if spread out, can only lie in an inconspicuous little corner of the newspaper, but everyone who sees the first few words, the spirit is lifted:
"The Mandate of Heaven Yu shiki soil."
That is to say, the content recorded on this ceremonial vessel turned out to be the Great Yu Zhishui that was passed down by word of mouth by the sons and daughters of Huaxia!
On this artifact, it is clearly recorded that people in the Western Zhou Dynasty felt for the merits of Dayu Zhishui:
Heaven sent Dayu to control the water in the rivers to calm the floods that had plagued people for many years, and after Dayu ruled the waters, all localities lived and worked in peace and contentment, thriving, and the people had surplus grain and could pay taxes on time. Dayu is endowed by the people, loved by the people, and his deeds to the people are immortal; as the ruler of a country, he should be like Dayu, with good virtue and gradually perfecting day after day...
At the same time, Professor Li Xueqin also found the words "Sui Gong" on the inscription of this bronze, which he speculated should be a certain monarch of the Sui State of the Western Zhou Dynasty, and this tribute was also written by him, intending to urge him to emulate Dayu's patriotism and love for the people.
At this time, this treasure finally had its own name - Sui Gong Yu
。
Why did Sui Gongyi set off a terrifying wave in the historical world?
"Five thousand years of China" is a common saying that every Chinese knows, but the international community has not recognized the 5,000-year history of China's existence, they only recognize that China exists for 3,500 years.
The reason for their disapproval is also very simple, because the "5,000 years" mentioned in China is the time from the Yellow Emperor period in Sima Qian's "Records of History", but the Yellow Emperor period is a mythological period, including the later founding monarch of the Xia Dynasty, Dayu, who is also a figure in mythological stories, so they are naturally qualified to doubt the rationality of the five thousand years of China.
Of course, although europeans also started by God, but it is also an old tradition of foreigners to oppose China, so it is also right to doubt and doubt China, and for themselves, they should write the story of God Jesus into their history of the Eight Classics;
But they also have a more lethal "handle" in their hands, which has always threatened China, and also let them hammer out the international word, proposing that China's history is less than five thousand years: this handle is empirical.
Foreigners' thinking is also very simple, the so-called speech to talk about evidence, Sima Qian's words are not counted, what can be dug out of the soil can testify, and China also lacks such empirical evidence - after all, thousands of years have passed, even if there are tombs in the ancient period, the vicissitudes of the sea and the mulberry field, have been corroded almost.
At this point, foreigners have given full play to the spirit of death, and their interest in Chinese history seems to be stronger than that of themselves:
In fact, at the beginning, they were not even willing to admit the Spring and Autumn Period, on the grounds that Sima Qian was a Han Dynasty, the Han Dynasty was hundreds of years away from the Spring and Autumn Period, and Sima Qian may have been making up stories, but the "Spring and Autumn" written by Kong Qiu himself has been circulated to this day, so that they have no words.
So they had to admit a period of history in the Spring and Autumn Warring States, including the Eastern Zhou and Western Zhou Dynasties, and with the excavation of the Anyang Yin Ruins site and the discovery of the Shang Dynasty Women's Tomb, the international community took a step back and finally recognized the history of the Shang Dynasty, adding up to a total of 3500 years.
The history of 3500 years is not easy to come by, and generation after generation of Chinese digging soil while grinding with foreigners has made China internationally recognized as one of the four ancient civilizations, but for the Xia Dynasty, China has not been able to unearth relevant empirical evidence, and the road ahead will be more difficult.
It was the 1920s, when China had just experienced the May Fourth Movement.
In the academic circles, the May Fourth Movement not only brought people vernacular literature and new trends of thought, but also brought skepticism to people, and the scholars at that time were carrying out research with great enthusiasm while doubting whether what they were studying existed or not, and people were groping forward on the dark road with such a contradictory mood.
Doubt is a kind of distrust, and it is no wonder that those scholars, because China at that time was poor and weak, oppressed in the international community, and had no dignity, and people at home naturally had doubts about China's splendid culture and history:
"If it's so good, why are we still beaten?" Why is it Europe and not us who stand up? ”
The wave of skepticism swept through the academic circles in an instant, and in the field of history, although the excavation of the Yin Ruins in Anyang in 1928 forced foreigners to admit the existence of the Shang Dynasty, before that, many Chinese scholars were as skeptical of its existence as foreigners.
This was true of the Shang Dynasty, not to mention the history of the Xia Dynasty to the Xia Dynasty, so many scholars at that time also recognized the saying "3500 years of China".
Chinese if you want to prove to the international community the existence of the Xia Dynasty, you can only come up with empirical evidence!
So the story goes back to the present from history: in 2002, The Suigong Cup was found in a market, and the inscription on it meant that its discovery brought more than a treasure to the country.
At least in the Western Zhou Dynasty, people knew the existence of Dayu Zhishui, which can prove that Dayu Zhishui was not a story made up by Sima Qian, nor was it a false legend of Chinese generations, but a legend that lasted for thousands of years.
Moreover, the time of the writing of this sacrifice text should be even earlier than the creation of the Book of Shang, which proves that it has more reliable evidence than the Book of Shang.
The evidence is overwhelming!
The spirit of countless scholars is invigorated, although the Sui Gong Cup is not a cultural relic of the Xia Dynasty, and we have not yet unearthed a single thing from the Xia Dynasty period, but at least, more and more people believe in the existence of the Xia Dynasty.
Only by believing can miracles happen.
Later, the sons and daughters of China will also see from Sui Gongyi that four thousand years ago, Dayu Belt followed his people over the mountains and mountains, they took stone tools, wooden tools and bone tools, and worked hard in the remote mountains, and he used his 13 years of good life to bring fertile fields and stable life to thousands of people in future generations.
No matter what outsiders say, the sons and daughters of Huaxia will not forget Dayu and the Xia Dynasty behind him.
Sui gong cup was later designated as a national first-class cultural relic, which shows its degree of value.
What happened next? The current situation of the public cup
The discovery of Sui Gonglu has invigorated the spirit of domestic academic circles, and also provided a more reliable argument for the existence of the Xia Dynasty, and such an important cultural relic will naturally attract the attention of the state.
However, because the original discovery of this cultural relic was the staff of the Poly Art Museum, at first he only sent the cultural relic to Beijing for identification, and did not propose to transfer it to Beijing, so the collection was eventually collected in his unit, that is, the Poly Art Museum.
With the rapid development of the information age, many museums have also carried out online business today, they have registered their collections on the Internet, and upload photos from all angles of physical objects for outsiders to find, so that even if they are thousands of miles apart, people can also see the national treasure through the Internet.
Open the official website of the Poly Art Museum, search for Sui Gong Cup, this square round bronze food box will clearly meet people's eyes, now it has faded layers of dirt, revealing the simple and solemn pattern on the body, in the background of gray gradient, it looks noble and dignified, under the picture, it is the relevant introduction of Sui Gong Cup and the complete content of the sacrifice text...
From a fortuitous coincidence to an exhibit of the Poly Museum of Art, where the language of a thousand years flows, the people of a thousand years ago and the people of today are connected, and at that moment, relying on civilization, the continuing emotions of human beings transcend time and space, and a story ends. (Hole A C)