At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the People's Republic, due to the incompetence of the rulers, the great powers invaded the Forbidden City, and in 1912, the Qing Dynasty, the last feudal dynasty in Chinese history, officially withdrew from the stage of history.
Puyi, the last emperor of the Qing Dynasty who lived in the Forbidden City since childhood and reigned for less than three years, has also become an ordinary person who has to buy tickets when he enters and exits the home he grew up in.
His life can be said to be very legendary, he has gone through different eras, has been the highest level ruler, and has also been a prisoner of the order. He also guarded himself.
Puyi
After the Xinhai Revolution, Yuan Shikai brazenly stole the fruits of Sun Yat-sen's revolution and imprisoned the then Qing Emperor Puyi and his family in the Forbidden City.
At the beginning of the Republic of China, almost all the use of the emperor came from the national tax, and when Puyi abdicated, the Beiyang government promised to issue Puyi 4 million taels of silver for them to use every year.
However, because these money are often deducted, Puyi can't get it at all, even if he gets it for Puyi's life, it is a drop in the bucket.
Forced to make a living, Puyi could only take out the many rare treasures left by the old ancestors and sell them.
Yuan Shikai
In 1955, an auction paid by the state to welcome the national treasure home at a high price caused a sensation in the entire cultural relics industry. The reason for the matter is very simple, an old man surnamed Li from the northeast region has reached the twilight of his life and is dying of old age. The family is not rich, not to mention, there are still seven children in the family who need the help of the elderly.
The old man's old age can be said to be destitute, forced to do so, the old man in order to reasonably improve the living conditions of his children, remembering that his father was the last emperor of the Qing Dynasty Puyi's palace guards, there is a famous painting from the Forbidden City that does not know the value of the value.
But how can seven children divide a painting? If you can't divide the painting into seven parts, it's not worth it. So the old man decided to go north and exchange the painting for money to distribute to the children.
The disappearance of the Ten Arias
After the Xinhai Revolution, the Qing government had completely lost the hearts of the people, and under the tide of the times, the Xuantong Emperor was forced to announce his abdication, ending the 200-year-long feudal rule.
However, Puyi and the members of the Qing royal family still live in the Forbidden City, which is equivalent to being imprisoned in the forbidden city, but still enjoy the 4 million yuan of living expenses given to the royal family by the Republic of China government every year, but this is far from meeting Puyi's luxurious living needs.
According to the "Preferential Conditions for Clearing the Room":
"The antiquities in the Forbidden City, the Qing Room only has the right to use, and cannot be sold or mortgaged."
In order to maintain his livelihood, the deposed emperor Puyi began to ask his two younger brothers to enter the palace to accompany him in July 1922, and quietly took out the treasures collected in the palace and sold them in the name of rewards.
Until November 1924, when members of the Qing royal family were expelled from the Forbidden City, Puyi and the Pujie brothers joined forces to steal a total of 1,200 pieces of the collection in the Forbidden City Palace.
Later, when the people counted the property of the Forbidden City, they found in the list of stolen collections that the stolen cultural relics included paintings by the Northern Song Dynasty painter Zhang Xian.
Revolution
In 1932, Puyi became a puppet of Japan, the emperor of Manchukuo. After Japan surrendered, Puyi hurriedly fled to Xinjing, the capital of puppet Manchukuo, which is now Changchun, Jilin Province.
Those cultural relics and antiques that he hoarded out of the palace, a large number of famous calligraphy and paintings, gold and silver jade, more than 1,000 palace collections were brought to the small white building in Manchukuo, because of its huge value, attracted the covetousness of countless people.
Therefore, after Puyi was sent to Siberia and underwent labor reform, a large number of rare treasures left by Puyi were first stolen by the soldiers left behind by the puppet Manchu regime at that time, then robbed by Ming, and finally robbed.
In this turbulent period, many cultural relics were lost to the people, including a unique ancient painting, whose whereabouts have been unknown since then.
The pearl is covered in dust The unique ancient painting is only worth 10,000 yuan
In the 1990s, a guest with a scroll in his hand walked into the Liuli Factory and found Mr. Qin Gong, a written appraisal expert on the State Cultural Relics Appraisal Committee, and told him that he had a portrait in his hand and wanted Qin Gong to help him identify it.
On Qin Gong's desk, the tightly wrapped painting was slowly unfolded, and the general manager was surprised when he just opened the first half of the painting, and when he saw the whole picture of this work, Qin Gong recognized that it was a "Ten Yong Tu" by Zhang Xian, a famous lyricist and painter of the Northern Song Dynasty.
The degree of mottledness on the scrolls is the imprint of the long river of history, such a rare treasure Qin Gong is still the first time to see, Qin Gong identified it as a national treasure song dynasty ancient painting that has been lost for more than fifty years. Excited, he decided to stay and asked Xu Bangda, Liu Jiu'an, Liang Qigong, Fu Xinian, Zhu Jiayun and other experts to identify.
After the appraisal experts unanimously determined that this was the treasure that Puyi brought to Changchun from the Forbidden City and was later lost in the northeast. As soon as this painting came out, it alarmed the four sides.
Zhang Xian's Ten Arias
In 1995, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage came to the door. The staff told the old man that the State Administration of Cultural Heritage was willing to buy the "Ten Yong Tu" for 10,000 yuan, but the old man firmly refused the acquisition of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage.
The old man insisted that the painting was worth at least $5 million. The bid must be 8 million. The experts of the Cultural Relics Bureau listened, and felt that this old man had some whimsy, the million yuan in 1995 was simply a sky-high price, and the people of the Cultural Relics Bureau felt that the old man wanted to go crazy for money, and he did not know that the pearl was dusty and did not know the true face. So they broke up.
It turned out that this painting was the heirloom of the old man, and the grandfather's father was the personal bodyguard of the deposed emperor Puyi at the end of the Qing Dynasty, and he had seen many rare treasures. The old man had heard the elders of the family talk about this painting since he was a child, and the old man knew very well that this was a royal treasure from the imperial palace and had great value. It's not just the price.
If the old man had not suffered from the poverty of his family, and had seven children to grow up, the conditions would not allow it, and he would not have sold the painting unless he had to.
State Administration of Cultural Heritage
The National Museum is the first to purchase cultural relics through the auction market.
In October 1955, the Hanhai Autumn Auction began, and on the day of the auction, many people came to visit and the scene was crowded.
Ma Zishu, then deputy director of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, and Xu Bangda, an expert in calligraphy and painting, personally attended the scene and participated in the bidding.
The auction house could fill the hall of more than 500 people on that day, even the aisle was full of people, the auction site was even more lively, and the auction price soared.
It turned out that the works to be auctioned at the Hanhai Autumn Auction were lost from the Forbidden City in the 1930s of the last century, and have been missing for the next 50 years.
Led by Qin Gong 2 years ago, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage came forward to buy Zhang Xian's work "Ten Yongtu" of the Song Dynasty for 10,000 yuan.
At the auction site, after the starting price of the painting was set at 6 million yuan, it immediately caused all the collectors present to compete for the auction.
Duke of Qin
The on-site bidding continued, until after the sky-high price of 18 million yuan appeared, there was such an exciting voice from the crowd: Don't bid, give it to the Forbidden City!
It turns out that this painting is not only an old collection recorded in the Forbidden City, but also a unique famous painting that has been handed down from generation to generation, which vividly depicts the humanistic customs of the Northern Song Dynasty and is now a precious historical material.
Finally, with the approval of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, the "Ten YongTu" was auctioned for 18 million yuan by a person with a very special identity, known as the "General Manager of the Palace Museum", and Liang Jinsheng, an expert, associate researcher and director of the Cultural Relics Department of the Palace Museum.
Coupled with the 10% commission, the painting cost a total of 19.8 million yuan, and the Palace Museum successfully completed the cultural relics recovery task issued by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage.
Liang Jinsheng
In the 1990s, 19.8 million yuan was a sky-high price for China, which broke the record for the highest number of calligraphy and painting auction houses in Chinese history at that time, and also opened the precedent for the National Museum to purchase cultural relics through the auction market.
The sky-high price of the hammer also caused a sensation in the entire ancient calligraphy and painting identification and collection industry. It was not until many years later that Song Huizong's "Sketching Rare Birds" was released that this auction record was broken.
After the auction ended, controversy followed, and some people said that if the experts of the Cultural Relics Institute at that time had the insight to see the treasure, we would be able to get the treasure smoothly at a price of 8 million yuan, and would not spend an extra 10 million yuan.
Afterwards, After Mr. Liang Qigong learned about it, he said, "The Forbidden City spent 18 million yuan to buy ten Yongtu to bring back to his mother's family value!" ”
Song Huizong's "Sketching Rare Birds"
Ten Yong Tu Famous Paintings of the Northern Song Dynasty
Volume of "Ten Yong Tu", Northern Song Dynasty, silk, light color, painting heart length 52cm, horizontal 125.4cm. It is a landscape figure painting, one of the favorite paintings of the Qing Dynasty Cixi Lafayette, written by Zhang Xian, a famous lyricist of the Northern Song Dynasty.
In the fifth year of Song Xining (1072), Zhang Xian, who was already 82 years old, out of nostalgia for his father, when reading his father's poems before his death, read the last two sentences of a seven-law ancient poem "Wu Xing Tai Shou Ma Daqing Hui Six Elders in the South Garden People's Poetry", "It is bound to know and pass on good things every day, Dan Qingning envied Luo Zhongtu", Zhang Xian was full of emotions and could not help but be touched.
He was inspired by ten poems written by his father, hence the name "Ten Arias".
For today's society, the "Ten Yongtu" is precious not only because it is the only surviving painting of the painter Zhang Xian during the Northern Song Dynasty, but also because the "Ten Yongtu" is a vivid historical picture.
Ten Arias
The character activities and cultural activities depicted in the painting during the Northern Song Dynasty have played a major positive role in our study of the history of the Song Dynasty, politics, economy, culture and other aspects, and the cultural activities and activities related to the characters in the Northern Song Dynasty recorded in it are the only existing first-hand information.
Such a precious national treasure, in order to no longer lose it, even if the country pays more money, its great value is far from being comparable to money.
After several turns, the "Ten Yongtu" came out of the Forbidden City and finally returned to the Forbidden City. This unique painting meets the Palace Museum like Boya and Zi period, the mountain flowing water.
Today, the Ten Arias are treasured in the Palace Museum in Beijing and are visited by Chinese and foreign tourists and cultural relics enthusiasts.
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The Palace Museum bought back the "Ten Wing Diagrams" on the new Forbidden City 3 October 31, 2020 issue