What foreign top cultural relics are collected in China?

Japan's national treasure battle knives, the painted coffins of ancient Egyptian priestesses, and statues of Buddha are among the top foreign cultural relics in the mainland.

Speaking of top cultural relics, as China with a splendid culture of 5,000 years, there are countless precious cultural relics handed down, many of which are treasures that can be called top cultural relics, such as the Terracotta Warriors of Qin Shi Huang and the Chimes of Zeng Houyi.

In addition, there are many rare treasures that have been lost overseas due to historical reasons, and I have to say that it is extremely regrettable.

So, are there any top foreign cultural relics that are now collected in China? The answer is yes, and there are still a lot of them, so let's take a look at what these artifacts are and the stories behind them.

Japan's top cultural relic: Nagaso Yakoku Masamune

In 1945, with the full surrender of Japan, the Japanese army invading China also came to an end, in which the commander of the Hainan Garrison, Goga Kejiro, surrendered to Lieutenant General Han Liancheng of the Nationalist Army.

After the surrender of Goga Keijiro, many military supplies were captured by the nationalist army, including some of Goga Keijiro's personal weapons, and the Nagaso Yahei Sword was one of the weapons he presented to Lieutenant General Han.

This combat knife is Keijiro Goga's personal saber, as a senior military commander in Japan, and at the same time concurrently serving as a vice admiral, the things that Keijiro Goga carries with him are naturally high-grade goods, and this combat knife is really a big deal.

The Japanese sword world has carried out a detailed classification of the most famous knife craftsmen in their history, and according to their skills, they are divided into four levels: "the highest big thing", "big thing", "good property" and "property", and the title of each level represents the superb knife-making process.

And this sabre of Keijiro Goga is from the hand of the famous sword foreman Tsang Yahei Masamune, who had the title of "the greatest property" in the Edo period of Japan, and this sword was forged by him in the ninth year of Hirofumi (1632 AD), and the Japanese sword industry at that time judged the sword "New Sword Shangzuo".

So, where is this Long Zeng Yaxing sword precious? Japan has a nationally famous war knife called "Tiger Che", which is a cultural relic that is revered as a national treasure throughout Japan, and both the production process and the reputation of the maker represent the peak of the Edo period in Japan, and the maker of this Nagasone Yahei sword and the producer of the "Tiger Che" are among the members of the "Greatest Undertaking".

It can be seen that this Nagasone Yahei sword is also one of the top cultural relics in Japan, and it can be called a national treasure.

However, now this knife is stored in military museums on the mainland, and it is also used as one of the evidences of Japan's invasion of China, showing future generations the numerous crimes committed by the Japanese army.

Ancient Egyptian National Treasure: Painted Coffins of the 19th Dynasty

Ancient China and ancient Egypt are the two major ancient civilizations in the history of the world, but due to geographical location and other factors, there is not much cultural exchange between the two, so whether it is folk or official, there are very few ancient Egyptian cultural relics in the domestic collection.

So, how did this painted coffin come to China? The story also begins in the last years of the Qing Dynasty.

In the thirty-first year of Guangxu (1905 AD), the Qing government, in the name of inspecting constitutionalism, sent five ministers to Europe and the United States, and these five people were divided into two horses, three of whom went to Britain, France and other countries, and the other two went to the United States, Germany, and Italy.

The two men who traveled to the United States, one of whom was the protagonist of the story, the Minister of The Northern Ocean, Toték Duanfang.

Duan Fang was a relatively important figure in the late Qing Dynasty, highly valued by Empress Dowager Cixi, and in addition to being a senior member of the Court, Duan Fang was also a well-known collector, especially fond of collecting antiques.

In December of that year, Duan Fang and his party set off, during which they successively inspected the United States, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and other countries, and in the process of inspection, Duan Fang came to Egypt and came to a publicly-funded tour and went to Cairo, the capital of Egypt.

At that time, the situation in Egypt could be said to be inferior to that of the Qing Dynasty, and there were constant uprisings in various parts of the country, and the princes and nobles sold their property and prepared to flee due to the war, so after Duanfang came to Cairo, he saw a cultural relics market full of streets like a vegetable market.

Since it is sold, the price is naturally not too high, and all kinds of cultural relics that can be seen everywhere are also sold cheaply like Cabbage, which is undoubtedly coming to heaven for the end party who likes to collect cultural relics.

In the end, Duanfang bought a number of precious cultural relics such as painted coffins, stone tablets, and stone carvings of the 19th Dynasty of ancient Egypt at one time, and brought these cultural relics back to China and collected them in his home.

So, the ancient Egyptian painted coffin bought by Duanfang contained which big figure in ancient Egypt?

According to relevant research, the coffin brought back by Duanfang contained the priestess of the ancient Egyptian god Minshen (the god in charge of reproduction in ancient Egypt) in the city of Panobolis (today's Ahmim), named Tahornut, and this coffin was the one that held her after her death.

On this coffin, the face of the deceased is engraved on the front, and at the same time, on its face, depicted in colored gold, the coffin from top to bottom, are engraved with various mythological figures representing ancient and cultural, as well as various animal paintings symbolizing the world of death, the entire coffin, showing a perfect human form.

In addition to the coffin, Duanfang also brought back a lot of stone tablets, stone carvings and other cultural relics of great cultural value, these cultural relics were brought back to China, Duanfang was very fond of them, often looked at it for a long time, and also personally promoted on it: "The ancient Egyptian queen stone carvings are really like Tuoba Fengzi Zhuangren Brother Observation, Duanfang Ji."

However, in 1911, Duanfang was killed by the mutinous officer Liu Yifeng, and after his death, the family road fell rapidly, coupled with the change of the situation, his descendants had to take out these precious cultural relics for sale in the street in order to make a living, which eventually led to the cultural relics being scattered in all directions.

Today, only the painted coffins and some stone tablets that Duanfang brought back in Cairo are stored in the National Museum, and the priestess mummies in the coffins have long been missing.

India's super national treasure: buddha and other figures

Buddha statues, i.e. the statues of Shakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism, there are three statues of Buddhas and other statues in the world, and two of them are collected in China.

According to legend, when Buddha Shakyamuni was dying, in order to remember the appearance of the Buddha in future generations, his disciples asked the Buddha to make statues according to the appearance of the Buddha, and after waiting for the Buddha's promise, the disciples drew three statues of the Buddha, namely the appearance of the Buddha when he was eight, twelve, and twenty-five.

After the painting was completed, the three statues were first preserved in Temples in India, but two of them, before the Tang Dynasty, came to China "by chance".

The earliest to be introduced to China was a twelve-year-old figure.

During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the emperor of the Former Qin Dynasty, Jian Jian, was very religious in Buddhism, not only established a large number of temples in the country, but also in order to show his devotion, he did not hesitate to send people to Tianzhu from thousands of miles to invite back the statues of the Buddha's Gate and other treasures.

Of course, such a heavy treasure, the people of the Tianzhu Kingdom were certainly unwilling to give it, but at the "gracious" invitation from the envoy of Zhijian, His Holiness Damapolo finally agreed to give the statue of Buddha and other statues to the emissaries of Zhijian.

At the same time, there were also a large number of Buddha bone relics that were taken away.

After the statue came to China, it was welcomed back to the temple by Zhijian with high etiquette and enshrined, and after Zhijian, the years of war and chaos, but the statue was well preserved, going around and around, until the establishment of the Tang Dynasty.

After Emperor Taizong of Tang ascended the throne, due to his great achievements, the custom of marriage between neighboring countries and the Tang Dynasty also prevailed, and Songzan Gampo of Tubo was one of them.

Songzan Gampo in order to marry a Tang princess, it can be said that it took a lot of effort, and finally Tang Taizong agreed to marry Princess Wencheng to Songzan Gampo, which has the story of "Princess Wencheng entering Tibet".

In princess Wencheng's dowry list, the statues of Buddha and other figures are among them.

The reason why Tang Taizong would use the statue as the dowry of Princess Wencheng so generously was, first, to show the national prestige of the Heavenly Dynasty, and second, to set off the honor of Princess Wencheng, and because of this, this statue was settled in the snowy plateau.

In order to show his respect, Songtsen Gampo specially built the Jokhang Temple to enshrine this twelve-year-old statue.

In addition, the five-year-old statue that came to China is also related to Songtsen Gampo, and, similar to the history of the twelve-year-old statue, is also due to marriage.

After marrying Princess Wencheng, Songtsen Gampo married Nepal's Princess Ruzun, and the dowry of Princess Ruzun was also very expensive, including the statue of the Buddha at the age of five.

In this way, two of the three statues were collected by Songtsen Gampo.

After this, Songtsen Gampo changed the place of worship for two statues, the five-year-old one was enshrined in the Jokhang Temple, and the twelve-year-old one was enshrined in the Jokhang Temple, where we can still see it today.

As for the twenty-five-year-old statue, as early as the completion of the painting, there was a sectarian dispute in India, and in order to protect the statue, buddhists had to go overseas with the statue, who expected to encounter wind and waves on the way, even people with boats, all sunk to the bottom of the sea.

In addition to the above-mentioned top cultural relics, there are many foreign tops in China, such as the gilded gold and silver bottles of ancient Greek mythological figures collected in the Guyuan Museum in Ningxia, the convex glass bowl, and the ancient Indian Baye Sutra collected in xi'an Daci'en Temple, etc. These are extremely important cultural relics in foreign civilizations, but these cultural relics, without exception, are obtained in history, through tribute, trade and other formal channels, rather than Chinese cultural relics collected in many foreign museums today. They took it by illegal means.