Archaeological events have never lacked mysterious colors, the mysterious stone plates found in the Bayankra Mountain in Tibet, the murals of the ancient Egyptian pyramids suspected of alien civilizations, the world map in Pilires' hand that seems to be a prehistoric civilization, and the metal spheres of South Africa three billion years ago, a series of strange and confusing mysterious events, which have cast a mysterious veil over history.
If a stone with a Chinese Simplified written on it was unearthed from the site of the fourth century AD, I am afraid that no one would believe it, but the reality is that not only has a stone with simplified characters found, but the site is also located in Britain, which is 7779 kilometers away from China.
Unusual ruins, unusual discoveries
In the village of Boxford in West Berkshire, England, there is an ancient Roman villa ruins, built around the fourth century AD, and at first the British only regarded him as a common site, because there are so many ancient Roman ruins in Britain.
In the fourth century, England was under the rule of the Roman general Maxim, in order to compete for the throne of Western Rome, Maxim withdrew all his troops in the British Isles to Rome, and after the victory of the war, Maxim, who became emperor, gave the British Isles to his beloved father, a Welsh tribal leader, and thus a large number of Roman ruins were left in Britain.
Although the site is not valued, sooner or later the gold will shine.
In 2019, an archaeological team came to Boxford to conduct routine archaeological research and accidentally found a mural, which caused an uproar in the archaeological community.
Precious frescoes
This fresco is huge, about six meters long, and unlike the painting we usually understand, it is painted with paint, and this Roman fresco is made up of small stones, and the stones of different colors are grouped together like building blocks toys.
This mural was made in a mosaic method invented by the ancient Greeks, and even in the world there are only three such murals, and the United Kingdom does not have one.
Therefore, the mural found in Boxford is bound to fill the gap in the history of ancient art in Britain, and the British archaeological community has caused a sensation, saying that this is one of the most exciting discoveries in Britain in the past 50 years.
Experts deduce from the images of Greek gods such as Hercules, Half-Horsemen, Cupid and others on the frescoes that the frescoes depict the mythical story of Perops, the grandson of Zeus, who participated in the chariot race of King Elis, and eventually won and married a princess, a story that is also considered the origin of the ancient Olympic Games.
Britain was a sensation, with murals making headlines
As a mural work that tells a mythological story, its historical value and artistic value are immeasurable.
The Sun, the BBC, the British Morning Post and other well-known overseas media have reported on this major discovery in Britain, and several media have invariably called this mural a national treasure, a fourth-century mural suddenly has unlimited scenery, as if the protagonist.
Bricks grab the camera, it is the protagonist
On September 1, 2019, under the gaze of three thousand people, the archaeological team spent ten days to successfully clean up the mosaic painting, followed by some small objects such as animal bones, bricks, jewelry, etc., which were also published in newspapers.
But it is these small objects that have attracted far more attention than the murals.
On the photo published in the media, there is a broken brick with the Chinese character "Jim here" written impressively, and it is also a simplified character.
Why did simplified characters, which were only popularized in 1956, appear on the cultural relics of the fourth century AD?
In the fourth century AD, the mainland was still in the chaotic era of the two Jin Dynasties, and although the culture was prosperous and there were some simple texts, it was impossible to spread to the British Isles thousands of miles apart.
The archaeological community has also speculated about this.
1. Falsehood
The falsification theory is not without purpose, and the examples of archaeological fraud are not uncommon, especially in the United Kingdom, which has been the strongest academic fraud incident in history - the Piertang ancient fossil counterfeiting case.
British paleontologists have adopted a fake fossil of a patchwork of human skulls and orangutan skulls as the skulls of a new species, and this skull has been named the Pirtang skull.
The Piltang skull is considered a transitional species in the evolution of apes to humans because of its characteristics of both modern humans and orangutans.
Therefore, the academic community has taken this skull as a strong evidence of evolution, until forty years later, the museum re-studied the skull and found that this skull was originally a spliced product.
This case has directly affected the research direction of archaeology and biology for forty years, and many scholars have exhausted their lives of research as a result, and the British archaeological community has been infamous ever since.
Therefore, many scholars believe that this is another gimmick created by the United Kingdom in order to attract people's attention.
2. Time travel says
Many scholars believe that this stone can be used as evidence of the existence of time travelers, perhaps a time traveler greeting us in the fourth century, but time travel is too sci-fi and unrealistic for modern science, so this hypothesis is not recognized by many people.
3. Symbols say
Some scholars believe that the characters on the bricks just happen to look similar to Chinese characters, but they are not actually Chinese characters.
However, this statement is obviously untenable, if there are symbols that look like Chinese characters, it is understandable, but the symbols look like Chinese characters, and the meaning expressed is so smooth and complete in Chinese, it is obviously not a coincidence that can be explained.
4. Prank said
This statement is more recognized, because the excavated stones are very clean, there is no sense of the times, and it may be a prank of the workers, who handed over a stone prepared in advance as a cultural relic when unearthed.
Moreover, around the 1870s and 2011, the remains were often excavated, and the possibility that this stone was left behind by future generations is extremely high.
Of course, the conjecture about "Jim here" didn't last long, after all, this precious mural is far more attractive to many than a stone.
However, thanks to this stone, we also learned that the united Kingdom unearthed such a precious and scarce painting, which tells an ancient mythological story.
"Jim here" may be a fake prank for archaeologists, but for us, we may as well imagine the stone, or romantic, or terrifying, or mysterious...
epilogue
All of the above hypotheses actually have their own positions and footholds, which are nothing more than to see what kind of arguments individuals can accept.
But archaeology needs not conjecture, but scientific and rigorous thinking, as rational as possible.
Regarding the mystery and mystery of archaeology, some things have long been impossible to explore, the ruins have long been covered by the veil of time in the long river of time, the truth of history can not be said clearly, but science and technology are developing, the times are progressing, I believe that one day, we can solve these mysteries.