A "ancient wardrobe" in the Yuanmingyuan, no one wants it, and the foreigner "picked up the leak" and sold it for 93.15 million

The Yuanmingyuan, an imperial garden built in the Qing Dynasty, is not only a treasure of garden art that blends east and west, but also a deep scar in the modern history of the mainland. After being looted by the invaders, countless precious pieces of literature that belonged to the mainland landed overseas.

In recent years, I have always heard from time to time that patriots have spent a lot of money to bring these cultural relics back to the motherland. An ancient wardrobe that once lived in Denmark is one of them.

The Garden of Ten Thousand Gardens was burned to the ground

The Yuanmingyuan is an imperial garden that embodies the painstaking efforts of several generations of emperors in the Qing Dynasty. It was built from the Kangxi Dynasty onwards, and was repaired and expanded several times by subsequent emperors, and by the time the Daoguang Emperor had completed its repairs, it had become a top art museum at home and abroad.

In this 3.5-square-kilometer garden, there are countless treasures. There are more than 150 scenic spots.

However, shortly after the Daoguang Emperor had just repaired the Yuanmingyuan, bad luck fell on the head of the Great Qing. At that time, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement was fierce, and there were also rebel armed forces in the Anhui area who committed crimes.

The Western powers have been trying to take advantage of the opportunity to open up the market of the Great Qing and gain more benefits from us. The Great Qing, which was already in decline, suddenly fell into a situation of internal and external troubles.

Originally, Britain and France orally put forward a series of trade demands, and the Qing Dynasty also had the opportunity to first settle inside and then outside. But after the last Opium War, the defeated Qing government still looked down on Britain. Second, the trade demands made by the great powers were too rude, and if the Qing Dynasty agreed, it would be equivalent to doing things in qin with land, which was no different from holding a salary to fight a fire.

So the two sides unsurprisingly collapsed, and the British and French allies, armed with the power of long guns and cannons, easily destroyed the last elite army of the Qing Dynasty and rampaged into the city of Beijing. In the eyes of these foreign robbers, the city of Beijing is like a young girl with no chicken power, allowing them to be humiliated.

They first burned and plundered in the city. But at this time, the Qing government was still not soft. So the British and French forces prepared to loot the Forbidden City and give the Daoguang Emperor a little look. But the purpose of these robbers was not to destroy the Qing, but to reap the benefits from the hands of the Qing.

In order to prevent the complete anger of Daoguang and the blitzkrieg into a protracted battle, they changed their targets and rushed to the Yuanmingyuan with their divisions.

After the Western powers and some priests in Beijing broke into the Yuanmingyuan, they packed up and took away all the calligraphy and paintings, jade, pottery, antiques, gold and silver that they could carry. If you can't hold it in both hands, you will find livestock and a cart to transport away. Even the dragon bed for the emperor to sleep was carried away by them.

In order to destroy the evidence, on October 18 and 19, 1860, thousands of Western robbers set fire to the Yuanmingyuan and burned it to the ground.

Court treasures were lost in Northern Europe

Countless palace treasures were looted, and the Anglo-French army filled four large ships before the "spoils" were transported to Paris.

However, those ignorant Westerners, unaware of the precious value of these cultural relics, are obsessed only with gold and silver, precious stones, ceramics and silk, and disdain many seemingly ordinary things. This includes a huge wardrobe that is 3.25 meters high.

At that time, the owner of the wardrobe sold the price very low, planning to sell back some blood, but no one cared. At this time, the famous Danish collector Ma Yile also saw this wardrobe. After some careful observation, he found that although the surface of the wardrobe was not inlaid with treasures such as gemstones and gold, it was carved with an unusually exquisite pattern.

Although Ma Yile could not understand the historical background behind this pattern. But his instincts as a collector told him that this wardrobe was absolutely extraordinary. So he quietly stepped forward and took the wardrobe into his pocket for 200 francs of cabbage.

In fact, if you change it to Chinese, you should realize the value of this thing the moment you see the wardrobe. Because the patterns on the wardrobe are all dragons.

In ancient China, only members of the royal family were eligible to use the Dragon and Phoenix Totem. More importantly, the dragon on the wardrobe is nine lifelike five-clawed golden dragons, which imply the meaning of the nine-five supreme, which only the emperor can use. Moreover, the surface of this wardrobe is smooth as a mirror, which is obviously the use of the "shoveling" high relief technique unique to the workmanship of the great inner rosewood.

What's more, in addition to the nine flying dragons and the imposing landscape, there is also a classic Western carved ornament called "passionflower" on the wardrobe. And this is also the Qianlong Emperor's favorite pattern of that year. All kinds of signs show that this only shows the majesty and honor of the Son of Heaven, but also integrates the wardrobe of Western exoticism, and is closely related to the Qianlong Emperor.

Later, Ma Yi'er learned that this wardrobe was originally the special wardrobe of the Qianlong Emperor. And it is enough to represent the top furniture manufacturing technology in China in the 18th century. Upon learning of this, Ma yile was ecstatic.

Someone offered 50,000 francs to buy a wardrobe, but he decisively refused. In the end, this large royal wardrobe was regarded as an heirloom by him, left to future generations, and also disappeared from people's vision.

Auction off the sky-high treasure to return to China

It was not until an auction hosted by Poly Group in 2013 that the "Qianlong Rosewood Carved Nine Dragon Pattern Large Four-Piece Cabinet" used by the Qianlong Emperor had the opportunity to reappear and become the most dazzling star collection at that auction.

In order to get this treasure, many collectors have prepared a lot of money. But everyone knows that it is not easy to take down the largest rosewood four-piece cabinet on the market.

Sure enough, after repeated discussions between senior auctioneers and a number of antique appraisal experts, Poly Group finally set a starting price of 28 million yuan for it. According to the experience of auctioning antiques in the Yuanmingyuan in the past, if you want to finally win it, you must spend at least 50 or 60 million.

But who knows that not long after the auction began, the price of the wardrobe jumped from 30 million to 45 million yuan.

In the face of this almost crazy price increase, many collectors who have ideas about wardrobes are retreating. The remaining bidders also regained their composure and began to slowly increase their prices by a margin of 1 million. At this time, the off-site bidders also began to exert their strength, and several people competed with each other for a price increase, so that the final transaction price of this national treasure antique came to a staggering 89 million.

In the end, after calculating the commission, the bidder spent 91.35 million yuan to finally bring the treasure home. This price also refreshed the record for the highest auction price of antique furniture, the price has increased by more than 70,000 times compared with more than 100 years ago, from a no-one bargain to a sky-high treasure worth nearly 100 million.

The return of the national treasure to the motherland after the ups and downs is a happy event worth rejoicing. However, many netizens believe that spending such an expensive price to buy a national treasure is equivalent to letting Western robbers rob it again, so they feel very unhappy.

Although the mainland is no longer the sick lion that was slaughtered by the West more than a hundred years ago, it also has the ability to take home those cultural relics and treasures that have been lost. But today, when our national strength is getting stronger and stronger, what we should do more is to remember the lessons brought by history and avoid the recurrence of the tragedies of that year.