Shu Jin
Cover news reporter Yan Wenwen Zhou Qin
China was the first country in the world to invent silkworm farming, silk reeling and brocade weaving, and Shu brocade is ranked among the three famous brocades in China. Chengdu, also known as Jincheng, was heard everywhere more than 2,000 years ago. In Chengdu and the surrounding areas, tomb bricks, bronzes, etc. have been excavated, depicting the scene of picking mulberry weaving cloth.
Although Shu Brocade has the reputation of the world's mother brocade, Chengdu has not yet unearthed brocade from the Han and Tang Dynasties.
How to copy an ancient Piece of Shu Brocade?
From the Dingqiao machine to the hualou machine, and then to the Han Dynasty gouge jacquard machine excavated from the restored Laoguanshan Han Tomb, this road is inheritance and root-seeking.
A replica of the "Five Stars Out of the East" brocade guard displayed by the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Museum
A piece of Han Brocade
Showcasing the exquisite craftsmanship of ancient craftsmen
In 1995, the Sino-Japanese Niya Site Academic Expedition excavated a husband and wife burial tomb from the late Eastern Han Dynasty to the Wei and Jin Dynasties in the Niya Ruins in Minfeng County, Xinjiang, and unearthed an extremely exquisite Han-style brocade in the tomb.
It was a protective arm, about the size of an adult male's palm, woven with red, yellow, blue, white, and green silk threads, in addition to the popular beast patterns of the bird, unicorn, tiger, etc., and the words "Five stars out of the East and China" were also woven on it.
Not only that, but another tapestry fragment was unearthed in the same tomb, which is exactly the same as the pattern of the "Five Stars Out of the East and Li China" arm guard, and the words are "Qiu Nan Qiang". Obviously, this is a cut part of a piece of brocade that is the same as the "Five Star Out of the East Lee China" brocade.
This archaeological discovery is hailed as one of the greatest discoveries of Chinese archaeology in the 20th century.
There are many different views on the origin of this brocade in the academic community.
During the Western Han Dynasty, the central government established a huge silk weaving factory, and the "East Weaving Room" and "West Weaving Room" in Chang'an and the "Three Service Officials" in Xiangyi, Chenliu County, each had thousands of weavers. Sichuan also had a very developed weaving process at that time.
The "Miscellaneous Records of Xijing" says that during the hancheng emperor's reign, he once ordered the administrative officials in the Yizhou region to leave a three-year-old tax and weave "seventy percent of the brocade tent for the court, decorated with shenshui incense". Using yizhou's three-year tax to weave a bed of brocade tents, it can be seen that the brocade tent is luxurious and the brocade craftsmanship is superb. The "JinguanCheng" established by the Han Dynasty court in Chengdu was the largest and most famous official brocade weaving workshop in the country at that time; the products were exclusively used by the court and the official government, and were given to foreign envoys and kings as a courtesy exchange for the imperial court.
After the research of experts and scholars, this piece of brocade is a piece of plain brocade, which conforms to the basic characteristics of the early Shu brocade popular in the Han Dynasty; some experts believe that in the history of dyeing and weaving in the mainland, only Shu brocade is a traditional craft brocade that has gone through the two development stages of "warp brocade" and "weft brocade"; during the Eastern Han Dynasty, Chengdu had the largest and most famous government-run brocade workshop in the country, which had the conditions to produce this kind of difficult "warp brocade" exclusively for the use of the court and the government. Therefore, many experts believe that this piece of brocade is a piece of "Made in Chengdu" 2,000 years ago.
Shu brocade weaving
Shu Jin not only reached a very high level in the Han Dynasty, but also maintained a high level in the subsequent dynasties. In the Tang Dynasty documents unearthed in Turpan, there are Shu Brocade Silk names such as "Yizhou Half Arm" and "Zizhou Xiaolian", and are marked with upper, middle and lower prices, which truly reflect the prosperity of Sichuan silk in the trade of the western region. Nowadays, the Shu brocade that has been handed down to generations can still be found in the Shosoin Temple in Japan. The Hunting Brocade of the Four Heavenly Kings in the Shoso-in Courtyard was given to Japan by the Sui and Tang Dynasties and brought back to Japan by the Envoys of the Tang Dynasty, and it is also a typical brocade produced in Shudi during the Sui and Tang Dynasties - the ornament of "Lingyang Gongshi".
In the Song Dynasty, the emperors and nobles, the rich and the rich, the wind of pleasure prevailed, the demand for embroidery increased greatly, and the embroidery skills also improved, which also promoted the further maturity of Shu Jin. Yuan Renfei wrote a special "Shu Jin Spectrum", which made a detailed record of the color patterns of Shu Jin.
At the end of the Ming Dynasty and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, Shudi experienced decades of war, the land of Bashu was barren of smoke and grass, things were not human, and the Shujin textile industry was almost destroyed and destroyed. It was not until the Kangxi Dynasty that the fleeing or captured Jingong returned to Chengdu and resumed his old business, and the sound of "Zaza Lane Machine" sounded again in Jincheng. With the support of the Kangxi Emperor, the Shujin textile industry continued to recover and develop. During the Guangxu years, "Chengdu organic houses 2,000, looms more than 10,000 shelves", has become a well-known silk fabric production and sales distribution center.
Dingqiao loom
A skill
Confirm the thousand-year history of Shu Jin
Shu brocade has always had the reputation of "the mother of the world", but what kind of machine is the exquisite Shu brocade woven? It's always been a question that scholars and archaeologists are trying to figure out.
In the 1970s, experts from the Sichuan Silk Industry Research Institute were studying the Han and Tang Dynasty Jingjin, and they were shocked to find fabrics similar to the Han and Tang Jingjin on the belt of a farmer in Huayang, Shuangliu County, Chengdu. After inquiring from many parties, it was learned that this fabric was woven by a loom circulating in Huayang, and the members of the expert group immediately went to look for it and found a multi-faceted multi-faceted hand loom that was still in production in Huayang.
The foot pedals of this loom are covered with bamboo nails, resembling the common river crossing stone piers in the rural ditches of Sichuan, so experts named it "Dingqiao Loom".
In fact, this "living fossil" loom is the oldest diaphragm jacquard loom in the mainland, originating from the pre-Qin and Warring States periods, popular in the Han and Tang Dynasties, and has a long history of more than 2,000 years.
This loom is generally used for weaving lace (the width is generally about 10 cm), before the old Guanshan loom was found, many experts believed that Hanjin was woven by the Dingqiao machine, but after some expert tests, when the width exceeded 30 cm, the longitude was dense to 200 rods / cm, almost impossible to weave. The warp density of the five-star brocade has reached more than 220 rods / cm, even if the weaving of ordinary brocade, when the width of more than 40 cm 4 colors or more of the brocade has a certain degree of difficulty.
In the Dingqiao loom, the heald frame is an important component, which is a frame with a through-laminate rod and a drive connected by the upper and lower beams and the left and right side rails, the loom has two hydrations that can be woven with plain grain, and there are three hydrations that can be woven twill, the more comprehensive, the more complex the ornaments that can be woven, and the tread is the foot pedal that links these hydrangles. According to experts, this is a craft that was almost lost after the middle of the Tang Dynasty.
In place of the "Dingqiao Loom" is the Bouquet Jacquard Machine, also known as the Flower Building Machine, which has appeared in the Tang Dynasty. When weaving, it is operated by two people, one sitting on the top of the flower building, singing and pulling, according to the jacquard pattern, one by one to lift the opening, and the other person steps on the ground and throws the shuttle to play the weft. The emergence of the flower tower machine marks the birth of Weijin. The establishment and development of weft brocade is not only a major change in brocade varieties, but also marks the leapfrog development of brocade technology. The impact of this technological change on later jacquard fabrics was profound.
The scene of the excavation of the tomb of Laoguanshan Han
The Shu Brocade Weaving and Embroidery Museum on the banks of Huanhua Creek in Chengdu houses the Dingqiao loom of the Qing Dynasty and the only Qing Dynasty Hualou Shu Brocade Machine in normal use in the world. Not only that, the museum also copied 6 sets of Shu Jin Hua Lou wooden machines, and used one of them to imitate the "five-star out of the Oriental Brocade" after transformation.
Even this imitation is not easy to come by. Director Zhong introduced that when this piece of Shu brocade was first imitated, the tomb of the old Guanshan Han had not yet been discovered, so it was woven using the flower tower machine in the collection. Director Zhong recalled the situation when he first copied this tapestry, and he can still clearly remember how many difficulties he encountered.
"At that time, the tomb of Laoguan Shan Han had not yet been found, so we also made many attempts. Han Dynasty five-color brocade is the highest level of Han brocade weaving at that time, relying on the warp line to flower, we use the Dingqiao loom to try to copy the five-star brocade, when adding to 80 pieces of comprehensive due to the length of the fuselage, warp density and tension is too large, the opening is too small to step on, the opening can not come up, need manual help to lift the synthesis, weaving is not smooth, and the back of the fabric is more messy. Zhong Bingzhang, director of the Chengdu Shu Brocade Embroidery Museum, told reporters, "Later, after trying, the pattern was woven after the transformation of the flower building machine, and from the appearance, the size and color of the pattern were almost the same, but there were still some differences in the density of the weave." ”
At that time, no one thought that a few years later, The Old Guanshan Loom would be unearthed in Chengdu, which could weave all kinds of Han brocade at that time, and also confirmed the status of Shu Brocade as the "Mother Brocade of the World".
Loom excavated from the tomb of Laoguan Shanhan
A loom
It fills the gap in the history of textile science and technology in the world
"The loom unearthed from the tomb of Laoguan Shan Han is really too powerful!" Zhong Bingzhang mentioned the tomb of Laoguanshan Han several times in the course of the interview, and praised the 4 Han Dynasty loom models, "Before, it was said that Shu Brocade is very powerful, it is the mother brocade of the world, which can only be recorded through literature, but the discovery of Laoguanshan has confirmed the status of Shu Jintianxia Mother Brocade." ”
According to Zhong Bingzhang, due to the perennial warmth and humidity of the Sichuan Basin, the main element of silk is fibrous silk protein, which is difficult to preserve in a humid environment, so it is difficult for Sichuan archaeology to find silk before the Song Dynasty. Previously, a Ming Dynasty "falling flower flowing water brocade" was found in the Ming tomb near Chengdu. In addition, in Japan' Shosoin Temple and Horyuji Temple, a large number of Tang Dynasty "Shujiang Jin" are collected, that is, the Central Plains Imperial Court that sent Tang envoys back to Japan to give Gifts to Tang Dynasty Shu Jin. Once the loom model of the Laoguanshan Han Tomb came out, it not only solved the weaving problem of Shu brocade in the Han Dynasty, but even found from the number of looms and the division of labor of human figurines that the weaving of Shu brocade in Chengdu in the Han Dynasty has been quite large-scale.
"Shu brocade, from the Han Dynasty to the Tang Dynasty, represents the highest level of Chinese brocade weaving and the first milestone of Chinese brocade weaving. The loom excavated from the tomb of Laoguanshan Han filled the gap in the history of world textile science and technology, and was the most advanced textile equipment found so far at that time. Zhong Bingzhang said so.
Animal face brocade woven from the restored pieces of the old Guanshan loom
In 2014, led by Zhao Feng, director of the China Silk Museum, the national "Compass Project", together with the Chengdu Museum, the Institute of Natural Science History of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and other scientific research institutions, restored the structure of the Han Dynasty Gou Jacquard Machine, and after more than three years of research, preparation, installation, wearing and weaving, the "Five Star Brocade" was restored, and the weaving demonstration was carried out on the CCTV "National Treasure" program.
In 2017, Chengdu Shu Brocade Weaving and Embroidery Museum cooperated with Chengdu Museum to carry out the Scene Restoration Project of Shu Brocade Weaving Workshop in the Han Dynasty: 1 set of jacquard machine for restoring the old Guanshan Han Tomb and a full set of weaving pre-tools excavated from the tomb, including two sets of wire adjustment and weft tools, a set of warp tools, and the national "Shu Brocade Weaving Technique" inheritor He Bin and his team successfully woven the Han Dynasty "human and animal pattern brocade".
The Shu brocade of the Han Dynasty was woven with a loom excavated from the tomb of Laoguanshan Han, which is an inheritance and a root search.