【Editor's Note】
A thousand years of wind and sand, through your hand, brushing my face, unchanging roughness, hiding the code of history.
More than 1,000 years ago, the Shubian soldiers of the Tang Empire came here all the way to the wind and dust, taking root in the garrison, protecting the road and protecting the people, defending the territory, and looking at the capital Chang'an from afar; more than 1,000 years later, he came here with absolute sincerity, with an archaeological heart, to explore this desolate and lonely land, but once blood boiling.
"2021 National Top Ten New Archaeological Discoveries" - the site of The Kyaker Kuduk Beacon, opened the memory of the western extension of the Great Wall. The vast scenery of the border plug, the shadow of the sword and light, the endless thoughts and distant looks, and the bits and pieces in the beacon pile have been telling the ups and downs of the millennium. He may spend his life deciphering and guarding, for the sake of this beacon, for the sake of that faith.
Cover news reporter Yan Wenwen Zhou Qin Chen Guangxu
Standing next to a pillar on a sand pile, Hu Xingjun took out his mobile phone and looked around for network signals, and video called his wife who was far away in Urumqi. As soon as it was connected, after a few "feeds and heyss", the video got stuck. Even so, it is a letter to the family.
In the distance, under the glow of the sun, moon and stars, the glimmer emitted by the mobile phone screen became clearer and clearer in the dark night, flashing with the heartbeat.
This is the "peace fire" he lit for his family.
From September 2019 to January 3, 2022, Hu Xingjun worked in the desert. As the person in charge of the excavation of the Ruins of Thek Kuduk Beacon, he spent 19 months in the no-man's land on the north bank of the Peacock River, conducting archaeological excavations around a Tang Dynasty beacon, trying to fully reproduce the military life of the Tang Dynasty Shubian soldiers. His little bits and pieces in this beacon have a wonderful coincidence with the lives of the guards a thousand years ago that span time and space.
1
At the same point, there is a network signal tower in the bucket
Hu Xingjun at the ruins of the Keyak Kuduk Beacon
"I studied archaeology at Sichuan University. Chengdu was humid and warm, and I didn't expect that after graduation, all my work would be carried out in the arid desert. As a post-80s archaeologist, Hu Xingjun graduated from university and entered the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology. He has participated in the excavation of the Little River Cemetery and has also served as the head of several archaeological projects.
In March 2011, he participated in an archaeological survey of the Peacock River Beacon Group, which was his first visit to the site of the Kjack Kuduk Beacon.
"The first feeling is heat." He narrowed his eyes, as if feeling the burning discomfort again, "There is not a single tree in that place, no place to hide from the sun." At 12:00 noon, the sun is particularly high, and the white flowers in front of you can't see anything. ”
Not only is the sun poisoned, but the saline soil where the beacon is located is also very thick and soft, and even if the shoe boots worn are very high, the saline alkali soil is still easy to drown the calves of the team members. I wanted to sit down and rest, but it was difficult to live in peace, "As soon as I sat down, I saw grass turtles coming at you. It was a tick, the size of a fingernail, so terrible that it wouldn't come out when it got into the flesh..."
Hu Xingjun still remembers the first time he saw the ruins of the Kārk kuduk beacon: "The windward surface of the beacon collapsed very badly, and it was not at all obvious that this beacon was built on a sand pile." What he didn't expect was that he would have a 10-year relationship with this badly collapsed beacon.
In the following years, Hu Xingjun conducted archaeological surveys and explorations of the Peacock River Beacon Group several times; in 2015, in order to cooperate with maintenance and protection, 3 of the 11 beacons in the Peacock River Beacon Group were excavated; in 2019, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage approved archaeological excavations of the Keyak Kuduk Beacon Site. Before the official excavation, Hu Xingjun and his team conducted a detailed exploration.
In September 2019, Hu Xingjun officially began his life stationed at the ruins of The Flint in Koyak Kuduk.
In the desert, the days are fast and slow.
Fast, because the daily work is very much, very complicated, time passes unconsciously; slow, because in the desert no man's land, almost no internet access, there are not many recreational activities to pass the spare time.
"Our archaeologists are fine, every night there are a lot of cultural relics records and report materials to write, until 12 o'clock in the middle of the night can not finish." But migrant workers are bored and can only brush short videos on their mobile phones. ”
In the desert without network signal, how to brush short videos?
"It would be wrong to say that there is no network signal at all. On a small dirt slope near our station, there is occasionally a little bit of network signal. Hu Xingjun clicked on his mobile phone and turned out a photo. A wooden pole was erected on a small dirt bag, and a bucket hung on the top of the wooden pole, and people standing around the wooden pole were holding mobile phones in their hands, and the screen was full of light.
Archaeologists search the dunes for network signals to surf the Internet
"When I first came, there was no network signal, and I used satellite phones to report to the unit that I was safe. But satellite phones are too expensive, a few dollars a minute, just a few days to make a call. Later, we found that there was an occasional network signal, so every night after returning to the workstation, we turned on a mobile phone to the hotspot, put it in a bucket, and used the pulley to send the phone to the top of the wooden pole. After a while, the mobile phone may have a little network signal, and everyone will stand below to go online and report to the unit and home that they are safe. ”
Hu Xingjun said humorously: "In the Tang Dynasty, there was a system of lighting 'peace fire' in the morning and evening, and we used this way to report peace to our families every day in the desert, which is the modern 'peace fire'. ”
2
Only by working together can we do a good job
There are more than 20 members of the archaeological excavation team at the Site of Kyak Kuduk Beacon, in addition to the leader Hu Xingjun, several personnel of the Archaeological Institute, and migrant workers from hundreds of kilometers away. The location of the archaeological team is in the hinterland of the desert, there is no shop in front of the village, and all the team members have to manage the food and drink of Lasa.
The first thing to solve is the problem of living. In the desert, the wind and sand are extremely strong, the sun shines on the ground during the day, and the temperature drops rapidly after nightfall, and it is imperative to find a safe and livable place. Thanks to the state's efforts to increase the protection of the Peacock River beacon group in recent years, many beacon protection stations have been built along the line, and Hu Xingjun and his team members have stayed in a protection station 11 kilometers away from the Kjak Kuduk Beacon.
"When I first went, the protection station had a suite with a total of 4 small rooms, with 40 or 50 square meters. But we had more than 20 people and couldn't live there and had to go and buy some tents. ”
Solved the problem of staying and eating. The site is located in a desert no-man's land, and all food has to be pulled from outside by pickup truck to the protection station. The protection station is out of power, and it is also necessary to prepare a high-horsepower generator to generate electricity, "so that there will be electricity at night." ”
In addition to excavation, collation and surveying, due to the high wind and sand, an important task of the archaeological team is to clean the sand. Hu Xingjun laughed at himself: "Our archaeological team is an archaeological team digging sand, and a large part of the work every day is sand digging." ”
Hu Xingjun sorted out the paperwork in the studio
In the desert, working together is the only way to overcome all difficulties. As the person in charge, Hu Xingjun also had to participate in sand digging, and all kinds of chores had to be done: "Sometimes, when we work in Beacon, we are quite similar to the Tang Dynasty soldiers who were guarding at that time. At that time, there were 5 beacons and a pawn in a beacon, and everything had to be done, and every day he had to wait for the beacon to be released, to know the documents, the symbols, and the transmission, but also to guard, prepare the beacons, and prepare grain and grass, and one person had to do a lot of things. ”
The same is true of the archaeologists, pushing carts during the day, digging sand, looking for cultural relics in the "millennium old ashes", and going back at night to sort out the cultural relics excavated during the day, while also dealing with a series of life problems such as reimbursement and procurement.
"Desert archaeology is like this, in addition to doing their own work, there are many things, because just a few people, if you don't do it, you can't finish the work." We are a team, and only by working together can we successfully complete the work. Hu Xingjun recalled the work of the teachers during the excavation of the Xiaohe ruins in the first major project he participated in, "In Xiaohe, the old leaders also did the same. Dig up sand during the day, then use buckets to get sand onto conveyor belts, and enter information at night. Desert archaeology has no professors, no leaders, no migrant workers, you go in, you are a member of the archaeological team. ”
3
Walking the Silk Road together in three years, more than ten chassis iron plates were replaced
Ruins of the Flint in Kjak Kuduk
In the desert, water is precious and scarce, and there happens to be no water near the flint of Kjak Kuduk.
This is not only a problem that plagues Hu Xingjun's life, but also an academic problem that plagues him: Where did the Tang Dynasty soldiers draw water from?
In 2021, the archaeological team found the remains of an irregularly circular pond in the southwest of the beacon. It was determined that the water source of the pond was underground fresh water, and the water quality was four categories, and after treatment, it barely reached the drinking standard. The mystery is revealed: the domestic water of the soldiers who guarded the beacon at that time came from this.
Academic problems have been solved, but domestic water is still a problem. The nearest water source is more than 20 kilometers from the camp, and every two days, the team members drive pickup trucks and pull 15 50-liter buckets to fill the water. The water at this water source point is tap water drawn down from the mountain, although it is tap water, but it is basically not filtered, "the water flowing out of the pipe is often mossy, and the salinity is also very heavy." ”
Even water of average quality is precious. Therefore, the daily water consumption of each person is not uncontrolled, and in addition to drinking and cooking, each team member has only two pots of water available per day.
"By May, it's hot in the desert. Buckets were placed in the yard and the water was hot from the sun. Pull up a curtain and give each person two basins of water to take a shower. Hu Xingjun laughed and said that after returning to the station from the site, the whole person seemed to be rolling in the ashes, "The whole body is a thousand years old ash, especially dirty." Although wearing a two-layer mask, when I took it off, my face was black. ”
In the summer, it was fine to be able to take a bath with the hot water of the sun. In winter, the temperature is more than -20 degrees Celsius, and it is impossible to take a bath at the station. The team members could only find a guest house in the nearby County town of Yuli every 10 days to take turns to take a bath.
Ruins of the Flint in Kjak Kuduk
There are two roads from Keyak Kuduk Beacon to Yuli County: one is to drive more than 60 kilometers in the desert to reach the nearby provincial highway, and then from the provincial road to Yuli County; the other road is called Beishan Bendao.
The local section of the Beishan Road coincides with the North Silk Road of the Han Dynasty, the Middle Road of the Silk Road in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, the Da moraine Road of the Sui Dynasty, and the Loulan Road of the Tang Dynasty, which is a gravel road, which is extremely bumpy, and only large trucks and off-road vehicles that pull ore can walk.
"There are too many stones and sand and gravel on the road, and we often encounter punctures when we walk this road, and we often have to change tires." In fact, not only is the tire a problem, but the chassis steel plate of the pickup truck is often broken. In the 3 years of Kjack Kuduk Beacon, the pickup truck was replaced by more than 10 steel plates.
"But ah, when we take this road, it is very touching, we are walking the road that the ancients walked." At that time, the guards of the beacon had to go to the nearest county town, at least for a week. In contrast, we drove for 4 hours, which was considered lucky. ”
4
Sending acacia letters is the most beautiful love letter for everyone to give up a small home
Hu Xingjun said that he has been working at the Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region for 18 years, but he is not familiar with Urumqi, but he can mention the cultural relics in the Loulan area and the Taklamakan Desert. Because he works in desert areas all year round, "the family depends on lovers." ”
More than 1,000 years ago, in The Beacon of Koyakkuduk, there was also a Beacon who entrusted the affairs of the family to his wife. Archaeologists excavated an unsent letter from the site, and the husband advised "the woman not to be sad, to clean up the wheat and sheep, and not to fall."
Did Hu Xingjun also write to his wife that "a woman does not have to be worried"? He shook his head straightly: "Not now, with the family is an occasional video, often it is 'feed feed' a few times, and then it is stuck." ”
Nowadays, there is no longer any borrowing from Hongyan to pass on the book. But in the past, Hu Xingjun often wrote letters to his wife. Hu Xingjun's wife was his sister-in-law when he was studying at Sichuan University, a beautiful Chongqing girl. When he went to work in Xinjiang, his wife had not yet graduated, and the two could only express their concern and love through letters.
Hu Xingjun recalled, "At that time, the work station was in Ruoqiang County, and we had to drive to pull water once after a while. The written letter should be sent out in Ruoqiang County, and the letter needs to be sent to the Ruoqiang County Cultural and Sports Bureau first. "After writing the letter, it takes about half a month to deliver it to the other party. Although the road is tossed, it has become a long witness to the feelings of the two people.
Ruins of the Flint in Kjak Kuduk
"Desert archaeology, if the mind is a little lax, can not stay for a day." Hu Xingjun said. Because of this, in the desert archaeology work, he carried the spirit of "dead bumps" and opened the door of these sites to connect with the outside world little by little. Letters with his family became a relaxing moment in his busy work.
Standing in front of the precious Tang Dynasty paper documents in the studio, and recalling the family letter written at that time, Hu Xingjun was a little shy in his words: "Nowadays, people don't write much letters, and they may not be able to empathize with the emotions expressed in the family letters." ”
The selection of the Keyak Kuduk Beacon as one of the top ten new archaeological discoveries in the country in 2021 is a great encouragement for Xinjiang archaeologists, including Hu Xingjun. The beacon has been excavated for the longest time since he joined the work, and it is also the place where he has devoted the most effort to it except for the Xiaohe Cemetery.
Hu Xingjun still remembers the last day of this beacon, and his heart is very reluctant: "I wondered if there was a place that had not yet been excavated, so I circled around the sand pile several times." Look again, look again..."
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