Appreciate the treasures of the thousand-year-old Jingchu culture

Hubei is located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, with a long history and a long cultural context, and is an important origin of ancient mankind, the birthplace of Chu culture, and the rich culture of the Three Kingdoms, which has played an important role in the origin and development of Chinese civilization. The fossils of "Founder Man" and "Yunxian Man" prove the long history of the hometown of human beings in the East; The Shijiahe culture in the Neolithic period represents the highest level of prehistoric civilization development in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River. The Tonglushan Mining and Metallurgical Site created the first peak of China's bronze civilization; The thriving Chu culture has created dazzling spiritual and material achievements; The turbulent division of the Three Kingdoms period staged a heroic legend that has been passed down through the ages; The remains of dozens of Ming Dynasty vassal kings show the abundance of material life in the Ming Dynasty; The magnificent revolutionary history of modern times has demonstrated the fearless spirit of daring to be the first in the world. On April 27, 2018, General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out when visiting the exhibition of fine cultural relics in the Hubei Provincial Museum: "Jingchu culture is an important part of the long-standing Chinese civilization and plays a pivotal role in the history of the development of Chinese civilization. ”

Hubei Provincial Museum, as a national key museum jointly built by the central and local governments, is known as the "Jingchu Cultural Center" and "National Cultural Living Room". There are more than 460,000 pieces (sets) of cultural relics in the collection, the system is complete, the characteristics of Jingchu are distinctive, forming the prehistoric cultural relics represented by the cultural relics of Qujialing and Shijiahe, the bronzes of the Shang and Zhou dynasties represented by the cultural relics of Panlong City and the Chu State and the Zeng State, the Warring States Qin and Han Dynasty slips represented by the bamboo slips of Zeng Hou Yi, the Chu slips of Baoshan and the Qin slips of the sleeping tiger land, and the cultural relics of the vassal kings of the Ming Dynasty represented by the tomb of King Liangzhuang and the tomb of King Yingjing, which enjoy a high reputation at home and abroad.

"The king of ancient musical instruments in the world" - Zeng Hou Yi chime

Zeng Hou Yi bell is the most well-known cultural relics in the collection of Hubei Provincial Museum, and is the largest, most well-preserved and best musical bronze bell found by archaeological discoveries so far, and is recognized as the representative of the ritual and music civilization in China's pre-Qin period.

In September 1977, a unit of the Wuhan Military Region of the Chinese People's Liberation Army expanded its factory in Dongtuanpo, in the territory of the Unity Brigade of the suburban commune of Suixian (now Suizhou City), Hubei Province. Signs of an ancient tomb were found during the blasting of the red sandstone hill on the leveling of the land, which was immediately reported to the local cultural department. In 1978, the archaeological team of the Hubei Provincial Museum began to carry out archaeological excavations. From the large number of bronze inscriptions unearthed from the tomb, it can be known that the owner of the tomb was a monarch named "B" in the early Warring States period.

When the bell was unearthed, it was displayed in the middle room of the tomb of Zeng Hou Yi, and was composed of 65 bells, including three different types of bells: button bells, Yong bells, and punium bells. The largest bell is 152.3 cm high and weighs 203.6 kg, and the smallest bell is 20.4 cm high, weighs 2.4 kg, and weighs about 5 tons.

The full set of chimes is divided into 3 layers and 8 groups suspended on a copper and wooden structure bell frame in the shape of a curved ruler. The bell body is cast by mud casting and sub-casting methods, and adopts technologies and processes such as brazing, casting and inlay, and wrong gold. There are a total of 3,755 inscriptions on the bells, bell frames, and hooks, which contain numbering, memoirs, phonetic transcriptions, and music theories such as sound names, order names, octave groups, and correspondence between the names of various countries.

Each bell has the acoustic characteristics of "one bell and two tones". One bell with two tones is an acoustic feature of pre-Qin Chinese bells, which means that the front and side of the drum can produce one tone each when struck the bell. Bells with this acoustic feature are usually in the shape of a shingle. This technique has been lost for thousands of years after the Han Dynasty. In the 70s of the last century, some music archaeologists discovered this phenomenon in the sound measurement of the Zhou Dynasty chimes, but it was not recognized by the academic community because there was no empirical evidence. After the excavation of the bell of Marquis Yi, the inscriptions of different pitches on the front and side of the drum confirm this great achievement of the pre-Qin chimes in China. Each piece of the bell has been finely tuned, and the two tones on the bell are in harmony with each other. This is a great invention of the ancients who have been exploring the pronunciation rules of bell and bell instruments for more than 2,000 years and honing the bell casting technology. In this long process of development, they have established the concept of harmony of "harmony and reality, and the same is not continuous".

The sound of Zeng Hou Yi's chimes has preserved the musical information of the time, with stable pitch, wide vocal range and grand system. It is contrasted with the inscription of the chime, which accurately confirms the content of the inscription, and the coexistence of the two shows that there was a rich musical content and a high level of music at that time. The inscription and musical information of the bell of Marquis Yi of Zeng are the only audio documents in the world in the 5th century BC, the only official music rhythm archives of pre-Qin China, and the earliest unearthed documents containing the mathematical relationship of music.

Witness the "first sword in the world" - Yue Wang Goujian sword

The sword of King Goujian of Yue is exquisitely made, the ornamentation is gorgeous, it is still extremely sharp after more than 2,400 years, it is an outstanding representative of the ancient bronze sword of the mainland, and it has become the treasure of the Hubei Provincial Museum.

In 1965, in order to cooperate with the water conservancy construction in Jingzhou, Hubei Province, cultural relics and archaeologists conducted archaeological surveys in relevant areas. They found the cemetery of the Chu State during the Warring States Period - the Wangshan Chu Tomb on the hill in the northeastern part of Baling Mountain, Jingzhou District, Jingzhou City. The sword of King Goujian of Yue is from the No. 1 tomb of Wangshan. When the sword was unearthed, it was inserted in a black lacquered wood scabbard, with two curved pieces of wood sandwiched near the head of the stem. When the archaeologists extracted the sword along with the scabbard and kept it indoors, they were struck by its sharpness and delicacy.

The Yue Wang Goujian sword is 55.7 cm long, 4.6 cm wide, and the hilt is 8.4 cm long. The body of the sword is decorated with a double-line pattern, and there are double-layered flowers with irregular edges at the intersection, which is dark gray, which is a common diamond-shaped pattern of Wu and Yue bronze weapons at that time. The grooves on both sides of the lattice are inlaid with pieces of turquoise and glass. The sword head cast has 11 concentric circles with a spacing of only 0.2 mm, and the thinnest concentric circle (the third line) is only 30 microns thick, which is thinner than a human hair.

To the surprise of archaeologists, there is also an eight-character "bird and insect book" inscription on the body of the sword. Due to the difficulty of interpretation, after more than 2 months of correspondence and discussion by scholars such as Guo Moruo, Xia Nai, Tang Lan, Chen Mengjia, Yu Xingwu, Rong Geng, Shang Chengzuo, Xu Zhongshu, Su Bingqi, Fang Zhuangyou, etc., it was finally determined that the inscription was "Yue Wang Goujian's self-acting sword", and then it was concluded that the original owner of this sword was Yue Wang Goujian.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, wars were frequent, and the atmosphere of aristocratic swords was very prosperous. With the advancement of bronze smelting and casting technology, the production process of swords has also become more developed. At this time, the swords of Wu and Yue were famous all over the world and were popular among the vassal states. This exquisite sword for Gou Jian's own use was unearthed in the core area of the Chu State, and it was inseparable from the surrounding situation of the vassal states at that time. In the struggle for hegemony in the late Spring and Autumn period, the Jin State used the State of Wu to contain the State of Chu, and the State of Chu united with the State of Yue to flank the State of Wu. Gou Jian, the king of Yue, gave the exquisite sword to the king of Chu, which may be a product of Yue's policy of forming a good alliance with Chu.

In short, the superb casting and decoration technology of the Yue King Goujian sword embodies the developed scientific and artistic level of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. At the same time, it also reflects the exchanges and interactions between the civilizations of various regions of the mainland in the pre-Qin period, and is an important material evidence of the vigorous vitality of Chinese civilization in the early period.

The first systematically discovered legal document of the Qin Dynasty - Sleeping Tiger Land Qin Jian

The Sleeping Tiger Qin Slip is the first Qin Slip discovered in the archaeological history of the mainland and has the largest number of words published in full at present. Most of its contents are laws and documents before and after the unification of China by Qin in 221 B.C., involving the political, economic, cultural, military and other aspects of the time, providing unprecedented rich materials for the study of the history from the late Warring States period to the Qin Dynasty, and are precious cultural relics that witness the historical process of the "great unification" of the mainland.

The Sleeping Tiger Cemetery is located in the western part of the county seat of Yunmeng County, Hubei Province. Between November 1975 and January 1976, archaeologists excavated 12 Qin tombs at the Sleeping Tiger Land cemetery. Among them, tomb No. 11 was buried in the thirtieth year of Qin Shi Huang (217 BC). The owner of the tomb was a low-ranking official of the Qin State, named "Xi". Xi is a Qin person who came south after the Qin occupied this place, participated in local government affairs, and once went out to fight with the army, and was one of the tens of millions of soldiers in the Qin Unification War.

The bamboo slips are stacked in an orderly manner from the head, right side, abdomen and feet of the tomb owner, and most of them are well preserved. The length of each group is between 23 and 28 cm, the width is 0.5-0.6 cm, and the thickness is 0.1 cm. Judging from the remaining traces of bamboo slips, they were all woven into a book with a thin rope divided into three paths: upper, middle and lower, and placed in a volume around the body of the tomb owner. The discovery of the Sleeping Tiger Qin Jian provides a physical basis for the discussion of the Qin book system.

After sorting and restoring, a total of 1,155 bamboo slips (another 80 fragments). There are a total of 10 kinds of contents, including "Chronicles", "Book of Words", "Eighteen Kinds of Qin Laws", "Imitation Laws", "Miscellaneous Copies of Qin Laws", "Legal Questions and Answers", "Sealed Diagnosis Style", "The Way of Officials", and 2 kinds of "Book of Days" A and B. Most of the contents belong to the Qin Law, which is the first systematic Qin Law discovered in the mainland, from which it can be seen that the Qin Law has carried out detailed regulations on the political, economic, life, and military aspects of the Qin people, so that the behavior of all classes of agriculture, industry and commerce has laws to follow. It had a profound impact on traditional Chinese law during the Han Dynasty and beyond, more than 800 years before the Tang Dynasty Law and Discussion.

Other contents, such as the "Chronicle", chronicle the major events such as the war to unify the six kingdoms from the first year of King Qin Zhao (306 BC) to the thirtieth year of Qin Shi Huang (217 BC), and at the same time record the life of the tomb owner Xi and related matters. The Book of Languages is a document issued by Nanjun Shouteng to various counties and provinces, emphasizing the use of Qin law to change the old cultural customs of Chu. The "Sealed Diagnosis Style" is mainly an official document record format for the investigation, inspection, interrogation and other procedures of the case. Among them, the materials on forensic examination are about 1500 years earlier than the forensic science work of the Southern Song Dynasty. "The Way of Officials" is mainly some basic principles and moral norms that officials should abide by. The main content of the "Book of Days" is the selection of time and day, which is a compilation of daily methods for seeking good fortune and avoiding evil, and is also an important material for the study of ancient social life. The first type of "Book of Days" of Qin Jian in Sleeping Tiger Land is the most complete and best-preserved "Book of Days" material seen so far.

In the late Warring States period, after Qin occupied Chu Yunmeng's hometown, Qin and Chu cultures gradually merged, and finally merged into the torrent of Chinese civilization. Qin Jian is a vivid reflection of this historical process.

As the "national tide fever", "museum fever" and "research fever" continue to heat up, more and more people enter the museum. Hubei Provincial Museum has always adhered to the concept of "people-oriented", told the story of Jingchu with innovative and diversified means and elegant and popular ways, and promoted the creative transformation and innovative development of Jingchu culture. In 2023, the Hubei Provincial Museum will compile and release a three-year exhibition plan (2023-2025) to scientifically build a cultural relics activation and utilization system with exhibitions as the core, and coordinate the related work of "exhibition + social education, + cultural creativity, + academic", and at the same time, take multiple measures to continuously innovate the content and form of cultural relics activation and utilization. Through the excavation of characteristic IP, the total number of cultural and creative products developed has exceeded 2,000, and products such as chime egg noodles, architectural refrigerator magnets, and plush "Yue Wang Goujian Sword" have become "Internet celebrities" sought after by the audience. Relying on the core collections such as musical instruments unearthed from the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng and Qin Jian of the Sleeping Tiger, we will create cultural brands such as chime music and dance, and ritual music school, so as to effectively enhance the beautiful experience of visiting and "bring home the memories of the museum". Through 3D scanning modeling, virtual exhibitions, interactive experiences, immersive holographic dramas, etc., we will strengthen the empowerment of science and technology and realize the multi-form "life" of cultural relics.

(The author is Secretary of the Party Committee and Director of Hubei Provincial Museum)