2021 is the Year of the Ugly Cow. Cattle have always had a very important position in China, because China has been a big agricultural country since ancient times, and there is a deeper study of farming nature, so cattle occupy a very important position in ancient China. Therefore Chinese has always had the custom of loving cattle, respecting cattle, and worshiping cattle. The totemic worship of cattle can be traced back to the period of Dayu Zhishui four thousand years ago. According to legend, when Dayu ruled the water, every time he cured a place, he would cast iron cattle into the water to deter flooding. In the Tang Dynasty, the iron bull was changed to be set on the shore. In ancient mythology, it is said that the cattle who work diligently all their lives and open up the land and open up the garden are the gods of the society who stole the grain of the Heavenly Garden and planted all the people to save the people of Li.
In the West, the bronze bull statue on Wall Street is one of the most important symbols of American capitalism. The bronze bull statue was designed by Italian artist Demodica after the 1987 New York stock market crash, and its moral meaning is to bless the stock market with a bullish future. Therefore, cattle have always occupied a very important position in both China and the West.
In the Year of the Ox, let's talk about the copper yak of Gansu Tianzhu, which is one of the few national treasures of Gansu Province. The bronze yak has a length of 118 cm, a front ridge height of 61 cm, a back height of 51 cm, an arm height of 52 cm, an abdominal diameter of 30 cm, a tail length of 30 cm, a horn length of 40 cm and a weight of 75 kg. Its shape stands on all four legs, listening to the heavens, showing a tranquil and thick simple temperament. It can be called an outstanding work in the history of bronze sculpture in China.
The bronze yak was excavated in June 1972 at the Xia Mentai Production Team of the Youai Brigade in Haxi Town, Tianzhu Tibetan Autonomous County, Gansu Province.
An accidentally unearthed copper yak was exhibited in the Gansu Provincial Museum in Chenglan, Gansu Province, which immediately caused a sensation in the cultural relics community, attracting a group of cultural relics experts and enthusiasts, and many well-known archaeologists, metal smelting experts, historians, ethnologists and cultural relics enthusiasts in China were overwhelmed by the superb casting skills and vivid body image of the copper yak. They agreed that this is a rare large copper yak unearthed in Our country so far.
The bronze yak has seen the light again, experienced the ups and downs of the sun and the moon, and also let the land be blessed overseas. Yak is known as the "boat of the plateau" and is well-deserved. Majestic snowy plateau, peaks and mountains, ravines and valleys, beaches like blankets, severe cold climate, thin air. Since ancient times, the Tibetan people have worked very hard to open up this "forbidden area of life" with great courage. Similarly, wild yaks have gradually been domesticated into domestic animals, becoming inseparable partners and an important source of food and life for the Tibetan people, and even becoming a "totem" revered by the tribe and worshipped. Yak is not only an important means of transport in an area of more than three thousand meters, but also the main supplier of milk, ghee, cheese and meat of the Snow Nation, with its strong and durable skin can be made into ropes, bags, boots and other supplies for production and life, and wool is woven into accounting rooms, bags and other supplies, and its meat, milk and wool can also be exchanged for grain and other daily necessities. The blood, horns, hair and bone of the yak have become industry, handicrafts, bone marrow can be made into bone marrow powder (calcium products), nourishing the human body, cow head, horn, tail and bone can be made into handicrafts. Throughout the years, yaks have quietly dedicated everything to the plateau people and made indelible contributions to the survival and development of the Tibetan nation. For this reason, why not erect a monument of history for it?
Huarui as the hometown of the white yak, located in the northeast of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, with an average altitude of more than 3,000 meters, where there are snowy mountains that do not change all year round, dense forests, and wide grasslands, so that this Tibetan ethnic settlement formed at the end of the Tang Dynasty took the yak as its most important living animal breed at the beginning, so that it could survive and develop, so this copper yak was unearthed in Tianzhu, it is no accident, this is an inevitable reflection of history, thanks to the ancient artists left us this valuable treasure.
So what dynasty did this precious work of art belong to, and who was its owner?
Some experts assert that the Tianzhu copper yak was the dowry of Princess Honghua of the Tang Dynasty. The argument is that on September 25, 2019, the Land and Resources Bureau of Tianzhu County, Gansu Province, while preparing land, found a brick chamber tomb on a hill surrounded by three mountains in the north, west and south of Chashan Village in Qilian Town, Gansu Province.
Who the owner of the tomb really was, and the "Tomb of Murong Fujun of the Great Zhou Dynasty" in the Yongdao provides an important clue. "Great Zhou" was the name of the state when Wu Zetian was proclaimed emperor. It can be seen that the tomb owner was buried between 690 and 705 AD; "Murong" was the surname of the Tuguhun royal family that ruled the Ganqing region.
As we all know, Tuguhun was a country located in the Qilian Mountains and the upper valleys of the Yellow River and Liangzhou during the Western Jin Dynasty to the Tang Dynasty. In 635, Emperor Taizong of Tang issued an edict to make Tuguhun officially a vassal state of the Tang Dynasty. In 663, TuboLu Dongzan invaded Tuguhun and the Tuguhun state was destroyed.
Not far from this cemetery, there is the tomb of Princess Honghua in Lama Bay in Qingzui Village, Nanying Township, Liangzhou. Since the reign of the Qing Dynasty, 9 epitaphs of Tuguhun in the Tang Dynasty have been found here, and 9 people have been buried, one of which is Princess Honghua.
Historical sources record that in the fourteenth year of Zhenguan (640), Tang Taizong Li Shimin married Princess Honghua to Tuguhun Khan Nuoyu Bowl. In the third year of Long Shuo (663), Tubo occupied the city of Fuqi (伏俟俟曷钵) and "took Liangzhou with thousands of accounts with the princess", and Tugu Hun destroyed the country.
Whether ancient or modern, the dowry is an indispensable element in the etiquette of marrying a woman. The dowry of a royal dowry is certainly not comparable to that of a subject. There is no doubt that the state dowry, which is related to the diplomatic relations between the two countries, is a state-level dowry. It became natural for the court to make sacrificial vessels such as the bronze yak, and to bring them into the lower marriage kingdom as the dowry of the next princess.
Of course, whether this conclusion is true or not, the excavation of this large copper yak fills the gap in the cultural relics of China's nomads, which is a rare and precious ancient work of art.