Source: Spring City Evening News
Recently, a number of bronze artifacts including copper bells, bronze swords and copper cymbals have been newly discovered and excavated at the site of the ancient tomb group of Dadian Mountain AilaoGuo in Changning County, which is another time in the county after the excavation of bronze artifacts in the ancient tomb group of the Ailao State in Dadian Mountain in 2012.
The Reporter of Spring City Evening News-Kaiping News learned from the Changning County Cultural Relics Management Institute that it was Yang Zhimei, a villager in Longquan Community, Tianyuan Town, Changning County, who discovered and handed over this batch of precious cultural relics.
Artifacts are found when leveling the land
According to reports, the 60-year-old Yang Zhimei's family lives near Dadian Mountain, and he has been working in the fields near this area before. "I often go to the ancient tomb group protection area at the foot of Dadian Mountain to level the land, and in the process of retrieving the soil, I have successively turned over and found damaged bronzes, so I picked them up, loaded them, and collected them. Since last year, A total of more than 10 pieces have been picked up, large and small, and after sorting them out, I have now decided to hand them over to the cultural management office. ”
It is understood that among the batch of bronzes that Yang Zhimei found, sorted out, and handed over, there were well-preserved bronze bells, bronze swords, and bronze cymbals. According to the preliminary judgment of the local cultural relics staff, these cultural relics belong to the products of the ancient Ailao Kingdom more than 2,000 years ago.
The newly excavated cultural relics belong to the dadian mountain ancient tomb group
After being sorted out by the Changning County Cultural Management Office, Yang Zhimei handed over this batch of bronze cultural relics, including copper bells, copper swords, copper urchins, copper spears, copper face pattern copper machetes, copper boxes and other artifact fragments totaling more than ten pieces. Among them, there are two bronze bells, the more complete one is 43cm high and 22.5cm wide, and the body is decorated with sun and dragon patterns. There are 7 pieces of copper swords, all of which are bronze swords with mountain character grids, with a length of 41.5-18 cm and a width of 2-4 cm. There is 1 piece of copper, boot type, good preservation, height 20.5cm, blade length 21.5cm, the body is decorated with slash pattern. In addition, there are 2 pieces of copper spears, one with a length of 12.5 cm and a width of 3.3 cm, and the other with a length of 10 cm and a width of 2 cm, all without ornamentation.
After the relevant experts of the Ailao Bronze Culture Survey Team and Yang Zhimei learned in detail and went to the field to verify and confirm, these bronze cultural relics are from the Dadian Mountain Cemetery, and the collection site is outside the protection range of the Dadian Mountain Cemetery. The investigation team speculated that in the early years, the soil was pushed from the top of Dadian Mountain and the mountainside to be stacked outside the brick factory billet making workshop, ready to be used to make brick blanks, in the process the tomb was destroyed by bulldozers, and the burial products were buried with soil, which belonged to secondary accumulation. Due to the discovery and excavation of the Dadian Mountain cemetery at that time, the relevant departments ordered the brick factory to stop taking soil to burn bricks, so it was not discovered in time.
Yang Zhimei: I can't sell it for any amount of money I give
According to Yang Zhimei, from the beginning of the discovery of bronze artifacts, he knew that these artifacts should belong to protected cultural relics, so every time he found a piece, he carefully sorted out and collected it so as not to let these bronze artifacts be damaged again.
"Earlier, I heard that I had dug out bronzes, and many people had come to ask me and wanted to buy them with me." Yang Zhimei said: "I told them at that time that the bronzes belong to the national cultural relics, and I can't sell them for any money I give, but I have to give them all to the state." ”
Cultural Management Institute: Provide empirical evidence for the study of the culture of mourning
According to Zhang Yunfeng, director of the Changning County Cultural Management Institute, in 2012, the discovery of the ancient tomb group of Dadian Mountain attracted the attention of experts from relevant departments at the provincial, municipal and county levels. With the approval of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, the Yunnan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, together with the Baoshan City Museum, the Baoshan City Cultural Relics Management Institute, the Changning County Cultural Relics Management Institute and other units, began to carry out rescue archaeological excavations of the Dadian Mountain tomb group from October 2012 to March 2013.
"The excavation area is more than 2,500 square meters, 198 tombs of various types have been cleaned up, and 268 pieces (sets) of burial items have been unearthed. The excavated cultural relics include five varieties of bronze, iron, stone, pottery, amber and rattan, mainly bronze. Zhang Yunfeng said that on October 16, 2019, the Site of Dadian Mountain in Changning was approved by the State Council as the eighth batch of national key cultural relics protection units. According to the research of relevant experts, the Dadian Mountain Tomb Group is one of the important archaeological discoveries in Yunnan, and this tomb from discovery, protection to excavation and archaeological research will provide physical evidence for revealing the local culture of Changning and the bronze culture of Baoshan and even Ailao, and provide more detailed and scientific archaeological materials for the construction of the Ailao cultural system. ”
Zhang Yunfeng said that it is gratifying that Yang Zhimei, who discovered and handed over this batch of cultural relics, is only an ordinary farmer in Changning, which shows that with the development of the times, more and more people recognize the importance of cultural relics protection and can actively participate in the protection of cultural relics. "The batch of bronze cultural relics recently handed over by Yang Zhimei to our museum has greatly enriched the number and variety of cultural relics in the collection of Changning County, and will provide new physical materials for the future study of Ailao culture."
Source: Chuncheng Evening News - Kaiping News Reporter Cui Min Correspondent Wang Lixue Yang Jie Photo report