Chu kingdom cloud pattern copper forbidden
The State of Chu was originally a small southern Yi country between the Han River and was not valued by people. In the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, the princes could not attend the meeting during the alliance, and were only sent to do the chores of guarding the lights. Since then, it has often been attacked by the Zhou royal family. Zi Ge, the minister of Chu, said: "Once upon a time, our former king Xiong Xuan was in a secluded area of Jingshan Mountain, riding a chai cart (筚路), wearing torn clothes (blue wisps), opening up overgrown mountains and forests, and paying tribute to the Zhou royal family with bows made of peach wood and arrows made of jujube wood.", which shows the hardships of that year. Until the beginning of the Spring and Autumn Period when King Wen of Chu (reigned 689 BC - 677 BC), it was a small country with "no more than the same land" (a hundred miles in all directions).
However, in the Spring and Autumn Period, the social and economic development of the south was very rapid, and from the archaeological materials, its level of productivity was not lower than that of the Central Plains countries, and in some respects it also achieved a leading position.
The State of Chu is located in the Jianghan Plain, with good natural conditions and relatively developed agriculture. Iron tools, which play a very important role in agricultural development, were also used relatively early in Chu, only in Changsha, in the Spring and Autumn tombs excavated today, several pieces of iron tools were unearthed, including iron mines, shovels, tassels and other tools and weapons such as daggers and steel swords. In 1977, a 3.25-kilogram cast iron ding was unearthed in a Spring and Autumn Warring States tomb in Yaoling. Such a large cast iron product is still the first time to be found in China. Cast iron must have a temperature of 1150 degrees Celsius to 1300 degrees Celsius to be smelted, reflecting that the Chu state has a good grasp of the technology of controlling high temperatures. Cast iron is liquid when it is baked and can be cast into various shapes at will. It has few impurities and a hard texture, allowing it to be used in bulk to make strong and sharp tools. The production of cast iron is a major leap in iron smelting technology, and Western countries did not develop from block ironmaking to the cast iron stage until the 14th century AD, later than 1900 years in China, and iron tools made it possible to cultivate a larger area of farmland.
The Chu people also attach great importance to water conservancy and irrigation. King Zhuang of Chu ordered Yin Sun Shu'ao to block the Rushui and build the Sipi Irrigation Project, which is the earliest recorded water conservancy construction in China.
The bronze smelting and casting industry in the Chu state is quite developed. In Jiuqu bend, Mayang County, Hunan Province, 5 copper mines in the Chu State were found in the Spring and Autumn Period, which were opened from the top of the mountain and followed the direction of the ore vein, and the oblique well method was used. The well is 2-4 meters wide and 1.2-1.5 meters high, and the pillars in the well are made of 15-20 cm diameter log columns to ensure safety. Hubei Daye Copper Green Mountain Copper Mine, which began to be mined from the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, until the Warring States period. In mining, the principles of engineering mechanics have been used for well and lane support to ensure the safety of producers. Underground opening adopts the combination of shafts, inclined shafts, inclined alleys and flat alleys, which initially solves a series of technical problems such as ventilation, drainage, lifting, and lighting. Copper smelting shaft furnaces, 1.2-1.5 meters high, can be concluded that there are three in the Spring and Autumn Period. The vertical furnace body is raised to make iron blast furnaces. Here is a large copper mine in the Chu state, and from the slag left behind, it is estimated that more than 400,000 tons of ore are mined and more than 100,000 tons of copper can be smelted.
The bronze of the Chu State is of excellent quality and is a good material for making weapons, so it is forbidden to flow out. In 642 BC (the eighteenth year of the Duke of Lu), Zheng Wengong arrived in Chu, and King Cheng of Chu gave him some copper materials, and at the same time agreed with Wen that this batch of copper was not allowed to make weapons, and Zheng Guo had to use it to make 3 copper bells.
In bronze casting technology, the Chu state was also at the forefront at that time. The bronze ware of the Chu Kingdom has a beautiful shape, exquisite pattern, smooth and vivid, and is full of rich life atmosphere. From 1978 to 1979, a number of tombs of Chu nobles in the middle of the Spring and Autumn Period were found in the Huaichuanxia Temple in Henan, and the bronze inscription excavated from Tomb No. 2 contained the name of Prince Wuhe. Prince Noon is king Kang's time ling yin zi geng, and if it is probably after the prince noon, he is Ling Yin's xuezi feng. There are more than 700 pieces of bronzes here, and a variety of casting methods are used to combine hun casting, sub-casting and hun casting and sub-casting. There is a copper ban and two pieces of copper on the cup, which are cast by the lost wax method. This method is to make a model of the utensils to be made by making a fusible mold material (wax), which can be finely carved because the wax is soft. The prepared wax model is then coated with liquid mold mud for the cast bronze and hardened into a shell. Repeat it many times, and it becomes a thicker shell. The outer fan is heated, the wax melts and flows out, that is, it becomes a fan, and a liquid bronze liquid is poured into it to form a complex artifact. The resulting utensils are smooth in appearance and dimensionally accurate. Modern people use this method to cast highly sophisticated artifacts such as aircraft engines, missiles, and instruments. The lost wax method used in the Chu Tomb of the Lower Temple is a metal casting method adopted in China and the world.
The mathematical level of the Chu state can be seen from Sun Shu'ao's construction of Yicheng. In 598 BC (the eleventh year of Lu Xuangong), King Zhuang of Chu sent troops north to attack the Song Dynasty, and asked Ling Yinsun Shu'ao to complete the task of building Yicheng within a month, and the feudal people in charge of building planned the size of the city, Situ calculated the number of ten parties needed, took the soil far and near, and then decided how much manpower was needed, how much rations each person brought, and what tools to prepare. Due to the careful planning, the results were completed on time.
These important achievements of the Chu State in science and technology are an important part of the excellent culture of the Chinese nation, and are also the material basis for the Chu State to compete with Qi and Jin for a long time during the Spring and Autumn Period.
The State of Chu, which had a strong material force, gradually annexed the surrounding small countries during the periods of King Wu of Chu, King Wen, King Cheng, and King Mu, and had developed from a small country that used to be "blue wisps of the road, set up in Jingshan, and enlightened the mountains and forests" to a large country that dominated the Jianghan Dynasty, coveted the Central Plains, and was thousands of miles away.