By the middle and late Western Han Dynasty, great changes had taken place in the structure of tombs. The tombs of "cutting mountains for tombs" are mostly horizontal points, which are divided into ear rooms, front rooms and back rooms. The vertical cave tomb is built of bricks and stones. The shape and structure completely imitate the houses, palaces and courtyards in real life. This kind of tomb acts as a coffin, so there is only a coffin in the tomb, and there is no coffin. In these tombs, most of the walls are painted with colorful murals or molded brick portraits, while in the tombs with stone structures, most of them are carved portraits. Murals have a wide range of themes, except gods, monsters and historical stories, which mainly show various life scenes of the emperor before his death.
Since the reign of Emperor Gaozu in the Western Han Dynasty, for political purposes, many buried tombs have been set up in all tombs, called "buried tombs", forming a large-scale buried cemetery. Most of the people buried with him were imperial envoys and relatives of the country at that time. According to records, Xiao He, Cao Can, Sean and other founding fathers were buried with Changling. There are famous tombs such as Wei Qing and Huo Qubing. Most of the tombs of the buried people were given by the emperor, and each tomb has a cemetery, a garden city and an ancestral hall. Some people also buried their descendants next to their father's grave, forming a family cemetery. The higher the status of the buried person, the closer it is to the emperor's tomb, and the higher the enclosure. Judging from the status and identity of the people buried with the emperor in the Western Han Dynasty, the tombs of Emperor Gaozu, Emperor Wudi and Xuan Di are mostly important officials and celebrities in the imperial court. However, in the late Western Han Dynasty, Emperor Cheng and Emperor Ai were buried with consorts, concubines and imperial secretaries. This situation reflects the ups and downs and changes of politics in the Han Dynasty from one side.
The Han Dynasty was the most popular period in the history of China. Including treasures, funerary wares, pottery figurines, chariots and horses, grain, etc. There are all kinds of articles in front and behind.
Although so many excavations have been made, the archaeological community is still more interested in Maoling. First, Mausoleum has been built for more than half a century, and its internal organs are very heavy, so it is difficult to get in, and the funerary objects cannot be stolen. Second, early grave robbery only valued gold, silver and jewelry. Some ancient books, utensils and other cultural relics used by people at that time were not taken seriously and would stay in the underground palace.
After more than a year of on-the-spot investigation, archaeologists finally figured out the overall layout of the mausoleum of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty.
In the 1940s, an American pilot happened to see a pyramid-like building in the northwest of Xi 'an. He called these buildings "Oriental Pyramids". He and his flight crew only regard these buildings as navigation landmarks because they don't know what monuments they are. This "pyramid" is the tomb of Liu Che, the emperor of the Han Dynasty.
In April this year, after more than a year's field investigation, the archaeologists of Shaanxi Archaeological Research Institute finally completed the exploration of the mausoleum of Liu Che, the Emperor of the Han Dynasty, and found out the overall layout of this mausoleum, which was considered by historians to be the longest-ruled, most fruitful and fruitful mausoleum in the history of feudal society in China.
"There were 1 1 emperors in the Western Han Dynasty. According to our archaeological investigation and historical documents, the things buried with Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty are the most abundant, and it is impossible to put them in the mausoleum before his death. At that time, the grave robbers stole the funerary objects. " Jiao Nanfeng, president of Shaanxi Archaeological Research Institute and captain of the Han Tomb Archaeological Team, said in an interview with Beijing Science and Technology News.
According to legend, there are more than 30 volumes of jade clothes, jade boxes, jade sticks and miscellaneous classics read by Emperor Wu, all of which are packed in gold boxes and buried together.
Now, archaeologists are most optimistic about Liu Che's gold and jade clothes. Liu Xin's Miscellanies of Xijing in the Western Han Dynasty recorded that "when Emperor Wu died, jade boxes were all made of pearls, shaped like armor and connected by gold thread. In Zigong, Emperor Wudi had cicada jade in his mouth and a gold box on his back. The boxes are engraved with the images of the dragon bending phoenix and the fish forest, which is called the jade box of the dragon in the world. " It is said that Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was tall and fat, wearing a large jade coat, with a total length of 1.88 meters. There were about 2,498 pieces of jade, and the gold thread of the jade was more than two kilograms. Emperors and nobles in the Han Dynasty wore "jade clothes" (also known as "jade boxes") when they died and were buried. They are made of many jade pieces with small holes in the four corners, woven with gold, silver or copper wires, which are called "golden wisp jade clothes", "silver wisp jade clothes" and "copper wisp jade clothes" respectively.
■ Although there have been many excavations, the archaeological community is still optimistic about Maoling.
According to historical records, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty 16 years old succeeded to the throne, and the mausoleum was built in the second year BC 139. According to legend, Liu Che, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, found a unicorn-shaped animal and a long-lived fruit tree near Maoxiang during a hunting. He decided that Maoxiang was a treasure trove of geomantic omen, so he wrote a letter to enclose it and began to build a mausoleum. While creating great achievements, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty also expanded his mausoleum. In February 57 BC, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, who was 7 1 year old, was finally buried in Maoling after 18 days. Maoling stopped construction. At this time, Maoling has been built for 53 years, and all the trees originally planted have grown into towering trees. During the Western Han Dynasty, the mausoleum of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was called "Maoling" because it belonged to Maoxiang in Li Huai County.
Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty died, and there was no peace after his burial. According to the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, after the peasant rebel Red Forest Army captured Chang 'an, it burned down the palace and "dug the grave to get its treasure". The treasures in the mausoleum have been moved for dozens of days, but "the objects in the mausoleum still cannot be halved". Later, the rebels ran out of money and stole Maoling. At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Dong Zhuo also stole Maoling. He asked Lu Bu to find a secret recipe for treating the dumb when he entered Maoling. It turned out that his granddaughter Dong Bai was dumb. At the end of the Tang Dynasty, Huang Chao had no money to use during the uprising, and he also went to Maoling. During the Republic of China, Sun Lianzhong, a warlord, built a trench on the mausoleum, which was suspected of robbing the tomb. However, there are no specific written records of these tomb robbery stories, and no one can tell how many treasures there are in the mausoleum.
Although so many excavations have been made, the archaeological community is still optimistic about Maoling. First, Maoling has been built for more than half a century, and its internal organs are heavy, so it is difficult to get in and the funerary objects cannot be stolen; Second, early grave robbery only valued gold, silver and jewelry. Some ancient books, utensils and other cultural relics used by people at that time were not taken seriously and would stay in the underground palace.
■ There are more than 400 kinds of burial pits in the Mausoleum of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, more than those found in the Mausoleum of Qin Shihuang.
At present, what archaeologists want to know most is what it looks like under the mausoleum covering an area of nearly 60 thousand square meters. Understanding this layout is very important for protecting this cultural relic. After exploration, the mausoleum sits west to east as a whole. The mausoleum of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty is located in the center of the mausoleum, with double walls inside and outside. There are more than 50 buried tombs on both sides of Sima Road, and the tomb guards are located in the northeast of the cemetery.
Ma, the vice captain of the archaeological team of the Han Tomb, told people that the shape of the tomb is "Asian", and there is a pyramid-shaped mound in the middle of the enclosure on all sides, and the plane is trapezoidal.
Jiao Nanfeng believes that historically, every emperor who has made great achievements will inherit the system of his ancestors on the one hand, but we can also find from the information we have now that he has actually begun to seek changes in layout according to his own contributions. For example, since the Western Han Dynasty, hidden pits (commonly known as burial pits) have been set up on the outer layer of the mausoleum. A lot of things were put in the pit, representing the bureaucrats and troops of the Han Dynasty. The emperor took these things to another world to continue his life. Through this drilling survey, it is found that Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty has changed a lot compared with the previous Gaozu, Wendi and Jingdi. The number of hidden pits outside Jingdi Yangling has greatly increased, reaching 183. In Maoling, up to now, the number of various buried pits has reached more than 400. In fact, it's not just the mausoleum of Qin Shihuang.
Another change is the change in the layout of burial pits. The burial pits of Emperor Gaozu and Emperor Han Jingdi are located in the east of the mausoleum, and some are located in the north. Jiao Nanfeng said: "This can be said to be a system in the early Western Han Dynasty. The emperor faces east, and ministers stand on both sides of the east. When we arrived at Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, we speculated that he had a large number of burial pits not only in the east and north, but also in the west and south. We speculate that this reflects the idea that Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty takes me as the center. This should be said to be a new stage in the development of the Mausoleum of the Western Han Dynasty. "
■ This investigation not only found Maoling Town, but also found the cemetery of Xiuling people. In addition, this survey also found Maoling Town. Jiao Nanfeng said that this was an accidental discovery of this investigation. According to previous archaeological studies of Han tombs, all tombs in the Han Dynasty should have tombs guarding the tombs, but the tombs of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty have not been found before. "We were lucky to find Maolingyi in this investigation." Dozens of Li Fang were found in Maolingyi, among which the southeast was a pottery workshop area. We focused our exploration on south-central China, and found many residential sites, with architectural relics scattered around.
Another important discovery is the cemetery of spiritual practitioners. Ma, the vice captain, said that the Maoling cemetery is located in the south of Nanfang Town, about 4 kilometers west of Maoling. In 1970s, when the local people leveled the land, they found a large number of skeletons with iron instruments of torture. According to the people present at that time, these bones were buried in mass graves with different heads, some even stacked together, and some were half kneeling and half squatting. Maoling Museum has a small number of iron instruments of torture collected here in those days. Ma said: "According to the clues provided by the masses, we conducted investigation and drilling in the south of the village in June 5438+ 10, 2007, and found a large number of small tombs with dense tombs in an area of about 40,000 square meters. These tombs are1.8-2.0m long, 0.4-0.6m wide and 2.0-3.0m deep, with a spacing of 0.2-0.5m.. According to this density, it is estimated that more than 20,000 bones are buried in this cemetery. "
Maoling is the mausoleum of Liu Che, the emperor of the Western Han Dynasty. Located in Maoling Village, Xingping City (formerly Xingping County), 40 kilometers northwest of Xi City. Now it is a national key cultural relics protection unit. It was built from 139 BC to the first 87 years, lasting 53 years. In the second year of Jianyuan (BC 139), Liu Che built Shouling here and was buried here after his death in 87 BC. Liu Che, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, is a very talented feudal emperor who can be compared with Qin Shihuang in history. When he was in power, it was the heyday of the Han Empire. He adopted the grand strategy of rewarding farming, developing production, enriching Qiang Bing and fighting against Xiongnu. At the same time, he strengthened centralization of authority politically, and economically implemented the government-run system of salt boiling, iron smelting, transportation and marketing, water conservancy construction, agriculture development and foreign trade development. Fighting against Xiongnu militarily opened the way to the western regions, firmly controlled the Hexi Corridor and reached Hainan in the south, which basically formed the pattern of the living space of the Chinese nation, thus making the Han Empire stand in the east of the world with a unified and prosperous attitude. The building of the mausoleum is magnificent, and the sacrificial objects in the tomb are extremely luxurious and rich. Historically, it has been said that "money, animals and birds, fish and turtles, cattle and horses, tigers and leopards, and raw birds are all hidden". According to legend, the tomb contains the golden carved jade clothes, jade boxes and jade sticks of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. At that time, there were sacrificial halls and sleeping halls in the cemetery, as well as houses where ladies-in-waiting and grave keepers lived. There used to be 5,000 people who managed the cemetery here, responsible for watering trees and sweeping sacrifices. Moreover, Maoling County was built in the southeast of Maoling, and many civil and military ministers and rich households moved in, with a population of more than 277,000. Maoling's paddock is bucket-shaped, with the existing residual height of 46.5 meters, the base side of the tomb is 240 meters long, and the cemetery is square, with the side length of about 420 meters. Up to now, there are three tombs in the east, west and north, and the tombs of Li Furen, Wei Qing, Huo Qubing, Huo Guang and Jin Ridi are buried with the tomb of Lingzhou. It is the largest imperial mausoleum in the Han Dynasty, with the longest construction time and the richest funerary objects. It is called the "Pyramid of China". Nine of the Western Han emperors1/kloc-0 were originally buried in Xianyang. Mausoleums are arranged in turn from west to east, nearly a hundred miles long and magnificent.