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In November 1994, the Xuzhou Municipal Bureau of Cultural Relics sent archaeological experts to excavate the Lion Rock Han Tomb, and the owner of the tomb was Liu Wu, the third king of Chu in the Western Han Dynasty.
At the beginning of the excavation, experts found that the tomb was surrounded by robber holes, and it was clear that the tomb had been stolen several times.
But when the tomb was dug up, the archaeologists found that there were many copper coins and jade pieces scattered around, which made everyone excited. Afterwards, experts dug up more than 2,000 cultural relics such as golden jade clothes, jade dragons, jade bi, and seals in this Han tomb, including 1760,000 copper coins!
Many people are curious about why tomb robbers don't take these jade pieces and copper coins that are priceless and scattered in the tomb passages
In fact, although the tomb robbers are engaged in stealing chickens and dogs, they also have unwritten rules that gold, silver and jewelry can be taken, but only 2 things cannot be touched!
Ancient Chinese tomb robbery culture
Tomb robbing originated from the ancient Chinese custom of thick burials, where the ancients believed that death is not the end of life, and that the soul will start over in another world.
For the dignitaries and nobles, in order to continue to enjoy a luxurious life in the world after death, they would bury the gold and silver, jewelry, calligraphy and paintings that they loved in their lifetime in the tomb.
However, these gold, silver and jewelry were innumerable treasures for tomb robbers, and tomb robbing began as early as the Warring States period.
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, tomb robbers turned from rats spurned by everyone to public officials. It turned out that in order to raise military salaries, Cao Cao set up the official position of "Touching the Gold Captain", and the main responsibility of the Touching Gold Captain was to dig up the tombs of nobles and steal the gold, silver and jewelry.
To this day, there have been several sects of tomb robbers, each with a different way of robbing tombs.
1. Touching the gold pie.
The gold school is also established by Cao Cao, this sect has many rules, such as entering the ancient tomb after lighting a candle in the southeast corner, and not robbing the tomb after hearing the rooster's crow.
Everyone in the Touching Gold School is a master of Feng Shui, and they also have mastered the skill of tomb robbing, looking for possible ancient tombs from the mountains and wilderness.
2. Moving mountains.
As the name suggests, the mountain-moving sect is good at using force to rob tombs, and its history is very long, although the gang members do not understand feng shui, but through a variety of crude tomb robbery methods to obtain gold and silver treasures, but because of the great damage to the ancient tombs, it attracts the contempt of other sects.
3. Faqiu faction.
Most of the members of the Faqiu faction are middle-class people in society, such as antique dealers, shopkeepers, low-level **, etc., who know how to use their connections and resources to rob tombs. Every time before robbing the tomb, they will hold a copper seal engraved with "no taboos", looking forward to being able to restrain the ** power.
4. The Unloading faction.
Most of the members of this sect are ruffians and bullies, but they are very good at feng shui mechanisms and formation methods. During the Yuan Dynasty, members of the Jieling faction tried to excavate the tomb of Genghis Khan and destroy its feng shui to overthrow the Yuan Dynasty regime, but they were bloodied by the court officers and soldiers.
But no matter which sect it is, there is an unwritten rule circulating in the tomb robbery world: gold, silver and jewelry can be taken casually, but only copper coins and jade cannot be moved, why is this?
Copper coins are not to be taken
Copper money is the main circulation currency of our ancient society, after Qin Shi Huang unified the six countries, the currency was changed to the general outer circle and the inner square half two coins, since then the copper coins of the past dynasties have changed, the style of coinage remains unchanged.
After the death of the dignitaries and nobles, in order to continue to maintain a luxurious life, they would be buried with a large number of copper coins. In addition, copper coins are also considered to be the money to buy roads in the afterlife, which can protect the deceased from ascending to Elysium early.
Therefore, in ancient times, powerful families would bury a large number of copper coins for the deceased, and the more money, the better, which not only allowed the deceased to avoid disasters, but also made the family prosperous and wealthy.
In 2011, archaeologists excavated the tomb of Liu He, the king of Changyi in the Western Han Dynasty, in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, although the tomb of the Marquis of Haiyang was stolen more than 1,000 years ago, archaeologists still unearthed 2 million copper coins, which surprised everyone, why did the tomb robbers have no interest in copper coins?
1. The copper coin has "expired".
For tomb robbers, most of the tombs they robbed were the tombs of previous dynasties, and the style of copper coins varied from dynasty to dynasty.
Even if the copper coins are stolen, the currency of the previous dynasty has become invalid and has no use value at all.
It has been suggested that coins could be melted down to mint coins, but this is a big mistake. In ancient times, the government strictly investigated the act of minting money without permission, and once discovered, it might be beheaded.
Most of the tomb robbers are greedy for life and afraid of death, and they only seek money and not their lives, so naturally they will not do this kind of murderous thing.
2. The value is not high.
Copper coins were not worth much in ancient times, such as during the Qing Dynasty, 1,000 copper coins were equal to 1 tael**, and 8 taels ** could be exchanged for one tael**. And in terms of today's purchasing power, a copper coin is equivalent to 2-4 cents today.
Compared to the *** copper coins in the ancient tombs, it is worthless. The most important thing is that copper coins are large and difficult to carry, and tomb robbers have limited time to rob tombs, and once they are on the same coin, they may be discovered.
For example, the Han Dynasty stipulated that once a tomb robbery was discovered, it would be exiled to the frontier at least and beheaded at worst.
In the Tang Dynasty, tomb robbers dug up ancient tombs would be exiled for 1,500 kilometers and labor for 3 yearsThose who open the coffin of the owner of the tomb will be directly executed, and those who attempt to rob the tomb will be exiled for 3 years.
Obviously, tomb robbers could not joke with their lives, so they naturally did not dare to steal copper coins that were not of high value and could easily reveal themselves.
Why don't you dare to steal "jade".
Jade is a symbol of beauty in ancient China, as early as the Spring and Autumn Period, jade was referred to as a gentleman, whose emperor had the purest white jade, ** according to the identity of different equipped with different styles of jade.
It can be said that all those who have jade and jade in the burial goods in the ancient tombs are either rich or noble and have a noble status during their lifetime.
Since jade is so important, why don't tomb robbers who are not afraid of heaven and earth dare not steal jade?
There is such a rumor in the tomb robbery world: Zhang Laosan, the captain of the gold school, inadvertently touched a piece of jade during a tomb robbery, and the whole tomb became dark and gloomy.
The reason why Zhang Laosan was afraid was also because the ancients believed that jade was not just a stone, it was a spiritual thing.
In the Book of Mountains and Seas, it is said: "Jade is born in mountains and rivers, and it is transformed by **." "In the eyes of the ancients, jade is a spiritual creature brewed from the essence of heaven and earth, as long as it is worn on the body, it can protect the owner and help it save the day.
In the funerary culture, jade is a very important funerary object, many people believe that after death, the soul will gather in the jade to continue to exist, this statement makes tomb robbers very afraid, they dare not steal jade at will, for fear that they or their family will suffer the curse of the tomb owner.
After all, even if a tomb robber dares to steal a jade pendant, he may not be able to sell it. After all, in ancient times, jade was a very valuable item, only the rich and noble could have it, and jade was highly recognizable, once the tomb robbers sold it leaked, they might be retaliated against and hunted down by the descendants of the tomb owner.
Intensify the crackdown on grave robbing
For ordinary tomb robbers, they will follow the unwritten rules in the tomb robbery circle, but for Cao Cao, Sun Dianying and other "military thieves", ignoring the laws and regulations of the current dynasty, tomb robbery can be described as unscrupulous, and nothing will be spared.
For example, Sun Dianying, as a Jiangyang thief in modern times, looked at the object of tomb robbery to the Empress Dowager Cixi.
Cixi, as the ruler of the late Qing Dynasty, controlled the Qing Dynasty for more than 60 years, and she attached great importance to her mausoleum, spending more than ten years and countless sums of money to build the mausoleum, and after her death, she was eager to move all the gold and silver treasures into the mausoleum.
But Cixi rested in the tomb for more than ten years, and the Jiangyang thief Sun Dianying launched tomb robbery work in the Qingdong Mausoleum in the name of military Xi, and used more than 20 trucks to pull seven days and seven nights to clean up the treasures in Cixi's tomb.
In contemporary times, tomb robbing still exists.
In order to protect China's traditional cultural heritage, in recent years, China has also improved the legal system, focusing on cracking down on tomb robbery, regardless of whether the tomb robbers are the best cultural relics, they have been dealt with strictly.
The cultural relics department should also increase publicity efforts, so that the public can know the special historical value of cultural relics, promote the public's awareness of supervision and protection, and jointly protect cultural relics through the participation of the whole people, so that historical and cultural heritage can continue to be inherited.