Chapter 1084 – Mourning and Burial

“Elder brother, history books say that Chinese burials began in the Central Plains, it’s really true, just through the Yu Province, from the Yangshao culture to the Ming and Qing Dynasty burials can be seen in almost all of them, I don’t know how many ancient civilizations are still buried under the ground!”

A line of three cars drove out of Henan, into the territory of Shaanxi, sitting in the head of the car Zhuang Rui is chatting with Dr. Ren, this field archaeological action, Zhuang Rui himself out of two cars, in addition to a van of the Institute of Archaeology of the Beijing University, used to carry excavation tools and other supplies.

A week ago, Zhuang Rui took Dr. Ren and three graduate students from Beijing University, and set off from the capital, passing through Hebei on the way to the territory of Henan.

Unlike the previous times they came to Henan, this time Zhuang Rui and his group almost didn’t enter the city, and almost all of them spent their time in the field, no matter if it was the historical tombs that had already been excavated, or the places that were suspected to have tombs in them, all of them left Zhuang Rui’s footprints.

“In fact, many of the many antique treasures left behind now, itself is a martyrdom product, that is, what we call Ming ware (plutonium), if there is no burial system, it is estimated that a lot of objects will not be made, Zhuang Rui, there are a lot of things in this connection, you learn more about the origins of the Chinese tombs, you engage in the collection is also a great benefit. ”

When Dr. Ren was studying for his doctorate, his main research direction was the origin as well as the development of Chinese tombs, and he was extremely knowledgeable about the period of existence of each tomb and the social formations of that time.

Almost every place he visited, Dr. Ren was able to explain to Zhuang Rui what kind of people lived here how many years ago, as far as thousands of years ago, as close as the end of the Qing Dynasty, there was no place that Dr. Ren did not know.

This makes Zhuang Rui greatly admire the teacher Professor Meng is also secretly grateful, he knows that this is the teacher deliberately arranged, so that the knowledgeable brother to assist themselves, and strive to make their first excavation activities more successful.

The reason why in Henan stayed a week, is because Zhuang Rui want to systematically understand the origin of Chinese burial, in practice, Zhuang Rui’s harvest is far from the books and classrooms can get, through the different tombs on-site investigation, China’s thousands of years of burial culture, in Zhuang Rui’s mind has formed a more systematic cognition.

China’s Han Chinese as the main body, the Han Chinese ancient name Huaxia, Huaxia originated in more than 5,000 years in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River Yanhuang Tribe, so we call ourselves “the children of Yanhuang”.

The Han Chinese traditionally practiced earth burials, a tradition related to the geographic conditions of agriculture and its culture. The Han Chinese originated in the Central Plains, where the land was fertile and was regarded as the basis of life, with the so-called “heaven as the father and the earth as the mother”.

In the I Ching, the saying that “the sky is covered by everything, and the earth carries everything” was understood by the ancients to mean that the land had the function of “fertility”, and that after a person’s death, burying him in the ground was a place for the dead to rest in peace and for the soul to reside in, and it was therefore necessary to preserve the body in the earth in order to await the return of the soul. Therefore, it is also necessary to keep the body in the earth to wait for the return of the soul.

China’s earliest earth burial 18,000 years ago, but this only proves that there has been earth burial, and can not deny that other burial (such as cremation, wild burial, etc.) also exists at the same time, or even what is the more important burial, we must know that the caveman is not yet an agricultural inhabitants.

Into the civilized society, the form of burial can best reflect the social status of the deceased, the most can send people’s “remembrance”, “filial piety” this kind of feeling, and as a means of governance of the people’s hearts and minds, and therefore by the successive dynasties of the protection.

So in ancient China, not only the Han Chinese tradition of earth burial, such as Xiongnu, Turkic, Huihe, Miao, etc. are also to earth burial as the main burial.

In ancient times, earth burial was also called funeral, which are two different forms. Zhuang Rui learned from Dr. Ren’s explanation that as a form of funeral, the ancients never treated the funeral as a kind of social activity or even entertainment.

They invariably have to be in the funeral of a big and lively, such as condolences, witchcraft, jumping corpse (entertaining the corpse), singing sacrifices, prayers, funeral, etc., to give vent to the later development of rice containers, small coffins, coffins, funeral clothes, wrestling pots, as well as the system of guarding, etc., the Chinese dynasties have a lot of corresponding rituals and norms for this.

This way until now is still retained in China, for example, is the joy of mourning, joy of mourning is generally divided into the full blessing, the full life, the full end, the full blessing is to refer to the birth of their own family within the door of the prosperous, the formation of a large family, the full life is said to be the age of the deceased, generally full of eighty or ninety years old, or even break through the 100-year-old mark, the minimum must be more than the “ancient and rare” (seventy years old) years! The older and older the deceased is, the more he or she meets the conditions of “mourning”.

The end of the whole is better understood, also known as “good end”, meaning the end of a full life, the folk thought, the deceased before life, virtue and good deeds, extensive merit, the end of the disease will not be tortured, and even “no disease,” the natural death of old age. This is regarded as the fundamental conditions of “happy mourning”.

Generally in line with the above three conditions of death of the elderly, the family have to make a big deal, the old man buried in the ground, we must know that the rural areas are not popular cemeteries, even after the cremation, but also in accordance with strict compliance with a variety of processes, so that the old man into the ground for the sake of peace.

Above said is funeral, and as the evolution of the form of burial, the most prominent is the burial, it is manifested in the grave, tomb decoration, burial objects, etc., it is trying to show is the difference between the social hierarchy of noble and lowly.

Xia, Shang, Zhou three generations ago, “Rituals – Tan Gong” in the “tomb and no grave”, that is, the tomb does not look on the mound, also does not set up a monument, but the tomb of the burial goods in the custom of a long time ago, to the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States period, began to appear in the grave generally popular mound type of burial, and the more the more spectacular repair.

Mozi – section of the burial, described the burial is “coffins and coffins must be heavy, burial must be thick, clothes and coverlets must be more, the mound must be huge.”

Monarchs, relatives in order to demonstrate, show respect, show rich in the world, have also been in the mound on the big show off comparison, “the historical record – Qin Shi Huang this collection of interpretation”: Qin Shi Huang used 720,000 people to build their own graves, “grave height of 50 zhang, circumference back to the five-mile-odd, called ‘mausoleum,’ and is still there today. The mausoleum, the mountain mausoleum also, later generations of extravagant emperors all follow the example.”

In order to limit the size of the graves of unlimited comparison, and make “the difference between the noble and the lowly”, the dynasties are also in the rites, the law to be stipulated, such as the “Han law” stipulates that: “Liehou grave height of four zhang, Guannei Hou the following to the populace have a difference.” “Kaiyuan Rites” stipulates that: a grade of official pit height of one zhang eight feet, two grades below, each lower grade minus two feet, six grades below eight feet.

Song, Yuan, Ming, Qing largely followed this provision, at the same time, the emperor’s tomb built as a palace, known as the “Palace”, the ground is also built with palace-style buildings, such as the Imperial Palace, the Ming Tombs and the Qing East Mausoleum, is so far well-preserved emperor’s mausoleums and their palace-style buildings.

Because of the funeral and burial need to have considerable wealth and social status, so historically the Chinese community funeral and burial are by the royal family, relatives, rich merchants take the lead in promoting.

Such as the mausoleum of the first emperor of qin shi huang, the current excavation is only one of the burial tomb, has unearthed terracotta warriors, infantry, car soldiers, cavalry terracotta warriors as many as nearly 10,000 pieces of terracotta horse terracotta, more than 500 horses, wooden chariot more than one hundred and thirty, and, soldiers, horses, terracotta warriors with real people, real horses, the height of the size of the same. According to some people speculate, like this tomb of Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum of the front and back of the right and left should each have a (has been excavated in the location of the east). If the Qin Emperor’s Mausoleum all excavated, its burial goods still do not know how much.

Han Jingdi when the gambler in Luoyang play Meng, his mother died, to participate in the funeral more than official rich and powerful, the light of the car there are more than a thousand cars, sensational Luoyang, the people and even the view of the play Meng’s ability to socialize and the degree of respect for the people.

This funeral style has been inherited through the generations, as far as the Ming and Qing Dynasties, even today there are also keen, like the previous period of time broke out of a place where the tycoons mobilized hundreds of limousines for the mother’s funeral, in fact, and the drama of Meng’s mother’s funeral mentality is almost the same, are in the ability to show their own and wealth.

Of course, because the funeral is a waste of manpower and material resources, and encourages the society to spread the wind of luxury, and thus there have been opponents throughout the ages. As early as the Spring and Autumn Period, Mozi strongly opposed the idea, and advocated the “modest burial”, and opposed the theory of ghosts and gods.

At the beginning of the founding of each dynasty, the people thrifty phase, the social economy to be restored, the court for the rest and recuperation, so the founding of several generations of emperors can vigorously advocate the simple funeral and burial, and largely able to perform the effect. Such as the emperor of han wen di, han jing di, tai zong of tang, gao zong, etc. have advocated “thin funeral”.

But the dynasty into the middle, the later, the funeral and burial of this trend, along with the whole society’s luxury wind grows up, until the collapse of the dynasty, the establishment of a new dynasty, a new round of the cycle and start again.

So every tomb of funeral and burial is almost a microcosm of the society at that time, through the study of the burial goods within the tomb has been the form of burial, you can have an intuitive understanding of hundreds of years or even a few years ago the cultural patterns, which is also archaeology is deeply attracted to the charm of Zhuang Rui.

But unfortunately, Henan although there are many tombs, but Zhuang Rui walked all the way, most of the tombs have been patronized by grave robbers, even if Zhuang Rui has the eyes of the supernormal ability, can see through the underground tombs, but the complete tomb or one have not found, which also shows that the wealth and money, thousands of years there are countless of grave robbers in the big dead man’s fortune.

“I say Zhuang Rui, that tomb northwest of Anyang, in all likelihood, is the High Tomb, why aren’t you interested in it as well?”

The Gao Tomb that Dr. Ren was talking about was the historical tomb of Cao Cao of the Three Kingdoms, and the day before yesterday, while passing through Anyang, the local archaeological department was preparing to excavate this Eastern Han Dynasty tomb, but Zhuang Rui wasn’t very interested in that Cao Cao’s tomb, which made Dr. Ren a bit puzzled.

“Hehe, senior brother, Cao Cao has seventy-two suspicious graves, where would it be discovered so easily?”

Zhuang Rui smiled and shook his head, the scale of that tomb was not small, but Zhuang Rui had long since discovered through his eyes that the burial goods inside were not much, it must have long been visited by grave robbers, even if it was excavated, the significance wasn’t very great.