Chapter 0892 – Sarcophagus

Placed in the middle of the tomb this sarcophagus, the front of the head of the material is painted with a monument hall cranes and deer, glazed tiles over the hall wings flying two snow-white cranes, on both sides of the pale tufts of flourishing pines, cypress trees.

Before the head of the coffin is fragrant and colorful green grass, grass in the middle of the stone steps leading to the hall of the path, it seems very clean and elegant, the whole picture will be decorated throughout the head of the coffin as if the fairyland apartment, the whole a quiet villa.

On both sides of the coffin, also painted two are circling nine days of the phoenix, chasing and teasing the treasure pearl, from this point can be seen, the owner of the coffin should be a woman.

“Xiao Zhuang, in our ancient times, coffins are also called old rooms, and this coffin is just like that, with flowers, plants, trees, cranes and pines, just like a corner of a royal garden.”

Professor Meng saw Zhuang Rui holding the camera and couldn’t stop filming the relief patterns on the sarcophagus, spoke out to explain to him, Chinese culture is profound, every pattern is not for nothing, all have their hidden meanings.

“Teacher, how many sarcophagi were unearthed in the tomb?” Zhuang Rui spoke out and asked.

“Not much, that is, it was found that there were sarcophagi within the Eastern Han Dynasty tombs.”

After Professor Meng walked around the sarcophagus a few times, he looked at Dr. Ren and said, “Xiao Ren, this sarcophagus can be pushed open directly, go up and try it out, use a rope to tie it down when you push it halfway up, and be careful of falling on the ground.”

Since the sarcophagus itself was very thick and heavy, it was so that there was no wooden coffin with a bayonet peg, it should be possible to push it open directly.

Before Dr. Ren opened the coffin, Zhuang Rui took a small knife and stuck it in the place where the lid and the coffin itself were connected, but found that even though it was as thin as a knife blade, it still couldn’t be inserted.

“Xiao Zhuang, don’t try, you’re just taking a piece of paper, you won’t even be able to stick it in.”

Prof. Meng couldn’t help but laugh when he saw Zhuang Rui’s actions, many of the ancient people’s craftsmanship can be said to be ingenious, not to mention that it was used by the royal family, how would those craftsmen dare to not beat it with all their heart?

“Teacher this …… can t push it!”

Dr. Ren with gloves, stood in front of the head of the coffin and pushed back hard, but even though Dr. Ren held his face red, the lid of the coffin still did not move.

Prof. Meng shook his head and said, “The strength is small, Xiao Liu, you also help.”

But even with the addition of Xiao Liu, he was still unable to push open the lid, Zhuang Rui saw the situation and said, “Teacher, let me try!”

Hand over the camera to Dr. Ren, Zhuang Rui put on a pair of gloves, hands on the front face of the coffin, both hands a force, suddenly the stone friction “click” sound, and the coffin itself match seamlessly with the coffin lid, slowly move back.

“It’s really not light.”

Zhuang Rui weighed it, this coffin lid weighs hundreds of pounds, I don’t know how the ancients moved up the mountain and placed it in this chamber.

“Shit!”

When the coffin underneath him revealed a crack, a stench that Zhuang Rui couldn’t tell what language he could use to describe it floated out from the pavilion, smoky Zhuang Rui hastily loosened his hands and stepped back.

“Vomit …… what ……”

Holding onto the wall engraved with reliefs Zhuang Rui bent his body and dry-heaved several times in a row, the smell was simply too unpleasant, and for a moment it almost made Zhuang Rui faint.

Dr. Ren took a bottle of wind oil essence, rubbed a little bit on the end of Zhuang Rui’s nose and temples, said apologetically, “Zhuang Rui, wipe a little wind oil essence, I forgot to tell you, try to hold your breath during the opening of the coffin.”

“This, this is also too bad smell, are one or two thousand years of time, how the flavor has not been able to evaporate?”

Zhuang Rui after a full five or six minutes, only then slowed down, looking at the sarcophagus that cracked open a slit, really do not have the courage to go forward again.

Professor Meng saw Zhuang Rui’s appearance and said with a smile, “This sarcophagus is sealed very well, plus this tomb has not been opened for one or two thousand years, so the smells are all cohesive in the pavilion, Xiao Zhuang, it’s okay, the smell is unpleasant, but it’s not poisonous.”

Professor Meng presided over a number of times to open the coffin science, and once in the last century to the identity of the staff, participated in the excavation of the Ming Tombs, what kind of unpleasant odor have smelled, at this time he stood not far away from the coffin, the smell of that floated out as if it had not been heard.

Zhuang Rui nose and floated through a trace of that kind of flavor, even the wind oil can not hide, and quickly said: “I still from the back of the coffin lid to pull down it!”

“Be careful, Xiao Ren and Xiao Liu, prepare the rope and bar, and put it down gently later.”

Professor Meng commanded the crowd to stand at the bottom of the coffin, sarcophagi were extremely rare in ancient tombs, plus the relief carvings on it were so exquisite, it was a precious work of art in itself.

When Zhuang Rui pulled the lid of the coffin out by about a meter, Dr. Ren and the others fixed it with a rope, and the four of them stood on both sides and lifted it up, and all of a sudden, the stench became even stronger, filling the entire chamber.

Zhuang Rui had already put on the amplitude mask and sprinkled a lot of windex on it, even so he still felt a bit uncomfortable and opened his mouth, “Teacher, should we use the blower to circulate the air in the tomb first?”

The soft leather tube they carried in for that blower was hundreds of meters long, enough to be pulled into this fundraising chamber.

“No, the rotten odor means that the objects in the pavilion are not decaying badly, if fresh air comes in, I’m afraid that nothing will be left.”

Prof. Meng shook his head, at this moment he also put on a pair of masks and leather gloves on his hands, this was for fear that there were corrosive substances present in the pavilion.

“Brocade?!”

Professor Meng in the light of the light, to look inside the sarcophagus, the mouth issued an exclamation of surprise, just through the mask came out, it seems a little dull.

Although Zhuang Rui did not like the smell inside the coffin, but the heart is really curious, what is it that can make the old professor so out of sorts? Hurriedly a stride to the front of the sarcophagus, looking inside.

“How come there is no corpse?”

Zhuang Rui forced himself to endure the unpleasant stench and raised his eyes to look, and found that in the pavilion there were only some things that looked like textiles in general, while the imagined corpse could not be seen.

“The corpse is at the bottom, we need to clean up the things on top first.”

Dr. Ren also wore gloves and came to the sarcophagus, and the cleanup of the artifacts inside the sarcophagus was mainly carried out by the two of them, him and Professor Meng.

The other few people were holding some plastic rigid bags and paper bags, each bag had a label attached to it, this was to record the order in which the artifacts were unearthed, in some research literature, the number of artifacts unearthed from so and so tomb, it was due to this.

“The characters on this, is the character for longevity, right?”

Zhuang Rui saw that on the brocade inside the coffin, there was a large character for longevity, and next to it were many floral decorations, which were still as good as new despite being dusty for thousands of years.

“This is the Han Dynasty brocade made of longevity quilt, it has been unearthed before, but those tombs have all been robbed, and it’s the first time I’ve gotten to see such a complete brocade, it’s a priceless treasure!”

Professor Meng looked at these brocades, and then said, “This is called two-color jinku brocade, these patterns on it, all of them are woven with two kinds of threads: gold and silver, usually gold threads are the main ones, and a small number of patterns are decorated with silver threads, and in ancient times, only the royal family could use them.”

When Prof. Meng was talking to Zhuang Rui, he suddenly saw that Ren Chunqiang had already stretched out his hand and lifted at the corner of the brocade, he couldn’t help but shouted urgently, “Slow down, don’t.”

Just Professor Meng shouted a little late, Dr. Ren’s hand has grabbed on the brocade, Zhuang Rui see really, that bright color, as if just made out of the general brocade, in the heart of Dr. Ren’s hand, has been turned into ashes.

“Alas, I don’t blame you, these textiles are very difficult to preserve, Xiao Zhuang, take a picture of all these brocades and keep them for future reference.”

Professor Meng sighed, he originally wanted to observe for a while longer, but Dr. Ren had already done it, and the color of the brocade that had been moved was slowly becoming darker, I’m sure that in a moment when the air from the outside circulates in, all of these brocades will cease to exist.

Zhuang Rui heard, and quickly picked up the camera, will be brocade every pattern are photographed, he now also know, the master’s body, is in the brocade quilt underneath.

As the air in the chamber gradually became clear, the brocade inside the sarcophagus, the color became more and more obscure, and the party’s bright and shiny, completely incomparable.

“Alright, start! Be careful, live layer by layer to uncover.”

The fact that the brocade was not preserved only made it difficult for Professor Meng for a while, and the excitement of discovering a large, intact tomb from the Han Dynasty surged back into his heart.

You know, the Han tombs unearthed in modern times are basically nine empty tombs out of ten, and even the one that isn’t empty doesn’t have a few things left in it, almost all of which have been moved by successive generations of grave robbers.

Although now only a complete chamber was found, but there is enough reason to believe that the possibility of this tomb being stolen is very small, perhaps there can really appear some shocking discoveries in the archaeological world.

“Unearthed artifact number one, a pair of gold silk bracelets.”

“Unearthed artifact number three, one phoenix hairpin.”

“This …… this is a gold silk phoenix crown, be careful, be careful to place it.”

I don’t know how many layers of this Wanshou quilt, anyway, with one layer being lifted off, almost every layer will appear some of the burial goods, mostly used by women, and when the head part of the coffin is the first to be cleaned out, one of the most important artifacts of the day has finally appeared.

Zhuang Rui clearly saw in the camera, this is a phoenix crown, the entire phoenix crown is prepared with gold and silver wire, hollowed out, rich in three-dimensional, and it is also inlaid with dozens of beads and flowers gemstones.

The two ends of the phoenix crown is high up, is the two draw a song of the phoenix shape, phoenix mouth with jewelry string ornaments, beads and gold and silver reflecting, looks extremely rich and magnificent.

After Prof. Meng took out the phoenix crowns from the side of the skull, the whole tomb looked brilliant.

After storing the phoenix crown, Professor Meng and Dr. Ren gradually cleaned up the brocade, it has been more than two hours, and in just this one coffin, actually pulled out two hundred and thirty-one pieces of cultural relics.

A woman’s corpse with black hair left on the side of her head was finally presented in front of everyone’s eyes.