Riding the wind of rebirth

In 1984, archaeologists unearthed a single bronze tripod in the Xibeigang sacrificial pit in the royal mausoleum area of ​​Yinxu in Anyang. It looked ordinary on the outside, but surprisingly, there was a human skull inside the tripod.

At that time, this was an isolated archaeological case, so scholars speculated that the human head had accidentally rolled in during burial and did not pay much attention to it.

In 1999, another bronze tripod containing a human skull was discovered at the archaeological site of Tomb No. 1046 in the north of Liujiazhuang in Yinxu. It was exactly the same as the tripod unearthed in 84.

This broke the situation of the isolated cultural relic and immediately attracted great attention from archaeological experts. After research and testing, the results showed that the skull had serious calcium loss.

This was a horrifying discovery, meaning that the skull had been artificially steamed!

When the bronze cauldron was discovered, it was located on the head of a sacrificial victim, who was missing his head. So experts speculated that the victim's head was first chopped off and placed in the cauldron for sacrificial activities, and then buried with the victim.

Later, by studying the bones and teeth of the remains, scholars confirmed that the owner of the skull that had been boiled in the bronze cauldron was a female who was only about fifteen years old.

Moreover, the teeth of this young girl were in very good condition, indicating that she had adequate protein intake. In other words, this girl had never lacked meat since she was a child, so she should be an aristocrat with a high social status.

This confirms the customs of human head sacrifice and aristocratic sacrifice in the Shang Dynasty from a physical perspective.

For example, King Zhou's sacrificial meat of King Wen of Zhou's eldest son Bo Yikao was essentially an aristocratic sacrifice. This custom even continued into the Spring and Autumn Period. The Yellow Bird in the Book of Songs is a sad song in which the Qin people cried and sighed over the three good men of the Zi Che family who were buried with Duke Mu of Qin.

"Yes, this '鬳' is the ritual of boiling human heads." Zhou Zhi said: "The following sentence '其用妣辛，升' is very simple. 用 means who is the object of the sacrifice, 妣 means mother, 辛 is the name, and 升 means auspicious."

"But the result may not have improved the king's condition, so there was a third Zhenwen, '叀强火'."

"叀 is an uncommon character in modern times, but it was very common during the oracle bone script period. The shape of this character has not changed much from oracle bone script to regular script. The Shuowen Jiezi explains it as 'bundle grass and break bamboo to reach the god', which means to be cautious and dedicated to bundle grass and divine the gods.'"

"Xu Shen believed that this character was a pictographic character, which meant carefully arranging a bundle of silk with one's hands."

"However, Xu Shen interpreted this character based on the shape of the small seal script. After studying the oracle bone script, we found that this character is not a ideographic character, but a pictographic character. The character shape is actually an ancient spinning device called a spinning brick or a spindle. Later, it was extended to mean hanging. Then in the bronze seal script era, it was further extended to mean careful."

"The meaning of the Bunch of Grass Divination God is derived from the small rituals and divinations performed by the ancients using the straw stalks for cocooning and the spindles for weaving silk before and after silk weaving."

"So the meaning of the three characters 叀强火 is as straightforward as painting - hang the sacrificed person up like a spindle and light a fire underneath."

"Oh my God, this is so cruel." Lugens showed a look of pity.

"It seems that all ancient civilizations have gone through this stage, ma'am." Zhou Zhi said, "For example, during the First Dynasty of Ancient Egypt, a large number of officials, priests, royal women, domestic servants, and slaves were sacrificed. Another example is the rain-making ritual of the Mayan civilization, where hundreds of people were sacrificed at a time. "

"The city of Ur in Iraq; the 72 stone piles in St. Louis, USA; the ancient Israel in the Hebrew Bible, the Aztec civilization in Mexico, the ancient Greeks, the ancient Romans, the Vikings, the Carthaginians, even the Europeans in the Paleolithic Age, and the Koreans in the feudal period, all had similar customs." "Another very interesting phenomenon related to this cruel phenomenon is that after these civilizations developed to a certain stage, they seemed to have stopped the practice of human sacrifice very suddenly, but with a tacit understanding of history."

"For example, in China, in the Zhou Dynasty after the Shang Dynasty, King Wu of Zhou held a large-scale 'burning sacrifice' after completing the great cause of 'destroying the Shang Dynasty', but soon Duke of Zhou Ji Dan abolished human sacrifices and the Shang Dynasty's concept of governing the country with witches and gods, which was 'to obey the will of God and govern the royal family'. While emphasizing that the Zhou royal family accepted the command of God to become the king of the world, it also emphasized that 'the mandate of heaven is unpredictable and only virtue can assist', and established a ritual civilization with 'benevolence' as the spiritual core."

"Although human sacrifice continued to exist in later history, even until the Qing Dynasty, at least since the Zhou Dynasty, it has been defined as an act that violates social order and morality in terms of system and ritual, and is no longer part of social order and morality as it was in the Shang Dynasty."

"The writing system also underwent a transformation at that time, becoming somewhat simplified and more profound and gentle. It was no longer a magical symbol that only a few fortune-tellers could master, carved on oracle bones, and used to communicate with ghosts and gods, but became a secular symbol that was cast on metal objects and written on bamboo slips with a brush to record history and poetry."

After saying that, he pointed his hand toward the front of the display: "Finally, go in that direction and never come back."

Before he knew it, quite a few visitors had gathered around Zhou Zhi. They were all people who had been specially invited to attend the pre-exhibition buffet, and they all began to applaud softly.

"The explanation was very wonderful!" Lugens praised Zhou Zhi, "I didn't expect George to have such a deep understanding of ancient Chinese characters at such a young age."

Guan Shuning smiled and said, "The helpers Mr. An found are too powerful. I am convinced of my defeat. Let's go visit Laixi Hall together this weekend."

"Laixitang? Descendants of the Weng family?"

"Yes," Guan Shuning asked in surprise, "George is also very familiar with Mr. Weng?"

"I'm not very familiar with the current hall master." Zhou Zhi shook his head: "But the hall master of the late Qing Dynasty, the imperial teacher, is probably unavoidable for anyone who wants to study Qing Dynasty culture."

"That's right." Guan Shuning nodded: "The current owner of Laixi Hall is Mr. Weng Wange, who is the sixth-generation grandson of Weng Tonghe."

"I seem to remember that Mr. Weng has a good relationship with the Shanghai Museum?" Hearing this name, Zhou Zhi suddenly remembered something: "I seem to have heard of his name from Director Xiong or Director Ma?"

"Yes, he has a very good relationship with Mr. Xiong, and also has a good relationship with Mr. Ma. He has studied Wang Hui's paintings collected by the Shanghai Museum." Guan Shuning was surprised again: "Why? The two curators of the Shanghai Museum are also familiar with George?"

"The body of the Dish-shaped Lei was discovered by Curator Xiong Chuanxin. Elbow went to the island country and spent three million US dollars to buy it from a private collector. It was eventually donated to the Shanghai Museum. Now it is the treasure of the Shanghai Museum." An Siyuan said with a smile, "So he must be a distinguished guest of the Shanghai Museum."

"I spent money on this matter but still didn't get anything in return." Zhou Zhi waved his hands repeatedly, not knowing whether to laugh or cry: "Let's not talk about it."

"No! Tell me about it." Lugensi was very interested and wanted to know. (End of this chapter)