Master Archaeologist

Chapter 206 Traces of the Tomb Robber
"Have you found the tomb door?"

As soon as they heard that the tomb door had been found, the Archaeological Institute of the Academy of Social Sciences and others who were cleaning the east side of the tomb all became energetic.

What kind of tomb door is still being cleaned!

Hurry up and join in the fun!

Under the leadership of Professor Ke, a group of people hurried to the cemetery.

Following the passage dug out by the Qinghai Archaeological Institute, everyone soon came to a screen wall.

"Zhaoqiang" is a multi-curved wall between the tomb passage and the tomb.

This wall is higher in the east and lower in the west, and it is a wall that encloses the tomb passage and corridor from the earthen walls on both sides of the tomb passage to the west.

To put it simply, it is a wall derived from the left and right ends of the tomb door, next to the tomb passage, and its function is to support and fix it, and it may also have a somewhat aesthetic effect.

And in the middle of the screen wall are the corridor and the tomb gate.

The corridor connects with the tomb passage, which is the passage to enter the main tomb chamber, which is also high in the east and low in the west.

The north and south walls of the corridor are built with stone blocks, which are shared with the lighting wall. There are piercing wood between the stone layers. There are two-story platforms and three-story platforms on the two walls, with a total height of 2.26 meters.

The top of the corridor is a wood and stone structure, that is, a layer of gravel is laid between two layers of sheds, which is very strong and not easy to collapse.

"This tomb uses a lot of shed wood for the roof. In fact, it is somewhat similar to the nine-story demon tower." Chen Han said curiously.

The so-called shed wood is actually a "round plank" built of logs arranged in a row. This thing is relatively rare in the tombs of the Central Plains.

The tombs in the Central Plains are like the kind of vertical pits with earth and wood, and no wood is used to build the roof. The walls in the tomb may be built of stones, or they may simply keep the original mud.

Only when capping, use a row of roof panels to cover the tomb chamber, and then backfill it.

Well, later, more advanced tombs were built with stones or bricks, making them look like an underground palace.

Only in the main tomb, cypress wood will be used to make "Huang Chang Ti Pu".

However, Huang Chang Ti Cou is different from this kind of direct use of wood to build a shed as a supporting structure.

Huang Chang Ti Pu is more of a decorative function. It is stuffed with cypress wood in the main tomb and wrapped in the center of the main coffin.

Most of the sheds in this tomb were used to build the tomb.

The roofs of the sacrificial pits were built with sheds.

The top of the corridor is also a layer of shed wood as the roof, then a layer of gravel, and then a layer of shed wood.

This has the feeling of "nine-story demon tower".

The nine-story demon pagoda is a tower built of cypress wood, layer by layer, and wood is also used as the main material for the construction of tombs.

It's just that the tombs built here are a little special.

"It seems that although the Tuyuhun people have given up the burial system of the nine-story demon pagoda, they have not completely abandoned the tradition. When building tombs, they will also use a lot of wood as raw materials."

Professor Ke also nodded in agreement.

"Come here?" Li Chunchao, deputy director of the Qinghai Institute of Archeology, greeted them warmly, and walked towards the tomb door.

While walking, he also introduced: "The gate of the tomb is located in the middle of the corridor, and it consists of a door frame and a board door that are close to the two walls of the corridor."

"The door frame is composed of two sets of square wooden columns juxtaposed from east to west on the north and south sides."

"Simply put, this tomb door is made up of planks and logs."

"And the door of the tomb is not big, the height is only more than one meter, and the width is only seventy or eighty centimeters."

"Even if it is an adult, it is very inconvenient, and you need to bend over to enter."

"I reckon that the door of this tomb should be the last to be repaired after all the tomb chambers and coffins were put in."

"This has the advantage of preventing tomb robbers from stealing the tomb owner's coffin."

"However, tomb robbers are never interested in the coffin of the owner of the tomb, only the burial objects inside."

"Moreover, they generally don't go through the main entrance, and directly rob a hole into the main tomb."

"This anti-theft method can only be said to be better than nothing."

Leading a group of people to the tomb door, Li Chunchao pointed to a hole in the tomb door and said, "But there are also tomb robbers who walk through the main entrance."

"Because of the robbery, some of the upper boards of the board door were damaged, and some of the middle boards were rotten."

"The board door was originally decorated with foam nails, and a severely corroded iron foam nail cap was found at the bottom of the corridor."

"It should be that a group of tomb robbers once entered through the corridor and destroyed the upper part of the tomb door, but why they destroyed the upper part of the tomb door is a bit hard to understand."

"You said you want to go inside, it's obviously more convenient to destroy the bottom."

"And this tomb door is made of wooden boards, riveted and fixed with iron nails, as long as the iron nails are pulled out, the wooden boards can be removed."

"There's no need to destroy it like this. After destroying the upper part, could it be that the tomb robber passed through this hole and jumped in?"

"But this hole is so small, it seems that it can't accommodate adults in and out."

Li Chunchao rubbed his chin, very speechless.

Many robbery holes have been found in this tomb. From the tomb passage to the top of the main tomb, there are seven or eight robbery holes.

At the level of a tomb robber, why bother to go through the main entrance? Even if you go through the main entrance, why just make a hole on the upper left side of the door?

"Perhaps, this hole is used to transport funeral objects?"

Kong Jianwen gestured at the size of the hole, and said uncertainly: "One tomb robber entered the tomb through the hole, and the other entered through the corridor and waited outside the tomb door."

"After the tomb robbers who entered have searched for the burial objects, pass the precious gold and silverware out through the hole in the tomb door?"

"Then the tomb robbers inside return from the original route of the robbery cave, and the outside grave robbers return from the original route of the robbery cave on the corridor?"

"Why bother?" Li Chunchao asked in confusion.

"Because tomb robbers are also afraid of black people!" Kong Jianwen spread his hands: "Look, in ancient times, the tomb robbers were from the same village, or they were father and son."

"Even so, it is not uncommon for black people to eat black people. We have found the bones of tomb robbers in many robbed tombs."

"In order to prevent this kind of behavior of black eating black, no matter whether it is going to the tomb or staying behind, we must guard against it."

"In this way, it is safest for two tomb robbers who work as a group to use this method of splitting up."

"Both were buried in the tomb, but one was inside the tomb and the other was outside the tomb."

"After the people inside searched for the treasure, they handed it out to the people outside for confirmation."

"Then both of them have to return to the ground from different robbery holes, and the time-consuming is almost the same."

"This avoids the possibility of anyone wanting to kill each other in the tomb and enjoy the treasure all to themselves!"

Li Chunchao was still puzzled: "Then no one is pulling a rope to meet them, how did these two people climb up from the robbery hole?"

The so-called black eating black is usually the tomb robber who went down to the tomb. After sending the burial objects up from the robbery hole, the tomb robber who responded directly loosened the rope, then backfilled the soil, and quickly buried the one below that hadn't come up.

"You are stupid, this tomb is not deep, from the building on the ground to the chamber, it is only two or three meters deep!"

"At this depth, at the level after Tang and Song Dynasties, it is enough to be a ladder!"

"If there is a ladder, one person can do it, don't two people need it?" Li Chunchao continued to ask.

This time, Kong Jianwen was speechless.

"...Maybe there is something that requires two people to work together, or the relationship between the two people is very good, they are brothers."

"In short, I just proposed a possibility!"

(End of this chapter)