Sanxingdui civilization, do you know?

Sanxingdui Tongliren. We have all seen photos, the bronze cultural relics unearthed in Sanxingdui are very strange in shape. So what do these shapes mean? What are the Sanxingdui civilization and Chinese civilization that they represent? Next, I will introduce you a bronze sculpture unearthed in Sanxingdui, Guanghan, Sichuan, Sanxingdui bronze statue.

This sculpture "came into the face" with Ma Yun. Ma Yun really arranged a private itinerary to see this sculpture, which was very happy.

The Sanxingdui civilization is too peculiar, and what is even more confusing is that history has no record of this civilization. Who are they? Where do they come from? Where did they go?

There are various guesses. Some people say that Sanxingdui is from West Asia and has little to do with Chinese civilization. Some people say that it is an isolated civilization that grew out of it. Some people even say that it is made by aliens.

I disagree with these statements. In my opinion, the reason why it looks unfamiliar and incomprehensible is only because we understand this culture in a wrong way. We use the later generations of Han cultural thinking to guess the early border culture, "with the heart of the Han people, save the belly of the Si Yi", so we can't understand it. In fact, there is a huge relationship between Sanxingdui culture and Chinese civilization.

Strange Sanxingdui Culture

The ancient site of Sanxingdui is located in the northwest of Guanghan City, Sichuan Province. This site has a large area of ​​about 12 square kilometers. The time span of unearthed cultural relics is very long, from 5,000 years ago to 3,000 years ago, that is, from the new The Stone Age to the early Western Zhou Dynasty. The unearthed cultural relics include bronze, gold, stone, jade, ivory and shells.

The site is large in scale, long in age, and rich in cultural relics. These are not the most shocking places in Sanxingdui. The key is that the shape of these things is too special. Sanxingdui rewrote the history of ancient Chinese art, allowing us to see the richness and diversity of ancient culture.

Let's take a look at one of the most representative works of the Sanxingdui site, the bronze standing man. It is also the largest bronze figure unearthed in Sanxingdui.

Tong Liren

The appearance of this bronze man is the same as the faces on other unearthed masks, with a strange appearance. A pair of huge eyes that are almost connected across the face, wide mouth, thin lips, and straight nose.

Some masks also add a roll-shaped decoration on the nose that runs directly above the forehead. The largest mask in Sanxingdui, with a diameter of more than one meter, plus the ears on both sides, is more than 3 meters long.

Bronze longitudinal eye mask

This bronze figure is about 160 cm tall, which is close to the height of a real person. This is a frontal standing statue. The right hand is raised on the chest, slightly higher than the left hand. The two hands form two round holes respectively, which seem to be holding a slightly curved cylindrical object. Some complete ivory was also found at the Sanxingdui site, so we guess that he was holding an ivory in his hand.

To be honest, this image is still very different from the Chinese civilization in our usual impression. In the Shang Dynasty, there was absolutely no such huge figure sculpture. Moreover, there are many differences between this Tongli man and the Central Plains culture: for example, the long braid he wears is dragged straight on his back, and there is a strange hat or helmet on his head.

Also, take a closer look at his feet. He was barefoot, and he wore an ankle ring around his ankle, which was decorated with small things. When he walks, the little thing on this foot may still make a beautiful metallic sound.

Connection with business culture

However, in addition to these obvious characteristics, what I want to tell you is that there are many details on it that actually reflect the connection between Sanxingdui and the ancient Central Plains business culture.

First of all, why do I jokingly compare it to Jack Ma? I want to emphasize that the characters of Sanxingdui still retain the characteristics of the Asian race to a large extent-the face is flat, the cheekbones are taller, the nose is wider than whites and narrower than blacks, and so on.

Let's look at his clothes again. Instead of leaning over to the right and placing it under the armpit, his shirt placket is buttoned to the left. This is called "Left gusset". In ancient times, this was considered the dress of a barbaric minority. This is clearly recorded in historical documents. In the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, the Biography of the West Qiang, the Qiang people living in the west are described in this way, saying: "Qiang Hus were bristled on the left, and they were mixed with the Han." It means that they have loose hair, buttoned on the left side of their clothes, and live together with the Han. .

There is also another explanation: the ancient funeral document "The Book of Rites·Mourning Apparel Memorabilia" said: "Small and large, but the sacrificial clothing does not fall, all left gussets, no knots." It probably means that in ancient times it was made for the dead. For funerals, clothes are also left gusset, not right gusset. So Zuojun may also be related to a certain funeral ceremony.

Looking back, who is he? What does it mean? Perhaps he is the leader of a minority, representing the law of an era; or perhaps he is a wizard, representing a divine power or an imagination of another world.

However, in the absence of more supporting documents, our guess of this bronze man is limited. We cannot be sure whether he is a Qianghu or a dead Han Chinese, nor can he be sure of his figure holding ivory. Is it the power of this world or the majesty of another world.

Although we cannot confirm the true meaning of this Tongli man, if we follow this line of thinking and regard Sanxingdui as the site of ancient Shu culture, we can establish a more reasonable guess. Sanxingdui is in Sichuan Province, so we can see some characteristics of ancient Shu culture.

Regarding the Shu culture, I would like to ask you to think about it. The abbreviation of Sichuan is the word Shu. The upper part is a four-character, and the lower part is a box with an insect character inside. The four characters in the upper part are actually the eyes drawn horizontally, also called "Hengmu". Therefore, in ancient Chinese characters, the word Shu represents a worm with huge eyes, or a dragon.

In the Shang Dynasty, insects and dragons were unclearly related. In other words, in the Shang Dynasty, the image of the insect dragon with huge eyes represented a sacred power. The gluttonous faces often appearing in the decoration of Shang dynasty bronzes are very similar to it. Gourmet is famous for being able to eat. It also has a pair of huge eyes in a circle, and a wide and flat mouth without a chin.

The gluttonous pattern, Shang Dynasty, mouth length 23.8 cm, mouth width 35.5 cm, height 47.5 cm

Tianjin Museum Collection

Dragon patterns or Kui patterns often appear around the gluttonous food. Kui is a monster shaped like a dragon. There are also moiré and thunder patterns that symbolize natural forces, and these elements are also reflected in Sanxingdui sculptures.

So we guessed like this: the ancestors living in Sanxingdui may be a tribe of ancient Shu. They communicated with the culture of the Shang dynasty in a certain period, thus deducing the gluttonous pattern, a worm or dragon with huge eyes, As a symbol of power or an image with divine power. Chiefs or tribal leaders use the exaggerated appeal of art to create scary figures or masks with huge eyes.

If this is the case, Sanxingdui is not a culture isolated from Chinese culture, but is likely to be the reference and interpretation of the Shang culture from the Qiangshu culture, which is closely related to the Han nationality.

The center of Shang culture was the Yin Ruins, which is the area around Anyang and Zhengzhou in Henan. The business culture radiated from this area and formed a large cultural area. Sanxingdui played a relay role in the Shu area, and eventually spread the bronze culture of the Shang Dynasty to the Indochina Peninsula. Then, this exquisite and breathtaking bronze standing man is a physical example of the spread of business culture, allowing us to see the amazing radiation radius of business culture.

Protect together

Finally, I want to tell you another legend, which may make you feel more deeply the importance of Sanxingdui to Chinese civilization.

Sanxingdui was discovered for the first time in the spring of 1929, unintentionally excavated by a farmer named Yan Daocheng. This incident was subsequently learned by the army stationed in Guanghan, local missionaries, West China University Museum, surrounding antique dealers, and the Guanghan County Government. Four teams of people were involved. People from all walks of life gathered in Guanghan, and there were excavation teams everywhere, with new discoveries all the time. Surprisingly, all the excavation teams have achieved rich results.

But the Anti-Japanese War broke out soon. The excavation teams originally had different goals, but during the Anti-Japanese War, they unexpectedly buried the Sanxingdui site silently and protected it. Perhaps when foreign enemies invade and nations are threatened, people will appreciate the importance of civilization and inheritance and cherish the legacy left by their ancestors.

In the war years, scholars, antique dealers, military, and local officials were able to reach a consensus because they undoubtedly realized the importance of this peculiar site.

Sanxingdui was excavated again in 1979, more than 40 years later. The excavation took two full years, and it was 1981 that Sanxingdui was truly revealed to the world. It took more than half a century from discovery, excavation, and investigation to basically forming a relatively clear understanding of the site.

Today, our understanding of it is still limited, but in any case, because of its existence, we realize that the richness of our ancient culture far exceeds our imagination.

Okay, that's all about this Sanxingdui bronze standing figure sculpture.