"Could it be that Lao Ma is a gold-touching captain in the tomb robbery notes?" Lao Gang grabbed ahead of Dr. Liu and threw out this answer.

"Yes, yes, you guessed right, Lao Ma is a tomb robber, also called an inverted bucket, inverted bucket is just a widely accepted statement in the Internet era, at that time, everyone directly said that he was a tomb robber, what is the hair of the hill Zhonglang general, touch the gold captain, the mountain mover, these gods of the title, the people at that time did not know at all." Lao Bo said that Lao Ma is a family of tomb robbers, and when he was very young, he followed his grandfather to Linzi, when they dug a lot of places, they were Luoyang shovels into the ground, and after they found something, they began to dig down, because there were too few people, and the hole was small. Sometimes Lao Ma's grandfather would use a rope to send the child in to catch things.

"So small, just rolling in the ancient tomb, how bold the old horse is!" Lao Gang seemed a little envious.

According to Zhang Xuehai's recollection, at that time, the old horse took out the probe shovel he carried with him and carried out a preliminary exploration, and found that the cultivated land was full of horse bones. Horse Martyrdom Pit, there should be a Horse Martyrdom Pit here. The old horse seemed to be muttering to himself, such a large horse burial pit, that means that there will be major archaeological discoveries nearby, in fact, the horse burial pit itself is already a major archaeological discovery.

Hearing such news, the people of the archaeological team were very happy, and the dullness of several months was suddenly broken, and the atmosphere suddenly relaxed. In addition to being happy, Zhang Xuehai further put forward an idea, will this be a carriage pit?

"I heard that because it was summer and it was a fortuitous discovery, the members of the archaeological team were not mentally prepared and therefore had no further plans. However, on the way back, they found horse bones on both sides of the road, and the horse pit turned south along the road. However, the team found a very strange phenomenon: the horse bones on the south side of the pit were well preserved, but the east side was very badly damaged, also after thousands of years of erosion. In order to understand why this was the case, the archaeological team began an in-depth investigation in the vicinity.

After judging that this place was a martyr's pit, the team turned around and began to enter Heyatou Village to inquire about the situation. I heard the old people in the village say that as early as the end of the Qing Dynasty, when the fence wall was repaired, the bones of horses were dug up here. During the Japanese pseudo-period, horse bones were constantly unearthed. At this time, Zhang Xuehai finally knew that it was precisely because of the repair of the fence wall that the horse bones in the east were seriously damaged.

Where do these unearthed horse bones end up? According to the old people in the village, there was a merchant who bought daily necessities, miscellaneous goods, matches and needlework. He had all exchanged these horse bones.

"What does a merchant want from a horse?" Lao Gang blurted out, "We've raised this question before!" ”

"Well, later, according to the recollection of the archaeological team at the time, their final investigation was that the final destination of these horse bones was a match factory in Qingzhou, where they were eventually processed into matches. Because horse bones are rich in phosphorus, after being made into matches, they will come back again to exchange horse bones. In other words, every time the locals light a match, they are actually igniting the bones of horses underground......" Lao Bo said.

"It's a pity, these horse bones, are they all burned like this?" Dr. Liu rubbed his hands vigorously, and when he heard this, his hands were already covered with sweat. "How did this old man come to our house with such a big head, and how did he meet my father? My father never mentioned anything about the martyrdom pit, and I have the impression that he had nothing to do with it, just a peasant who sold large urns. ”

"As far as I know, your old man has a lot to do with this matter." Lao Bo pressed his hands on the table and motioned for Dr. Liu to listen to him continue.

"I later learned that in November 1964, when the archaeological team began to excavate the horse graves, Zhang Xuehai realized that the next task was to immediately begin to protect the horse bones. They also wanted to know if there were any ancient chariots or anything other than horses. After digging from east to west for a month, the team found that the pit had turned east. At this point, it was already relatively cold, and it was not allowed to continue digging. At the beginning of December, the sky was already snowflakes. The team decided to protect them first, so they got some bamboo poles and bought some wheat straw from the village, and built a temporary shed to protect them. Lao Bo said that from the above situation, it can be seen that although this is a concentration of talents from Shandong Province to carry out exploration and excavation, but the conditions were still very simple at that time, and the protective device erected by wheat straw can even be said to be very shabby.

The archaeological team members noticed that there was a north-south road ditch on the east side of the horse pit, the bottom of the ditch was about 3 meters from the surface, and the road was 0.8 meters above the bottom of the ditch. It can be seen that this place was originally a horse pit, and now it has been completely destroyed. There was rammed earth on the cliff south of the horse pit and five or six meters west of the path, and because the horse bones at the east end of the horse pit on the north side had been exposed, it was impossible to protect it, so the team had to clean up and excavate it in November. Shockingly, in this section of land that is only 54 meters long, the archaeological team has cleared up as many as 145 horse bones.

Because the conditions were so rudimentary, the team decided to backfill the horse bones. Since I can't think of a good protection measure, I might as well choose to continue to bury it in the ground.

To the great disappointment of the archaeological team at that time, although a large number of dead horses were excavated, no funerary goods were found, that is, only dead horses, and there were no chariots as originally expected. However, in the face of such a large number of dead horses, the archaeological team realized that there must be a large tomb nearby, and the identity of the tomb owner with such a large number of dead horses must be extraordinary.

"This situation, Lao Ma will definitely know. If there is a martyrdom pit, there will inevitably be the tombs of nobles of prominent status nearby. As I said before, some people say that the old horse only stayed here for a few months and then went back, but I am not sure exactly when he left. But I don't think it will be 1966, because a big event happened in 1996. Lao Bo said that in the summer of 1966, the archaeological team carried out a very careful exploration of this area, and sure enough, they found a large tomb (that is, the famous No. 5 tomb in the archaeological work of Linzi), around which there are connected large martyrdom pits on the west, north and east sides of this tomb. In the winter of 1964, the first thing they cleaned was the martyrdom pit located north of Tomb No. 5.

"Why is it called Tomb Five? Where is No. 1, No. 2, No. 3, No. 4? Who is buried in this number five? Lao Gang said.

"You got to the point, I think one, two, three, four, five, it's just the serial number of the excavation, there's nothing strange, the key is, who is the owner of this tomb?" Dr. Liu echoed.

"Yes, I heard that at that time, because Tomb 5 was stolen and excavated many times, the team did not find a single burial object, so it is impossible to directly determine the age of the tomb. However, a large number of pottery fragments such as mustaches, retorts, pots, pots, urns, beans, and bowls were scattered in the fill of the martyrdom pit. After the archaeological team restored these pottery, they found that their shape was the same as that of the pottery of the middle and late Spring and Autumn period in the ancient city of Linzi Qi, and there were no Warring States period vessels at the same time. Based on this, Zhang Xuehai and others judged that the age of this tomb and the martyrdom pit should be in the late Spring and Autumn period. "Lao Bo said, just like if later generations find a tomb with a smartphone buried in it, then it means that the tomb will not be a □□ period." The archaeological team found through investigation that although the tomb was damaged, the existing tomb still has an area of 614 square meters, from which it can be estimated that the original tomb may be larger, plus the horse pit, the entire tomb covers an area of three or four thousand square meters, and all the dead horses can reach more than 600. ”

"Even the world of the rich in ancient times is beyond the imagination of those of us. is so rich, burying 600 horses at once, not an ordinary rich person. Lao Gang was very envious.

"It's not something rich people can afford, you know? In the Spring and Autumn Period, the army was dominated by chariots, and people often measured the strength of a country by the number of troop vehicles. The chariots are counted by multiplication, and a cart of four horses is called a ride, and six hundred horses can equip a troop chariot of one hundred and fifty times. The State of Qi was one of the most powerful vassal states at that time, but such a rare tomb could only be done by a monarch. Lao Bo said that expert Zhang Xuehai believed that the owner of Tomb No. 5 was a monarch of Qi in the late Spring and Autumn Period!

"Monarch!?" Doctor Liu and Lao Gang exclaimed at the same time.

"Yes, in the late Spring and Autumn Period, starting from the Duke of Qi Qing to the Duke of Qi Jian, there were a total of seven monarchs of the State of Qi, and the owner of the tomb was most likely the Duke of Qi Jing. Duke Jing of Qi ruled the state of Qi for 58 years, and was the longest-reigning monarch of the state after Duke Huan of Qi. During his reign, except for the attacks and killings between the ministers and doctors at the beginning of his reign, with the assistance of Yan Ying, the regime was basically stable, and the relations with neighboring countries were basically peaceful. After a relatively long period of peace, "Historical Records: Taishi Gong Family" said that in the later period of Jinggong, 'it was good to govern the palace, gather dogs and horses, extravagant, and give heavy punishments'. After Qi Jinggong's death, the country maintained a stable situation for 9 months. Therefore, the objective conditions and the personal preferences of the ruler indicate that the No. 5 tomb and the large martyrdom pit most likely belonged to Qi Jinggong. Lao Bo said that although Zhang Xuehai's analysis is the most authoritative, so far, it is still only a speculation, and there is no direct evidence to explain who the owner of Tomb No. 5 is.

"I know, this old horse, if it's really that old horse, then this matter is too big." Dr. Liu said that he didn't believe in the old horse who rented the house, that is, the horse hurt the pillar back then, but this old horse must have known that there was a king's treasure involved here, "Yes, I may know where our old man put the secret." Let's go to our old house now. ”