Chapter 1 Background

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Without further ado, by noon the next day, Zhang Hefang and Bu Jin and I had already stepped on the train to Chengdu, Sichuan. We didn't take the bullet train or the high-speed rail, because, Zhang Hefang once told us that because the security check of the high-speed rail and the bullet train is relatively careful, some of the corresponding equipment could not be transported to Chengdu smoothly, so a few of us took a very ordinary green train.

Riding in the same carriage with us was an old man in his fifties, full of gray hair, who was addicted to smoking, and his name was Li Zhongkai. At first, I always felt that this name was a little familiar, but after some simple conversations and understanding, I realized that he was the tutor of Xiao Wanhui, a female graduate student I met on the train from Shenyang to Wuhan.

According to Zhang Hefang, a total of 10 people participated in our operation this time, but I don't know what the other six people are like so far. Zhang Hefang's explanation for this is that if there are too many people, the goal will be too big, and in this case, it is very likely that it will be detrimental to the task. So, the other six people were scattered in their own identities in the other carriages of the train.

Naturally, we were not idle along the way. As a professor of history, Li Zhongkai explained to me a lot about the ancient Shu Kingdom and the relics of the Sanxingdui civilization.

After listening to Li Zhongkai's introduction, I also have a certain degree of understanding of the history of the ancient Shu Kingdom.

In the vast historical documents of the ancient Shu Kingdom in China, there are only a few sporadic and vague introductions. Regarding the history of the ancient Shu Kingdom, some people believe that the ancient Shu Kingdom first existed 4,000 years ago, while on the other hand, they believe that the history of the ancient Shu Kingdom can even be deduced to 6,000 years ago.

The geographical location of the ancient Shu Kingdom is located near the Chengdu Plain, surrounded by mountains and plains, easy to defend and difficult to attack, due to the difficult and dangerous roads, it is in a state of isolation from the world all the year round. Li Bai has a poem: "The difficulty of Shu Road is difficult to go to the blue sky" has been vividly explained. It is precisely for this reason that when many people talk about the ancient Shu Kingdom, they often think of a rough state of life, or even a life like drinking blood. But in fact, to some extent, it is precisely because of the perennial isolation of the ancient Shu Kingdom that the original and unique civilization form of the ancient Shu Kingdom has been retained to a certain extent.

After listening to Li Zhongkai's introduction, I found that compared with the civilization relics of the ancient Dian Kingdom and the civilization relics of the ancient Yong Kingdom that I went to before, there is one thing in common, that is, the three ancient countries have quite developed bronze civilizations. However, in terms of the expression of the bronze civilization, the ancient Shu Kingdom is still very different from the ancient Dian Kingdom and the ancient Yong Kingdom.

The bronze culture of the ancient Dian Kingdom mainly focused on the casting of sacrificial items such as copper drums, while the bronze culture of the ancient Yong Kingdom mainly focused on the casting of practical items such as weapons and armor, while the bronze civilization of the ancient Shu Kingdom was more elegant. It can be said that the various cultural relics unearthed in the ruins of the civilization of the ancient Shu Kingdom can be called works of art, and they are often mainly used to show figures, and these figures are generally exaggerated shapes with big eyes, big mouths, thick lips, high nose bridges and no jaws. I'm not an artist, and I can't say how beautiful these figures are, but one thing is for sure, if you've seen them, you'll never forget them.

In terms of ethnic composition, historians generally believe that the ancestors of the ancient Shu people should be a branch of the ancient Qiang people who roamed the Tibetan plateau earlier. Due to the harsh living conditions, a part of the ancient Qiang people chose to move eastward into the Chengdu Plain to continue their development, and mingled with the local aborigines, and it is believed that both ethnic groups were later called Shushan and Silkworm Cong.

The Shushan clan and the silkworm cong clan gradually rose in the upper reaches of the Min River, and after years of development, they gradually formed a force, so the ancient Shu Kingdom was established. It is worth mentioning that the ancient Shu Kingdom is different from the ancient Yong Kingdom, and in the few historical documents, there are many descriptions of the monarchs of the ancient Shu Kingdom. The ancient Shu kingdom did not know that it had a separate dynasty, and before Qin destroyed the Shu kingdom, the ancient Shu kingdom was led by the silkworm cong clan, the Bai Guan clan, the Yu Yu clan, and the Kaiming clan.

There are poems about the monarch of the ancient Shu Kingdom, and there are also many good sentences that have been circulated in the world, such as Li Bai's "Silkworm bushes and fish, how dazed is the founding of the country; He is 48,000 years old, and he is not populated with Qinsai. and Li Shangyin's "Jin Se" in "Zhuang Shengxiao dreams of butterflies, and hopes that the emperor will trust the cuckoo in spring." ”

It is not unreasonable for literati and inkmen to mention these three monarchs, first of all, Silkworm Cong is the founding monarch of the ancient Shu Kingdom, and naturally has its important position. As the third-generation leader of the ancient Shu Kingdom, Yu Yan promoted the ancient Shu Kingdom from the ancient primitive society to the slave society, which directly created the glory of the ancient Shu Kingdom. In addition, when Yu Yan was in power, a major event occurred in the ancient Shu Kingdom, which even directly affected the process of the entire Chinese civilization. During the period when Yu Yan was in power, it was the period when the Shang Dynasty was close to extinction, because of discord with the Shang Dynasty, the ancient Shu State and the Gu Yong Kingdom participated in the alliance army of King Wu of Zhou to defeat the King of Zhou. The ancient book "Shangshu" once recorded: "King Wu cut down the Xuan, and he really got the master of Bashu." It is said that when the army of the ancient Shu Kingdom went to war, they were all singing and dancing, using strange and long howls to increase the morale and military prestige of their own side, and enhancing the combat effectiveness of the army in the form of inviting the gods to possess the body, that is, the magic of witchcraft - Wushu.

And Emperor Wang's real name is Du Yu. Legend has it that Du Yu descended from the sky and became the king of Shu, so he was honored as Emperor Wang. Emperor Wangdi Du Yu cares about the people very much and is deeply supported and loved by the people. And the name of the emperor after Du Yu is Turtle Ling.

Among them, Professor Li Zhongkai gave me a very interesting myth and legend about the relationship between Du Yu and the turtle spirit. According to legend, Du Yu was also a very enlightened emperor, but he did not do much in politics. At that time, the ancient Shu Kingdom was often worried about floods, and Du Yu sent many capable people to govern it, but no substantial progress was made. Until one year, a male corpse suddenly floated up the river against the current. People were amazed at the corpse, and when they retrieved it, they found that the corpse had begun to speak. He claimed to be a native of Chu, named Turtle Lingwu, who fell into the water because he fell into the water and floated from his hometown. After Du Yu heard about this, he eagerly summoned the turtle spirit to meet, but he didn't expect the two of them to chat very closely, and after hearing that the turtle spirit had a way to control the flood, Du Yu was very happy to give him the task. The turtle spirit opened up Wushan, so that the water flow from the upstream to the Yangtze River, so that the flood was completely eradicated. Du Yu was very grateful to the turtle spirit for saving the people of the ancient Shu Kingdom from suffering, and voluntarily gave up the throne to the turtle spirit.

After the turtle spirit ascended the throne, he was known as the enlightened emperor.

At the beginning, the turtle spirit was indeed very diligent in politics, but over time, the turtle spirit began to become very happy, ignoring the affairs of the court, and the idea gradually detached from reality, resulting in the ancient Shu country began to continue to lag behind, and it didn't take long for the ancient Shu country to perish in the hands of the descendants of the turtle spirit, and the ancient Shu country also disappeared completely. For this reason, Emperor Wangdi Du Yu died of grief, and after his death, he turned into a cuckoo bird, crying in the forest all day long, and hiding his face and crying when he smelled it.

In terms of culture, the ancient Shu Kingdom is not a barren land, according to legend, the ancient Shu Kingdom once invented another form of writing completely different from the oracle bone inscription, but this kind of writing with the demise of the ancient Shu Kingdom is also drowned in the dust of history, no one mentions it. For example, in 1986, archaeologists excavated two large sacrificial pits in Sanxingdui, Guanghan and found more than 1,000 exquisite and precious cultural relics, most of which were used for witch sacrifices.

After listening to Professor Li Zhongkai's explanation, I looked out the window of the train in a daze, thinking that thousands of years ago in the southwest frontier in addition to the ancient Dian Kingdom, there was such a powerful and mysterious ancient country, and I had an indescribable sense of vicissitudes.

Compared with the strange and unpredictable ancient Dian country and the powerful and fierce ancient Yong country, the ancient Shu country appears lighter and more mysterious, although there is archaeological work on the Sanxingdui civilization of the ancient Shu country has been carried out for decades, but the cultural relics still can not completely unveil the mystery of the ancient Shu country, it seems to be in front of our eyes, but it is far away in the sky.

Ancient Shu Kingdom - a country that exists in mythology.

Based on my previous experience, I have already made some mental preparations, and those established conclusions and the archaeological artifacts we have seen are very likely not real history at all, and those real historical facts are likely to be hidden in the mysterious mountains, and no one has cared about them for thousands of years.

I looked up at Bu Jin, who was sleeping on the top bunk, her eyes closed, her expression was serene, and she looked like she was in peace with the world.

I said to Li Zhongkai: "Professor Li, stop, don't say any more, I'm a little tired and want to rest for a while." ”

Li Zhongkai nodded, lit a cigarette, and walked out of the carriage.

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