After returning to the excavation site, Chen Han, Zhuang Yunpeng, Su Sa, and Lin Ya immediately entered Tomb No. 168 and continued to clean up the side boxes in the coffin.

It is said to be a box, but in fact, the range of the side box is very large, four meters long and more than two meters wide, which is very time-consuming and laborious to clean.

But everyone is full of energy and high morale.

Chen Han also put on rubber gloves and began to look for burial goods in the dark coffin sediment.

"In other words, this burial tool is still very well preserved, and there are almost no traces of damage to one coffin and two coffins."

Zhang Jianbo, who was also carefully cleaning the coffin room, pointed to some traces left by the rise and fall of water on the four walls of the coffin room, and said with some expectation: "According to the measurements of several colleagues. ”

"The depth of water in the coffin is 75 centimeters deep."

"And the highest water mark in the coffin is 132 centimeters, and the lowest water mark is 81 centimeters high."

"It's basically completely invaded by groundwater."

Water marks will only appear when water is soaked in wood for a long time.

It is a clear dividing line separating the place that has not been soaked in water from the place that has been soaked in water.

The depth of this coffin is only 1.55 meters from the coffin cover to the bottom of the coffin.

The highest point of the water mark in the coffin is 132 centimeters, which indicates that the coffin was flooded with groundwater of more than 1.3 meters earlier.

Moreover, it is because the coffin has been flooded with so much water for a long time that such obvious water marks will appear after many years.

So many water marks of different heights mean that the water in this coffin has existed for a very long time, and it may have been in a state of immersion not long after the burial.

Now the water is 75 centimeters deep, which is probably the lowest water level in the past 2,000 years.

"If the coffin has been soaked in water for a long time, and it has been soaked in it not long after it was buried."

"In addition, although the airtightness of this coffin cover is average, the closure of the inner coffin is quite good, so maybe the preservation of the body of the owner of the tomb in the coffin will also be very good!"

Zhuang Yunpeng boldly guessed.

Although he was quite scared of things like non-rotting corpses and dried corpses.

But at the same time, he also hopes that the No. 168 tomb can unearth a body with better preservation conditions.

Because the scientific research value is high!

If he Zhuang Yunpeng dies suddenly now, the corpse will have very important research significance for modern anthropology, biology, and medicine.

Not to mention a well-preserved corpse from 2,000 years ago!

If he could, of course, he hoped that the owner of Tomb 168 would be better preserved.

"I think it's possible, too." Chen Han, who was reaching out to grope in the side box, also nodded in agreement.

Dry for thousands of years, wet for 10,000 years, not dry or wet for half a year.

This sentence summed up by Chinese archaeologists is indeed applicable to most archaeological occasions.

The corpse of the owner of the tomb also belongs to the "tomb excavation" in a broad sense, and this sentence naturally applies.

When the corpse is dry, it can indeed be preserved for a long time, such as desert areas, where dry corpses are easier to find than other areas.

As long as you dry faster than you rot.

And it is buried in a relatively anaerobic environment, which can be preserved.

In addition to the fact that drying is easier to preserve corpses.

In a liquid environment where there is a lack of oxygen, the corpse will be better preserved and will be preserved for a longer period of time.

For example, in some areas, some snakes, centipedes, tiger whips, deer whips and the like will be brewed in medicinal wine.

If the seal is tight enough and effectively sterilized with a high degree of wine, the animal carcasses soaked in the medicinal wine will not rot and deteriorate.

And the structure of tissues, organs and cells will be well preserved.

However, the premise is that oxygen must be isolated and the airtightness must be very good.

Otherwise, water + oxygen will not be able to preserve the corpse for a long time.

Any dead plant or animal will quickly decay and deteriorate when exposed to aerobic conditions for a long time.

Soaking the corpse in open water, as long as there is a trace of oxygen dissolved in the water, it is enough for the corpse to decompose.

Bacteria are not afraid of water, and even in water, the putrefactive bacteria in the human body will grow and multiply like crazy after losing the control of the human immune system.

The reaction was the rapid decomposition of the corpses.

Therefore, the so-called "wet 10,000 years" does not mean that the corpse can be preserved for 10,000 years as long as it is soaked in water.

Instead, if you soak it in water and at the same time seal it without oxygen, it can be stored for a long time.

Among them, "anaerobic" is the key!

Although water can also have the effect of separating oxygen.

But for the preservation of corpses, filling them with water can only create a state of "constant temperature and humidity", providing a stable environment.

Extremely dry conditions, and conditions sealed in water, are theoretically constant temperature and humidity.

Just an environment that has been in a very low humidity all the time.

One is just in a humid environment all the time.

As for why it is dry for thousands of years and wet for 10,000 years.

The main reason is that it is difficult for the dry environment to be stable for thousands of years, and it is relatively easy to be destroyed.

It is already a small probability event that something is buried in the ground and can maintain a dry and anaerobic environment for a thousand years.

But wet is different, the underground tombs are filled with groundwater environment, it is difficult to destroy.

Tomb No. 168 is an example of a coffin where water rises and falls, but it is always difficult to completely dry up.

The coffin was filled with water, which was good news for the burial goods.

Because the oxygen isolation effect produced by the water environment is enough to slow down the oxidation rate of the utensils.

But why did Professor Li and Teacher Kong show disappointed expressions when they saw that the gap in the coffin cover was very large?

Because the coffin cover is not tightly sealed, the oxygen from the outside world may dissolve into the water.

A little oxygen may not have much of an oxidizing effect on the burial goods.

But it was enough for the decaying bacteria of the corpse inside the coffin to multiply.

Chen Han's tomb No. 105 excavated by them, the coffin was also filled with groundwater.

The bronze sword preserved in it is in very good condition, but the owner of the tomb does not even have a complete skeleton left.

Groundwater is not devoid of oxygen!

However, while the excavation and cleaning work was carried out in the past half month, several senior researchers from the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences were also investigating and judging the situation of the inner coffin in the coffin.

Different from the coffin cover, the inner coffin of Tomb No. 168 is still very well preserved, with three linen cloths wrapped around the coffin, each with six layers, and it is tightly closed.

It is not possible to say that there is no water at all, but it is possible that there is not much water at all.

In addition, although the sealing degree of the coffin cover plate is not very good, the layer of green plaster mud covered on the coffin cover plate can be called the king, and it has a very high anti-corrosion effect.

Perhaps the owner of the inner coffin was only exposed to a little bit of oxygen, and the body could still be relatively well preserved.

Thinking of this, Chen Han said with some expectation: "I don't want this tomb owner to be as well preserved as Mrs. Xin Chai, but at least he can be better than Mr. Si Bo, right?" ”

"The best... Huh?! ”

Chen Han, who originally wanted to look forward to a few more words, suddenly stopped abruptly in the middle of his words, with a solemn expression on his face.

His hands that were pulling in the side box also paused sharply.

A box with a length of more than 40 centimeters and a width of nearly 30 centimeters, as if it was woven from rattan and bamboo, was carefully held up by him from the stagnant water.

"What is this?!"