First, can you build a greenhouse with a span of more than 500 meters?
The scale of the Qin Shihuang Mausoleum determines the scale of archaeological facilities, and the protection of archaeological facilities is not in place. Digging the Qin Mausoleum is unthinkable.
When it comes to the scale of the Qin Mausoleum, we must first look at the scale of the land seal of the Qin Mausoleum.
Hanshu? In the Biography of King Chu Yuan, it said, "It is fifty feet high and walked more than five miles in a week." In the Qin dynasty, one foot was about 23 cm, and 50 feet was about 1 15 m. In the Qin Dynasty, one mile was 4 14 meters, and five miles was 2070 meters. This is probably the original scale of Qin Shihuang's mausoleum. However, after more than 2000 years of natural erosion and man-made destruction, the existing sealing soil is much smaller than the original sealing soil. In order to understand the actual size of the original sealed soil accumulation, the archaeological team of Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses found that the original sealed soil foundation was approximately square, and its circumference was close to the data of "more than five miles a week" in Hanshu, which was 2000 meters, 5 15 meters long from north to south and 485 meters wide from east to west.
In this case, we should first build a protective shed with a span of not less than 500 meters, and then dig, otherwise it is impossible to dig out the Qin Mausoleum.
The reason couldn't be simpler. The structure of the Qin Mausoleum consists of two parts, one is the underground palace, and the other is the earth seal above the surface. Of course, people are most concerned about the underground palace, hoping to see that the remains inside are really different as Sima Qian said, and even the remains and relics that Sima Qian did not record can be unearthed. To dig out the underground palace, we must first dig out the sealed soil with a length of 5 15 meters from north to south and a width of 485 meters from east to west. Don't say that this is an imperial mausoleum as a world cultural heritage, just a general mausoleum. According to the rules of archaeological excavation, neither explosive nor bulldozer can be used to push it, let alone excavator can be used to dig it. In a word, it is impossible to dig fast, so we can only take it slowly, that is, bit by bit. It takes a long time to dig bit by bit, going through spring, summer, autumn and winter, and facing wind, frost, rain and snow. In this way, it is necessary to build a greenhouse first, just like digging a pit of terracotta warriors and horses, which is beneficial to excavation and protection of unearthed cultural relics. Otherwise, even if people can work in the open air, they can fight against the sky and carry forward the fearless revolutionary spirit. What about the underground palace that can be dug up? Can't let it blow and rain?
Can the shed be made smaller? Is it possible to erect several columns on the enclosure to narrow the technically unsolvable span problem? The answer is no, the column stands on the sealing soil, how to remove the sealing soil? Even if you take 10 thousand steps back, you can stand up straight. What a scandal! How to ensure the complete plane landscape of the underground palace? What if there are cultural relics under the pillar? What's more, does the soil condition around the underground palace meet the requirements of the column? Therefore, it is necessary to build a greenhouse with a span of more than 500 meters. Can a beam frame with a span of 500 meters be built in the world at present? The problem is not too big. For example, there are not a few bridges with a single span of more than 500 meters, such as Lupu Bridge in Shanghai and Chaotianmen Bridge in Chongqing, all of which are about 550 meters. The pier spacing of Akashi Bridge in Japan seems to have reached 2000 meters, and so on. All these show that modern technology has been able to build long-span beam frames.
If such a greenhouse can really be built and the soil is sealed in the greenhouse, it is equivalent to "wrapping" the Qin Mausoleum. The open-air fence of Qin Shihuang's Mausoleum has been integrated with the cemetery landscape and mountains of 50 square kilometers around Fiona Fang. After the greenhouse is completed, how to coordinate the style of the greenhouse with the surrounding landscape is a headache.
Second, digging out the soil will make the ground landscape of Qin Mausoleum disappear.
There is a problem in building a greenhouse. Why not just dig out the Qin Mausoleum and seal the soil?
The most direct consequence of excavating the Qin tombs is that the ground landscape of the Qin tombs will disappear. How can people feel the grandeur of the panoramic view of the Qin tomb when there is only the landscape of the underground palace and the scene of the closed soil scale is lost? How can people appreciate the hardships and greatness of the ancients in building such a huge project? Obviously, I can't pass either.
Some people say that since it is difficult to build a greenhouse on the sealed soil and it is impossible to dig it out, why not find a tomb door on the mausoleum and dig a hole down to the underground palace? The question is, where is the underground palace? How big is the underground palace?
Two years ago, China included archaeological work in the National "863 Plan" for the first time, and conducted underground archaeological exploration with the largest capital investment and the highest technical level, mainly using remote sensing and geophysical techniques. The results show that the large underground palace is located at the top of the mound and below its periphery, about 35 meters deep from the ground, about 170 meters long from east to west and about 145 meters wide from north to south. The main body and tomb of the underground palace are rectangular; The tomb in the center of the underground palace is about 80 meters long from east to west, 50 meters wide from north to south and 15 meters high, which is equivalent to a football field.
Regardless of whether this detection is the actual situation of the underground palace of the Qin tombs, even if it is, is the location of the underground palace located in the place where it has been detected? What if it is misplaced? There is an introduction about the depth of the underground palace of Qin Shihuang's mausoleum in the historical materials "Nine Righteousness of Han Dynasty", to the effect that in 2 10 BC, Prime Minister Li Si reported to Qin Shihuang that he took 720,000 people to build Li Shan Mausoleum, which was dug deep as if it were underground. After hearing this, Qin Shihuang ordered "to walk another 300 feet or even." Whether it is the authenticity of historical data or the accuracy of conversion scale, are we psychologically prepared to bear the fact that the results of excavation are different from those of detection? Because the location of the underground palace is as confusing as Qin Shihuang's vague impression in our hearts.
Third, the underground palace is deep, how to get up and down?
If the underground palace is 35 meters deep from the present surface, it is equivalent to a high-rise building with about 15 floors. If the vertical wall is made of stone or even earth and stone, it is still very strong. If it is only a slab wall and an earth wall like the Terracotta Warriors pit, will it lead to collapse? To say the least, if reinforced, wouldn't it change the original form of the vertical wall itself and become a modern man-made product? To take a step back, if it is not a vertical wall that goes straight up and down, but a stepped vertical wall-this may also be the actual situation-it may be possible to avoid landslides, or it may be easy to avoid landslides. How can we build a tunnel? The Terracotta Warriors pit is 3-5 meters deep from the surface, and there is a fence next to it, so you can see it clearly without going down. But the underground palace is more than 10 times deeper than the terracotta warriors and horses pit. If you put a fence on it, can't visitors see it through a telescope? If a walkable passage is built, wouldn't it destroy the structural landscape of the underground palace?
Fourth, how long will it take to finish the excavation of Qin Mausoleum?
If we use the most mechanical algorithm, which can be said to be almost a joke, and only calculate the excavated area without considering the time cost, the actual burial situation and the input of human, material and financial resources, we can roughly calculate that the No.1 tomb of Qin Jinggong in Fengxiang, Shaanxi Province is the largest pre-Qin tomb excavated in China at present, with a total area of 5,334 square meters and a depth of 24 meters. The Qin Mausoleum covers an area of 250,000 square meters, about 50 times larger than it. Qin cemetery was discovered on 1976 and cleared on 1986. Digging 10 years. According to this reasoning, isn't the Qin Mausoleum going to dig for 400-500 years?
Qin Jinggong, the owner of Qin Jinggong No.1 Tomb, is the grandson of Qin Mugong IV and the 14th ancestor of Qin Shihuang. The tomb of the Great Tomb is like an inverted pyramid embedded in the ground, with three steps up and down, surrounding the tomb wall and a width of 2-6 meters. The top of the tomb is 59.4 meters long and 38.8 meters wide, and the bottom is 40 meters long and 20 meters wide, covering an area as big as two international standard basketball courts. The pyramid-shaped mound leads to the tomb in a gentle slope, connecting the two ends of the tomb. The pyramid-shaped mound is connected with the tomb in a zigzag way, with a total length of 300 meters. The bottom of the tomb is 24 meters from the horizon, which is equivalent to 8 stories high. The total volume of this tomb is more than 10 times larger than that of the Shang Dynasty tomb in Houjiazhuang, Anyang, Henan Province, and it is the largest king's tomb seen in the pre-Qin period. In the tomb of the tomb owner, 166 martyrs, men and women, were arranged neatly and orderly and buried in boxes. In addition, 20 bones were found in the fill, which is the largest number of martyrs' tombs found in China since the Western Zhou Dynasty. During the Han, Tang and Song Dynasties, the Qin cemetery was repeatedly invaded by thieves, and as many as 247 caves were found, and many gold, silver and jewelry and bronze dings were stolen by grave robbers. However, more than 3,500 cultural relics, such as copper, iron, gold, pottery, stone, jade, lacquerware and textiles, which have been excavated one after another, are still rare treasures.
200 1 a reporter came to this national key cultural relics protection unit for an interview. The reporter found that despite the sunny overhead and fresh air, the open pit of Qin Jinggong No.1 Tomb was overgrown with weeds and covered with blood. It turns out that due to various reasons, the protection of the tomb has been seriously lagging behind for more than ten years after its excavation. The huge open-air grave is exposed to the wind, rain, sun and rain, and the surroundings of the grave are washed away by rainwater and sewage, leaving countless spots, which almost become smelly puddles and garbage stations. The reporter also saw at the scene of the tomb pit that the bottom of the pit on the east side of the tomb pit ignited a flame tens of meters high. It turned out that four farmers were weeding with the most primitive burning method.
Previously, more than 70 villagers in Nanzhong Village, Fengxiang County, Baoji City, Shaanxi Province spontaneously raised more than one million yuan to build the first Qin Gong No.1 tomb site museum founded by farmers in China. However, South Zhang Cun, a remote village with a per capita net income of only 1000 yuan, cannot afford to invest several million yuan to build a large arch shed in a tomb pit. At the bottom of the tomb pit more than 20 meters deep, the reporter found that due to long-term immersion in rain, there were obvious large-scale landslide marks on the south tomb wall, and the main coffin room at the bottom of the tomb pit also collapsed due to long-term water accumulation, and the pyramid-shaped tomb frame shape was gradually disappearing. The curator of the museum said that if no protective measures were taken, the "inverted pyramid of the East" would cease to exist in less than ten years.
Let's calculate again: the total area of Terracotta Warriors and Horses Pit of Qin Shihuang is about 20,000 square meters, and the area of Qin Mausoleum is 13 times and the depth is 6-7 times. After 30 years of excavation, the actual excavation area of terracotta warriors and horses pit is not large. The excavation area of No.1 pit is 4000 square meters, accounting for 28% of the total area of No.1 pit. More than 200 square meters have been excavated in No.2 pit, accounting for 3.4% of the total area of No.2 pit; The 520-square-meter site of No.3 pit has been completely excavated; The total excavated area accounts for about 1/5 of the total area of the whole site, that is, more than 4,500 square meters have been excavated in 30 years. By analogy, the area of the Qin Mausoleum is 50 times the total area of the excavated terracotta warriors and horses pit. How many years will it take to dig?
Another ridiculous algorithm, but it may be a bit reliable. If the soil is combined, regardless of the depth, the area of the Qin mausoleum underground palace is more than four times that of the Qin cemetery, and it will take 40 years to dig; It is more than five times the actual excavation area of Terracotta Warriors and Horses Pit, and will be excavated 150 years.
There are also two reference data: experts estimate that after all three terracotta warriors and horses pits are excavated, 8,000 terracotta warriors and horses and tens of thousands of bronze weapons will be unearthed; Among them, the most famous No.1 pit has about 6,000 pieces of pottery figurines and horses, with an average height of 1.8m, an average height of 1.7m and a length of 2m. At present, more than 2,000 pieces of pottery figurines and horse figurines have been unearthed in the three pits, accounting for about1/4 of the total; There are more than 1 000 pieces of well-restored pottery figurines and horses, accounting for about 1/7 of the total.
These data look boring. If the conditions are really ripe in the future, if our descendants really want to open the mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor, these materials will certainly have important reference value. Although there are many statements about these data, and there is no authoritative and credible statistical conclusion at present, it clearly conveys such a message: there is still a lot of work to be done in the archaeological excavation of Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses Pit, and there are still a lot of relics and remains buried underground, not to mention the scale and volume of Terracotta Warriors and Horses Pit are far from being compared with the Mausoleum of the First Qin Dynasty.
Comparison of scale and volume between Terracotta Warriors Pit and Qin Shihuang Mausoleum
Compare the total area excavation difficulty between ground height and underground depth.
There are no known terracotta warriors and horses pits of about 5 meters or 20 thousand, and the types of relics are relatively simple.
The mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor is about 70m high, about 35m high and about 250,000 unknown. The types of relics can be very complicated.
After 30 years of work, only 1/3 was excavated in the Terracotta Warriors and Horses Pit. The mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor covers an area of about 56.25 square kilometers, and the part that has been drilled in detail only accounts for110 of the total area. The central part of the cemetery covers an area of about 2 square kilometers, and it is clear that the part buried underground only accounts for 1/3 of the central area. More than 500 kinds of burial pits and tombs, as well as millions of square meters of palace buildings, have been found in the cemetery, and basically no formal excavation has been carried out. Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses Archaeological Team has experienced two or three generations since its establishment. Most old archaeologists have retired, and some are no longer alive. In this regard, Yuan, the first captain of the retired archaeological team, said: "The archaeological work of the Terracotta Warriors and Mausoleums of Qin Shihuang has a long way to go and the archaeological task is very arduous. It takes several generations and hundreds of years of unremitting efforts. "
Fifth, how big is the investment?
Input includes the three most important elements of manpower, material resources and financial resources, and the others are temporarily excluded. Take Pit 1 and Pit 2 as examples. The plane of the No.2 pit is rectangular, with a length of1.24m from east to west and a width of 98m from north to south. Its protection hall is a steel grid structure, with a plane size of 134.2, a width of106.25m and a height of14.5m. The No.1 pit is larger, with a length of 230m from east to west and a width of 62m from north to south. Almost all the protection halls are built at the width of 10 meter from the outer edge of the pit. The roof of the hall is a floor-standing three-hinged steel arch structure with an arc length of 80 meters and a chord length of 67 meters, with a total weight of 306 tons and an investment of 2.45 million yuan. What makes archaeologists feel most sorry is that when the museum was built around 1975, it was at the end of the Cultural Revolution, when the country was in economic difficulties. In order to save one steel arch every 654.38+10,000 yuan, three arches were built less, and the ramps at both ends of the No.1 figurine pit were left outside the hall. Although it saved 300,000 yuan, it left irreparable regret.
Such a large-scale excavation requires a huge amount of money, and without sufficient financial support, the excavation work cannot be carried out at all. At present, building a provincial museum in China, excluding land and relocation costs, will cost at least 100 million yuan according to the current construction cost. An example before us is the Suzhou Museum designed by Mr. I.M. Pei. Its construction area is only about110 of the underground palace of the Qin tombs, with a total investment of 339 million yuan. How much investment is needed to dig the Qin Mausoleum? How much will it cost to build the Qin Mausoleum Museum after it is dug? How much investment does it take to build a museum for daily maintenance and protection? I'm afraid this is beyond the budget of this book.
In addition to manpower and material resources, it is even more unpredictable. At the most tense moment of cultural relics rescue in the Three Gorges Project, nearly 100 archaeological teams from all over the country worked at the same time. It's hard to say whether the archaeological work of the Qin Mausoleum depends on Shaanxi's own strength or whether archaeologists are recruited from all over the country or even abroad. Coupled with the archaeological scale of hundreds of people and the cooperation of relevant indirect personnel, it can almost create a "conference war" with countless employment opportunities. The planned Qin Shihuang Mausoleum Ruins Park is also a national key project, with an investment of more than 500 million yuan and an area of 56.25 square kilometers, which is equivalent to 70 or 80 Forbidden City and almost the size of a city. One of the achievements of the Three Gorges Project is the establishment of Chongqing municipality. Will the construction of Qinling Mountain make Xi 'an or Xianyang a municipality directly under the central government? Therefore, we really have to admire Qin Shihuang. In that year, 700,000 people participated in the construction of his mausoleum. How did he dispatch and coordinate thousands of troops? Today, we are still worried about how to protect his grave. This first emperor is really different.
The sixth is to explore technology, okay?
If the cultural relics in the underground palace are not stolen or destroyed, they must be extremely rich. However, the protection of paintings, silk paintings, murals, lacquerware, bamboo slips, pottery and wood products will become a headache, and the maintenance of the underground palace itself will soon become a huge problem. In addition, there is a problem that few people pay attention to in the excavation of Qin Shihuang's mausoleum. The question is not whether it can be protected after excavation, nor whether there is not enough manpower, material resources and financial resources before excavation, but whether there will be major mistakes in excavation itself. Have we studied its capabilities?
The excavation of the underground palace involves a series of survey, drilling, excavation and restoration techniques. We have no precedent for scientifically exposing the tombs of civil buildings, and we lack the experience of direct excavation. Who can guarantee that the mistakes made by archaeologists will not happen? The reason why we can't dig it now is almost always that the protection technology is not too hard. It is always said that there may be induration of silk fabrics and discoloration of utensils, which gives people the impression that once these technical protection problems are overcome, we can work hard. From the perspective of archaeology, what promotes the progress of archaeology is the discovery itself and the method of discovery-missing the discovery can leave the opportunity for future generations with stronger technical ability, but because of the mistakes and limitations of our current methods or research capabilities, this is a historical sin and regret. Faced with this non-renewable resource, who dares to simply say "pay tuition"? Who will pay the bill? Who are you responsible for?
On the other hand, if a wide variety of cultural relics are really unearthed after excavation-not just pottery products such as terracotta warriors and horses, how much effort will it take to restore them? How complicated is it? How many technical difficulties need to be overcome? It is also a series of problems that we can't avoid. Look at the following example of carefully restoring terracotta warriors and horses, and you will know that mountains and rivers are difficult to keep. Even if it is easy to dig up, how difficult is it to protect it? Qin terracotta warriors and horses have been destroyed by man-made destruction and fire. After more than 2,000 years of covering, they are all broken, and each terracotta warrior and terracotta horse must be bonded with dozens or hundreds of broken pottery pieces.
Before restoration, we should first record the unearthed location, present situation, coordinates of each pottery and its relationship with the surrounding cultural relics. At the same time, necessary photos and drawings should be taken to provide reliable data and physical materials for later research and restoration, and also facilitate the restoration of cultural relics in the future.
Secondly, before the restoration, the restoration object should be comprehensively observed and analyzed to understand its structural relationship and its accessories; According to a series of preparatory work in the early stage, a complete restoration plan was worked out.
When repairing, carefully remove the dirt and stubble stuck on the pottery, then clean it with clear water, dry it in the sun or dry it in the sun, and put it together according to the number when unearthed. After the pieces are assembled, the pottery pieces should be gradually bonded from bottom to top along the stubble. During the bonding process, the figurines should be divided into several parts for reinforcement to prevent the colloid from falling off. The stubble of the clay figurine's leg is supported by steel bars. The body cavity and pedals of the pottery figurines are laid flat on the summer planting site with pasted small pieces of cloth. After the glue dries, repair the cracks on the surface of the characters, and finally carry out the old treatment.
It can be seen that every Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses can only be repaired after the strict operation of the above procedures. In addition, in 2006, China cultural relics reported that in order to control dozens of germs produced by Terracotta Warriors, scientific and technological personnel made great efforts to constantly overcome technical difficulties, so I won't say much here.
Seventh, do relevant international organizations agree to dig?
Will UNESCO and the World Heritage Committee interfere with the excavation of the Qin Mausoleum? How to intervene? Even if we are emotional and rational, and people finally reach an agreement, it is unknown. Will it be like when Egypt built the Aswan Dam, and UNESCO launched the "International Action to Save Nubian Ruins" and organized 22 countries to participate, starting from 1960 for 20 years? If it is international, will foreign excavations-we only talk about this one-conflict with our existing archaeological excavation standards? For example, they have to dig underground bit by bit, inch by inch, which is extremely slow and there are so many rules. How long will it take? When the cultural relics rescue work of the Three Gorges Project was carried out, it was not without foreigners wanting to invest. Fortunately, we China people did it quickly and economically, otherwise it is hard to say when the Three Gorges Dam will store water.
It seems that Qin Mausoleum and Fuling have not reached the point where they must be rescued. Whether all underground cultural relics must be dug up in our generation or left to our descendants is a contest between sensibility and rationality, between standards and the overall situation, and between political achievements and political achievements. The real crisis faced by China's imperial tombs, such as the Qin Mausoleum and the Gan Mausoleum, is not only the climbing and description of tourists, the sinister intentions of treasure-hungry grave robbers, earthquakes, water seepage, weathering and mildew, but also the crisis of our cultural concept. We are always used to giving full play to our intelligence and wisdom, and always lack sober introspection on the limitations of our own abilities.
It can be seen that the reason for not robbing a tomb lies not only in how much technical support we have, but also in how much digging ability and cognitive ability we have. This is the key or essence of the matter. The former is technology, while the latter involves our cultural maturity. In other words, the technology has been achieved, can we still dig? If our archaeologists can't adapt to the process of human cognition, lag behind the general cognitive stage of archaeology now, and can't ask more and deeper questions to ancient times, then no matter how good our technology is, even if it is world-class, it is better not to dig.
Having said that, our understanding of * * * has almost reached: the excavation of the emperor's tomb requires not only technical conditions, but also the ability of archaeological research, and more importantly, Scientific Outlook on Development with human, history and culture. If the three are not up to standard, we have no choice but to leave the mausoleum to future generations. However, if you don't dig, you can't cut across the board. Just because archaeology emphasizes leaving cultural relics to our descendants to dig as much as possible, we can't think that such protection is scientific. Until when? If the underground cultural relics have suffered from their own and foreign erosion, wouldn't it be more scientific to dig them up for our study first? So it is wrong to emphasize digging blindly, but never digging is not necessarily scientific protection. In other words, not all cultural relics should be left to future generations. Some things that are easy to corrode should be dug up first, and those that are easy to preserve should be left to our descendants.