The eternal fire first appeared in all kinds of fairy tales. It is said that this eternal fire is the fire of the heavenly palace, which Prometheus secretly brought to mankind. In a word, human beings know this secret by accident. Perhaps a philosopher passed it on to human beings, just as Shennong taught human beings to grow crops and Youchao taught human beings to build houses. Once humans know how to make permanent lights, the news spreads like wildfire, and temples all over the world want to install this kind of lights that will never go out.
According to the customs of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome, the dead also need lights to drive away darkness and light up the road. So before closing the tomb, it is customary to put a lamp in it. And the house of wealth and splendor should be extravagant, with an unlit lamp to illuminate the dead forever. Thousands of years later, when the vaults of these tombs were opened, the diggers found that the lights inside were still burning well. But these are the facts of the past, and it is still an unsolved mystery today.
In China, it is said that on the New Year's Eve, all the ghosts come out to look for food because the gods went to heaven, especially those ghosts, such as raccoons and raccoons, who don't worship during the Chinese New Year and the holidays at ordinary times, are even more welcome (because every family has a lot of cakes and cocoons that night). If you blow out the lights and can't see the world in the dark, you will catch people with the sound, especially in the middle of the night when children cry and old people cough, and their lives are hard to protect.
There are many similar records. According to historical records, there is an ever-burning lamp in Qin Shihuang's tomb. China people have a tradition of treating death like life, and the mausoleum after death is also called a haunted house. Kings pay special attention to the mausoleum as a residence after death, and hope that the lights before death are as bright as palaces, so there will be ever-burning lamps.
Structure and characteristics
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The ever-burning lamp has a double-layer structure. The container is filled with lamp oil, the wick is soaked in vinegar, and the outer layer is filled with water to cool the lamp oil. This is a great invention, because the oil consumed by oil lamps is not mainly ignited, but volatilized by heat. Vinegar wick can not only keep the temperature low, but also the water outside the oil pot can effectively prevent the oil temperature from rising, but it is an ideal wish after all. During the excavation of Dingling in Beijing, there was a celadon vat in the main hall of the mausoleum, which contained wax lamp oil and a wick. This is the ever-burning lamp, but obviously it went out soon after the tomb was closed, because the closed tomb lacked the oxygen needed for combustion.
Ancient tomb ever-burning lamp
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The ever-burning lamp in the ancient tomb
There are grave robbers all over the world. They tried their best to steal gold, silver and jewels buried in ancient tombs for thousands of years. Ancient tombs are usually isolated from the world, making these treasures well preserved after thousands of years. In this dark tomb all the year round, grave robbers usually think it should be opaque. However, they are sometimes horrified to find that on the vaults of some ancient tombs, a bright lamp emits a faint light.
In 527 AD, Syria was under the rule of the Eastern Roman Empire. At that time, soldiers in East Rome, Syria, found a lamp in a niche of a pass, which was covered with a delicate cover, as if to keep out the wind. According to the inscription found at that time, this lamp was lit in 27 AD. When the soldiers found it, the lamp had been burning for 500 years! Unfortunately, savage soldiers soon destroyed it, and the principle of this mysterious lamp is unknown.
A Greek historian once recorded a lamp burning on the door of the Temple of the Sun in Egypt. This lamp has been on for centuries without any fuel, and it will not go out regardless of wind or rain. According to the Roman theologian Saint Augustine, there is a similar lamp in the Temple of Venus in Egypt, which can't be extinguished by wind and rain. It's a bit like the flaming mountain described in Journey to the West.
In A.D. 1400, it was found that such a lamp was also lit in the tomb of the son of the ancient Roman king, and it has been burning for more than 2000 years! Wind and water can do nothing about it, and the only way to put out the fire is to pump the strange liquid from the lamp bowl.
In A.D. 1534, the troops of King Henry VIII of England rushed into the English church, dissolved religious groups, and dug and robbed many graves. When they were digging the grave of the father of the Roman emperor Constantine in Yorkshire, they found a burning lamp. Constantine's father died in 300 AD, which means the lamp burned 1234!
In A.D. 1540, Pope Paul III found a burning lamp in the grave beside the ancient Roman road (an ancient Roman avenue). This tomb is said to be the tomb of the daughter of Cicero, an ancient Roman politician who died in 44 BC. Obviously, this lamp burned in this closed arched tomb 1584! More interestingly, the body in the tomb was soaked in an unknown liquid and seemed to have just died. It turns out that the ancients used this liquid to preserve the body.
The ever-burning lamp of Cizhou kiln in Song Dynasty
These ever-burning lamps are only a small part of all the discoveries in the world. Archaeological records show that this ancient temple lighting or tomb lighting phenomenon has been found all over the world, such as India, China, Egypt, Greece, South America, North America and many other ancient civilizations and regions, and even Italy, Britain, Ireland and France.
Ever-burning lamp conjecture
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Why hasn't such a magical ever-burning lamp been preserved so far? Didn't the ancients pay enough attention to the ever-burning lamp they discovered? In fact, the ancients did keep these magic lamps, but strangely, once they appeared, they would be quickly destroyed in some way, such as by savage marauders and diggers. Are the ancients using some kind of spell to keep their technical secrets?
/kloc-In the middle of the 0/7th century, in Grenoble, France, a Swiss soldier named Du Pulitzer stumbled upon the entrance to an ancient tomb. After struggling to enter the ancient tomb, the young man didn't find any gold, silver and jewels he wanted. However, what surprised him even more was that there was a burning glass lamp in this isolated grave. Surprised, he took this mysterious lamp out of the grave and gave it to the monastery. The monks in the monastery were equally dumbfounded. This lamp has been burning for at least 1000 years. They kept it like a treasure. Unfortunately, a few months later, an elderly monk accidentally knocked it off the ground and broke it.
Another interesting thing happened in England. A mysterious and unusual tomb was opened. The person who opened the tomb found a lamp hanging on the vault of the tomb, which lit up the whole tomb. When the man walked forward, part of the floor trembled as he walked. Suddenly, a fixed statue in armor began to move, holding some kind of weapon in his hand and moving near the lamp. The weapon in his hand destroyed the lamp. This precious lamp was destroyed like this.
The purpose of the ancients has been achieved again and again: the mystery of the lamp has been closely guarded and will never be known to future generations.
Changmingdeng building
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Long Fu Temple Changmingdeng Building is located in Guxian Village, the western suburb of Langfang City, Hebei Province. The lamp house is made of white stone, consisting of a square door seat, a lotus cover round seat, an equilateral octagonal stone pillar and a lotus raised tray, with a height of 3.4 meters.
The sculpture on the stone pillar is divided into three parts: the lower part is carved with a pointed arch, and the niche is embossed with geisha music. Among them, three sides are kneeling or sitting on the lotus seat of Sumi Mountain, playing flute, pipa, flute and other musical instruments, while holding the long-practiced dance geisha music. South of the center of the stone pillar is engraved with the seal cutting of "Ode to the ever-burning lamp building of Long Fu Temple in Anci County, Youzhou, Datang". Preface and eulogy are regular script, with cursive script in the middle. Zhang Xuan wrote "Anci County Commandant" and Zhang Qutai wrote "Anci County Magistrate's main book is Tongzhi Lang Shoujun". After the eulogy, Prajna paramita learned many heart sutras, and the lights were also engraved. There are double pointed arches carved on both sides of the stone pillar, and there is a Buddha statue carved in the niche, a total of sixteen. There are two hair styles of Buddha statues: meat bun and spiral bun, peach-shaped hair. Clothes are shoulder-to-shoulder, shoulder-to-shoulder and right-topless. The Buddha's seat is octagonal, and the sitting posture is mostly squatting, squatting and stepping on lotus. Buddha statues have different handprints, such as speaking, fearlessness and meditation.
Long Fu Temple Changmingdeng Building
The lotus disc is chiseled flat, with two grooves and a round shallow hole in the center.
Stone lanterns are one of the offerings of temples. Earlier stone lanterns were from Tongzi Temple in Taiyuan, Shanxi Province in the Northern Qi Dynasty, Faxing Temple in Cilin Mountain, Zhangzi County, Shanxi Province in the eighth year of Dali (AD 773), Shi Niu Temple in Ganxian County, Shaanxi Province in the Tang Dynasty, and Buddhist Temple in the south of Zhuque Street, Longquan Prefecture, Beijing in the late Bohai Kingdom (AD 893-906). Judging from the shapes of these stone lamps and the socket structure on the tray of Guxian Lantern Building, there should be a lamp room above the stone lamps in Guxian County.
Compared with the stone lanterns of the same period, the stone lanterns in Guxian County are exquisite and rigorous in carving techniques and solemn and simple in style, which is a precious stone carving in the Tang Dynasty. It also has the following two characteristics: First, it was first established, and the exact date of the ancient stone lantern was April of the fourth year of hanging arch, which is the earliest known stone lantern in the Tang Dynasty. Secondly, the stone lanterns in Guxian county are huge in shape and rich in carving content, which has extremely high historical value. The stone pillars of the ancient stone lanterns are engraved with Buddha statues, geisha music, scriptures, poems and eulogies, which are not found in other stone lanterns. [ 1]
Production reason
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Silver ever-burning lamp
So does this unusual lamp represent ancient high technology? How did our ancestors invent these lights that never go out?
Were the ancients familiar with making unlit lamps? No, there are no such lights in the graves of ordinary people. However, this kind of lamp will also appear in the tombs of ancient alchemists who are either rich or extravagant. For example, in A.D. 16 10, the grave of an alchemist named Los Cruz was dug up after his death 120 years, and there was such an unlit lamp in it. So people suspect that ancient alchemists and casters knew how to make this ever-burning lamp. Doesn't the dim light have anything to do with metal?
Eternal mystery
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Unfortunately, this unlit lamp has disappeared a few days ago. Are all the stories recorded in the past true? The ever-burning lamp has naturally become a controversial topic in academic circles. Some people think that the records of ever-burning lamps around the world are enough to make people sure that there is such an immortal lamp, or a lamp that burns for a long time, but the technology is lost and we can't understand it. In the middle ages, most people of insight thought that this kind of unlit lamp did exist, and this kind of lamp had some magic power. Some people think that although there are so many records about the ever-burning lamp, there is no ever-burning lamp in reality, and the energy problem of this lamp seriously violates the law of conservation of energy, so this ever-burning lamp should not exist. There are still many people who think this may be a clever joke played by the ancients in the book.
If ever-burning lamps really exist, what is their energy source? Or they won't last forever, but they will burn for thousands of years. If it is an ordinary kerosene lamp, it will consume tens of thousands of liters of kerosene. Can their fuel be replenished continuously? After the Middle Ages, many thinkers tried to make a kind of ever-burning lamp by supplementing fuel, that is, to replenish fuel quickly when the fuel was about to run out. But none of these experiments succeeded. Even with modern continuous fuel supply technology, it is unrealistic to make a lamp that can last for thousands of years.
Others boldly speculate that this kind of lamp is an electric lamp, and the liquid in the lamp bowl that looks like fuel may be mercury used for conducting electricity, so "fuel" never seems to be less, and this kind of electric lamp will not be afraid of wind and rain. The ancient Hebrews kept the modern technology called electricity in secret. It is described that in the13rd century, a Frenchman named Jacelli owned a lamp without any oil or wick. Usually the light is on the front porch of his room, and everyone can see it. When Jacelli was asked why the light was on, he always smiled and said, "Keep it a secret!" " Jechery has done many experiments related to electricity. In order to protect himself from the enemy, he invented a discharge button, which can discharge current to the iron handle on the door. When Jechery presses the button, a bright blue spark will suddenly appear.
If the magic lamp is really lit by electricity, how is electricity generated? Are there any machines that can generate electricity installed in temples or ancient tombs? Only solar energy can continuously supply power once and for all. Does the magic lamp really use solar energy to generate electricity? The ancients seemed unwilling to tell us the secret.
Solve a riddle
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365,438+0 years later, Americans solved the mystery of the ever-burning lamp.
Simon Effick is a physics and chemistry teacher in Idaho, USA. The man was very interested in the ever-burning lamp since he was a child, but unfortunately, no experts and scholars could explain the mystery of the ever-burning lamp clearly, so Simon made up his mind to solve it.
Simon read a lot of books about the ancient tomb magic lamp and found that there are striking similarities in the records about the ever-burning lamp. That is to say, in the tomb where the ever-burning lamp was found, in addition to the ever-burning lamp, there were dozens or even hundreds of ordinary oil lamps that had been extinguished and rusted. Simon felt that he had found the eternal mystery of the ever-burning lamp.
After 3 1 year efforts and more than 700 experiments, Simon finally made the ever-burning lamp. Simon mixed yellow phosphorus with other flammable substances to make a brand-new substance, which is not volatile in the air but can spontaneously ignite slowly enough.
The lamp made of this new substance can only burn for 50 hours under normal circumstances, so why did Simon say that he had made an ever-burning lamp?
Simon explained that before the tombs of ancient dignitaries were closed, there was an ever-burning lamp similar to his own, and there were many ordinary oil lamps in it. With the closing of the tomb door, a large number of ordinary oil lamps quickly exhausted the air in the tomb, and all the lamps, including the ever-burning lamps, were extinguished at this time.
After that, no matter how long it takes, even hundreds of thousands of years, as long as someone enters the tomb, it will inevitably bring in fresh air, so it will ignite the ever-burning lamp that will spontaneously ignite under normal circumstances. This is the secret that the ever-burning lamp is still on when people enter the tomb for thousands of years.
Simon also said that the purpose of this is to scare off grave robbers and prevent them from disturbing the peace of the tomb owner. [2]
Modern explanation
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In 527 AD, the Eastern Roman Empire found an ever-burning lamp in a temple in present-day Syria. According to the inscription in the temple, this lamp was lit in AD 27-that is, 500 years, comparable to the span of the Great Sage under the Five Elements Mountain.
Later, in 1534, King Henry VIII of England found the tomb of the father of the Roman emperor Constantine the Great in the underground of a church in Yorkshire today, with a lamp burning in it. Constantine's father died in 300 AD, so the lamp has been strong 1200 years, which is more durable.
China also has this record, even earlier. "Historical Records of the First Qin Emperor" wrote:
At the beginning of the emperor's accession to the throne, he passed through Mount Li and merged with the world. The world sent more than 700,000 people through three springs, went down to Tongquetai and Tonggong, and things changed in Gong Zhongqi.
Take mermaid cream as a candle, and it will last for a long time.
Mermaid cream can be used as a candle for a long time. If so, the Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor is also brightly lit and very lively all year round.
Some documents hold different views on the specific components of "mermaid cream".
"Three Lights on the Fire Cloth" quoted "Three Ji Qin" as saying: "In the tomb of the first emperor, whale paste was burned as a lamp."
From the fuel point of view, whale cream is more scientific and credible than giant salamander cream for the following reasons:
Whale oil itself is fuel.
Before the large-scale application of fossil fuels, whale oil, like today's crude oil, was an important fuel for industrial and domestic use, and even whale oil was widely used for lubrication between machine parts.
/kloc-In the middle and late 20th century, the whaling industry in the United States was highly developed, and New Bedford, Massachusetts was even known as "the whaling capital of the world". In addition to whale oil as fuel and lubricant, whale bones and other whale products have high utilization value, which encourages a large number of people to take risks and fight against marine behemoths.
Whales are more in line with the description of mermaids.
Although "mermaid" in ancient books mostly refers to giant salamander, some features in the description of "foreign body" are more similar to whales. Whales live in the deep sea, and their skin needs to resist extremely high pressure, so it may be "beneficial to mackerel". And "there is a small hole in the neck from which gas comes out" is very similar to the breathing process of whales. The biggest problem here is "extra feet". Even newborn whales are more than 1000 feet long, so they are still in doubt. )
Whales coincide with the legend of "Jiao Ren"
"Strange Tales from a Lonely Studio" records that "there are pearls in the South China Sea, that is, the eye pupil of whales, which can be seen at night and is called luminous. "Whale's eyes can shine like pearls, so there is a saying that' eyes are like pearls on the moon', which has the value of tribute.
Looking back at the legend of Jiao Ren that we talked about at the beginning, this description is very consistent. In fact, the legend of "sharks cry for pearls" may be a literary statement that gets eyeballs from stranded whales.
For the above reasons, I think "mermaid cream" is actually whale oil, that is, the first imperial tomb used whale oil as the fuel for lighting equipment.
Finally, talk about the mysterious "A Ring of Endless Light". We know that the conservation of energy is inviolable. After determining that the fuel is whale oil, the "ever-burning lamp" has the following two feasible schemes:
1. Store a large amount of "mermaid cream" and ensure that the tomb is well ventilated.
Before Candeira, one of the seven basic units of the International System of Units, the unit of measurement of light intensity was candlelight. 1 The standard of candles is defined by special whale oil candles. The requirements of this standard candle are: 2.2 cm in diameter and 7.78 g per hour.
Then a ton of whale oil can burn for about 14 years. A big whale can refine tons of oil, and under ideal circumstances, it can also support the burning of "mermaid cream" candles for nearly a hundred years, which is regarded as "eternal life".
Of course, combustion needs oxidant, and mermaid cream is advanced. After all, it's not a rocket, but it also has its own oxidant. Even assuming that Qin Shihuang had enough whale oil reserves, the air in the tomb had limited oxygen content and had to be ventilated constantly.
2. The illusion of "longevity" caused by the automatic control system.
The starting point of this paper comes from the records in Historical Records. In addition to mermaid cream, Tai Shigong also described the security system of the first imperial tomb: "Let the craftsman make a crossbow, and you need to shoot it if you wear it close." Take mercury as a hundred rivers and seas, instill machines, there is astronomy on the top and geography on the bottom. "-the first emperor's tomb has a crossbow. The crossbow is automatically triggered by people close to it, and its power source should be the gravitational potential energy of mercury.
If such a fire control system can really be realized with the productivity of the Qin Dynasty, then the ever-burning lamp is likely to be ignited by the human trigger mechanism, and the source of oxidant is the fresh air brought by people opening and entering the tomb.
In other words, the "ever-burning lamp" is not really long-lasting, but "people come to Ming." [3]
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