Treasure hunt begins in England

Chapter 868
The first time they heard the alarm from the metal detector, Liang En and the others became excited and started digging with the shovel in their hands.

It's a pity that the results were not optimistic. At least in the first dozen or so diggings, things like iron nails and iron sheets were dug out. There was nothing but these scrap metals.

But this is also expected. After all, there have been human activities in this area all year round, so it is not so strange to leave a series of metals.

And the other people present didn't think there was anything wrong. After all, archaeology can also be regarded as a process of continuous trial and error. It can be said that it is very common to find garbage like this.

Finally, when another metal detector rang, there was something underneath their digging tools that had never been seen before: a golden light leaked from a lump of dirt.

After gently scraping off the layer of soil with the small bamboo knife they carried with them, Liang En and the others found that this thing should be a piece of gold leaf. Unfortunately, after such a long time, this piece of gold leaf has become a ball under the pressure of the soil. gold.

Obviously, the next job was not something that Liang En and the others could do with the simple tools they carried in their hands, so they quickly brought this lump of gold to the prefab room on the previous construction site.

Because of the discovery of cultural relics on the construction site, the construction project that was originally planned to start was also stopped, but the batch of prefabricated houses that were built before for the workers remained, just enough for the archaeological team to use.

It's just that this prefabricated house was not used for living, but a series of temporary equipment, including some equipment for protecting and restoring cultural relics, and Liang En came here now to find those professionals Complete the repair.

"The situation inside this gold leaf is a bit complicated, and we may not be able to handle it here." After watching Liang En show his discovery, the young staff member in the room checked and said.

"However, Mr. Liang, you don't need to worry. This work is relatively simple for those who have special equipment, and gold is also very flexible, so it only takes two or three days to complete this maintenance work."

"Okay, then I'll leave it to you." Liang En said and signed a series of documents according to the regulations to complete the handover work, and then handed the small box containing the pressed gold leaf to the other party.

The rest of the time was just waiting, but Liang En and the others were not idle during the waiting process, but were digging on the construction site.

It's just that then I felt that the speed slowed down all of a sudden, because after those gadgets were dug up, everything that followed was difficult to dig.

To give the simplest example, just like the ivory discovered before, all of them are now at the bottom of the pit, because digging for ivory is a very difficult thing.

This is mainly because over the long period of time, most of the ivory has been completely corroded, leaving only the hardest part of the outer layer, the enamel, still remaining.

So the actual condition of these ivory was almost broken into countless pieces as what Liang En and the others had seen before, so it was definitely not an easy task to dig out these things.

Some other bronzes also have the same problem. The long-term underground burial has caused serious corrosion of these bronzes, so they must be treated before they can continue to be excavated.

After waiting anxiously for two days, Liang En received a call when he was about to go to the excavation site from the hotel on the third morning, asking him to go to the local archaeological department to visit the piece of gold leaf that had been cleared just yesterday morning.

"This is the clump of gold foil we sent before." After seeing the gold foil sandwiched between the glass plates, Joan showed a surprised expression, because this thing is very different from before.

"Yes, Your Excellency the Viscount." The person who came to guide them was a professional receptionist, so he said to Jeanne very seriously.

"This is the previous gold leaf. We now name this piece of gold leaf "Sun God Bird" gold leaf. The gold leaf decoration has an outer diameter of 12 cm, an inner diameter of 5 cm, a thickness of 5 cm, and a weight of 29 grams."

"From the appearance point of view, the outline of the gold foil is circular, and the pattern is divided into two layers, the inner and outer layers, both of which adopt a transparent form of expression. The inner layer pattern is twelve arc-shaped tooth-shaped awns distributed equidistantly, and the awns are arranged in order. Rotate clockwise."

"The outer pattern is composed of four equally spaced birds. The birds are all in a state of stretching their necks and legs and spreading their wings. The direction of flight is opposite to the rotation direction of the inner pattern."

"We can see that on the red substrate, the inner pattern of the gold decoration is very similar to a rotating fireball or the sun, and the bird in the outer pattern is very reminiscent of the sun-carrying bird in ancient myths and legends. This is why everyone named it the "Sun God Bird" gold leaf."

"This naming is more rigorous." Liang En looked at the familiar piece of gold leaf and nodded. "I think this should belong to the worship of the sun in the early days of Chinese civilization."

Because the sun plays a vital role in the survival and reproduction of human beings, the ancestors naturally have a feeling of awe and worship for the sun.Among the various primitive worship concepts, the most widespread one is sun worship.

However, in Chinese tradition, the worship of the sun is not very obvious, at least in the traditional Central Plains, there is not much related to sun worship, and the sun worship of this ancient Shu civilization is a rare exception in China .

At the same time, those discoveries in the previous archaeological work proved that there was a very prominent concept of worshiping birds and bird totems in the ancient Shu civilization, and this kind of worship blended with sun worship and sun mythology and was reflected on this piece of gold foil .

"Yes, after all, the pattern on it is very clear. Although everyone may have other guesses, this is still recognized by most people." The accompanying staff member said.

"Actually, I think this piece of gold leaf is also an example of the communication between the civilizations of the Central Plains and Shu in ancient times." Liang En thought for a while and said, "Of course, this is just my guess, and there may not be evidence—"

"It's okay, please tell me." After hearing Liang En's words, the staff immediately took out the phone and turned on the recording function, and then made a posture of listening carefully.

"That's right, I think this piece of gold foil not only expresses the worship of the sun god, but the producers and users of the gold foil decoration may also use it to show that they are the emperor who "made the four birds" in the "Shan Hai Jing" The descendants of them indicate their kinship with Emperor Jun, the incarnation of the Golden Crow, and Shiri, the son of Xihe, in ancient sun myths and legends."

Liang En quickly expressed his guess. In his opinion, the pattern on this piece of gold foil is likely to be related to the records of the famous work "Shan Hai Jing" in Chinese history.

Although mainstream archaeologists now tend to believe that the "Shan Hai Jing" was written by the people of Chu or Bashu from the middle and late Warring States period to the early and middle Han Dynasty, it cannot be denied that this book was not written in a short time, and the author was not alone.

That is to say, many older legends and stories are likely to come from older ages, and the pattern recorded on this piece of gold foil is likely to be the early record of the legend of Emperor Jun.

(End of this chapter)