Those who study archeology would naturally know what it means to resell cultural relics, such as stone statues and bronze items. However, whether they are auctioned or sold on private transactions, itâs expressly prohibited by the state. For example, the âTerracotta Warriors and Horsesâ of the First Qin Emperor hadnât been damaged for decades, because the state has made great efforts in protecting them by strictly forbidding buying and reselling cultural relics. The excavated cultural relics, such as the ones from the tomb of a Prince or a member of the Royal Family, if they were robbed, and the one who robbed them wanted to trade them, it wonât matter whether the trade is a public or private transaction, itâs still not allowed.
However, that doesnât mean that itâs impossible to sell any cultural relic; porcelain, gold and silverware, wooden furniture, etc., as well as cultural relics that are clearly circulating around, which have been handed down for generations. These kinds of things can be bought and sold freely. Therefore, many grave robbers use their ancestors as an excuse to take advantage of the legal loopholes and sell stolen items in legal transactions.
Qin Cheng guessed that what Wei Bofei wanted to buy werenât legal circulating objects, since the seller had said that the police were investigating the reselling of cultural relics in Jinzhong, also mentioning that they wouldâve to change the time where the transaction would take place. Thinking about it, Qin Cheng estimated that the investigation might be extremely strict. Normally, the police wouldnât be actively looking out for these transactions, checking only from time to time, so Qin Cheng guessed that something might have happened there recently to now be a large-scale inspection.
â Maybe an important cultural relic went missing. â
âThat seller, which day did he say the new transaction will take place?â Qin Cheng asked, after thinking about it.
Wei Bofei sighed: âHe said that he wasnât sure yet, because he doesnât know when the inspection would be finished. I guess the artifact he wants to sell is a bit⌠complicated. He said that he would call me once the inspection is over. At the latest, it wonât take longer than 8 days.â
âComplicated? Then, the artifact he wants to sell to you isnât a bronze piece like the last one?â
â If itâs something from the Xu Dynasty, then, I guess, itâs something that it will likely be treated as fake, it shouldnât be so complicated to sell it. â
âIâm not sure what happened. The artifact he was going to sell me isnât some kind of wine bottle like last time. However, itâs still a bronze artifact. He said that itâs from the same place as the wine bottle he sold to me before, and that this kind of objects can only be found there.â
Qin Cheng frowned: âThen, the only thing we can do is wait, to ask any questions.â
â But, if we have to wait for too long, how many days would we have to stay in Jinzhong? â When Qin Cheng thought about this issue, he thought that he may as well go to Pingyao County to look around first, and once the seller contacts them, he can simply go back.
âWell, since the trade has been postponed, my companion and I will go to the ancient city of Pingyao for two days. When the seller contacts you, you can call me and Iâll get back. Pingyao isnât far from Jinzhong after all, so it would take me an hour to get here by train.â
In fact, Wei Bofeiâs trip was solely to buy another artifact from the same person that sold him that wine bottle, and since the transaction has been delayed, he didnât know where to go. Since Qin Cheng mentioned that heâll go to the ancient city of Pingyao, he was tempted as well. Wei Bofei was a man around the age of 28 or 29, and he had just gotten married, so he really wanted to travel around. Last time he went to the ancient city of Pingyao was on a business trip, so this time, he wanted to go as a tourist, to visit Datong, and see the Xuankong Temple. At this thought, he replied: âAlright then, I was also thinking of going to see the Xuankong Temple. Iâll go to Yuncheng, and then Iâll take a bus to get there. Weâll get in touch when the seller calls me.â
âExcellent.â
After agreeing on this, the three of them parted ways after they arrived at Yuncheng. Qin Cheng and Wu Hai were ready to set off for Pingyao.
Some people used to compare the ancient city of Pingyao like this: âItâs a deep rooted beautiful place in a troubled world. Even after it experienced the trials and tribulations of the storm, it wasnât affected by the disgrace. The ancient city of Pingyao, which was once a glorious city, had sustained half of Chinaâs commercial activities. No matter how many ups and downs it had experienced, it was still a place of great passion, as if it were giving History a meaningful smileâŚ.â
The ancient city of Pingyao has a history of thousands of years, and it can be seen that the history of this ancient city was so important, that it was incomparable to the rest of the ancient cities in the country.
This was the first time that Wu Hai visited Pingyao, and since he had finally come here, as an archeologist, he would naturally wish to see Pingyaoâs City Wall, which was built in the Western Zhou Dynasty.
âItâs said that the ancient city of Pingyao was built during the reign of King Xuan of the Zhou Dynasty, by Yin Jifu, an important Minister of that time, when he was stationed in the army. Itâs also said that there were many mysteries surrounding the construction of the ancient city of Pingyao. At the beginning, it was built as the âCity of Turtlesâ, with the intention of representing the turtlesâ âLong Life and Good Fortuneâ. From the point of view of a bird flying in the sky, the southern gate of the city can be seen as the head of the Yingxun Gate, which is referred to as the eyes of the turtle. The northern gate of the city, the Gongji Gate, is the tail of the turtle, which is the lowest point in the city, where all the city water flows out. The east and west sides have four gates facing each other. This city has an history of more than 2800 years, and has been restored 26 times.â Wu Hai stood at the foot of the towering city walls, and continued: âHowever, what remains now is the reconstruction made at the third year of Hongwuâs reing in the Ming Dynasty; even many of the bricks and stones are of the present era.â
After hearing Wu Hai saying that the city was built during the reign of King Xuan of Zhou, Qin Cheng chuckled and thought of the time Su Jingmo said to him that the city built by King Xuan of Zhou was long gone, and even his Great Xu hadnât seen any ancient city corresponding to King Xuan of Zhou at that time, meaning that this city was newly built by the previous Dynasty.
When he saw that Qin Cheng had laughed, Wu Hai thought that he had said something wrong, and that he was being ridiculed by Qin Cheng. For a moment, he felt a little embarrassed. âWhatâs so funny?â
âNothingâŚ.â
It was true, Qin Cheng was indeed not laughing at Wu Hai. After all, they only knew about the legends of King Xuan of the Zhou Dynasty from books. But in fact, there wasnât an actual trace of the city for more than 2000 years now. Before, he also lost face in front of Su Jingmo because of thisâŚ. After so many years have passed, itâs understandable that there will be many errors in modern peopleâs estimates of what actually happened that long ago.
However, Wu Hai didnât know what Qin Cheng was thinking about, and he simply thought that Qin Cheng was being arrogant. In the end, he replied angrily: âI just donât like this temper of yours. You alway say half of the words you think, making others look more stupid than you!â
âNo, I didnât mean that.â
âThen say it more clearly!â
Wu Hai is the type of person thatâs very temperamental and speaks bluntly, and Qin Cheng was aware of that. Otherwise, after Jiang Boâs death, when everyone was gathered in the research lab, Wu Hai wouldnât have stood up from his chair to say what everyone else thought, which was that Qin Cheng was speaking bullshit about the ghosts, and that there were an 80% chance of him being the principal suspect.
âI was thinking of a friend, umâŚ. He did some research in this area, and he said to me that in addition to what itâs written in later books, there isnât actual evidence to prove that this city was built in the period of King Xuan of Zhou. At that time, I said something that made him laugh, so as soon as you mention it, I thought of what happened then and couldnât stop myself from laughing.â
After Qin Cheng explained, Wu Hai was relieved and no longer worried: âI wish you had said that earlier.â Wu Hai then looked at Qin Cheng, and said: âHey, why has your way of speaking changed recently? I noticed it just now that when you speak, you do it with âeleganceâ. What, âwritten in later booksâ, âit made him laughâ? You shouldnât watch so many dramas, now you canât even speak normally.â
Once Wu Hai said this, Qin Cheng also noticed that heâs been speaking weirdly. At this, he was stunned for a while, but he also didnât know how to explain it. Perhaps, after having spent such a long time with Su Jingmo, he was naturally affected by his way of saying things.
Theyâre archeologists whoâve been quite busy working on the burial pits, so they never talk with each other that much. Recently, heâs been even more busy than before, and when he thought about it, these past months Qin Cheng might have been speaking more with Su Jingmo than with his colleagues. It wouldnât be so strange to get influenced by the ancient speech Su Jingmo spoke so fluently.
âHow can you watch those kinds of dramas that adapt history like that? Even the way you speak has been affected!â Qin Cheng didnât deny it, and because of that, Wu Hai had already seen him as guilty of such a thing. When he thought about those dramas that altered history beyond recognitionâŚ. It made Wu Hai look at Qin Cheng differently: âItâs better to not watch those dramas at all, otherwise, everything you learnt in history class would be wasted.â
Wu Hai said this with such earnestness that made Qin Cheng not know whether he should cry or laugh. But, what else can he do? He had already spoken that way, he canât swallow them back, and itâs not that he can find any other good excuse to explain himself. The only thing he could do, was to grit his teeth in silence.
âAlright, letâs not talk about that. Last time, I found a map engraved on the stone wall of one of the side chambers inside the tomb.â He hadnât tell Wu Hai and Zhang Jun that the capital of Great Xu was near Pingyao, and after remembering the day when Su Jingmo wrote a poem on the map, Qin Cheng continued: âThere was a poem engraved on the map which said; âThe Ninth Heaven <sup>1</sup> of prosperity exists in Zhongdu, and the golden gates of the Palace closes around the Fenhe Riverâ. When I read âZhongduâ and âFenhe Riverâ, I remembered that Pingyao, whoâs close to the Fenhe River, was once called âZhongduâ in the Han Dynasty. So, maybe, the so-called Great Xuâs Capital City was once in this area. Besides, coupled with the fact that the man who sold that Jue to Wei Bofei was doing transactions of this kind in Jinzhou, I guessed that there might really be something left here.â
After Wu Hai heard this, he also understood why Qin Cheng wanted to come here: âDo you want to look for this capital city, and see if you can find any traces that can prove the existence of this Xu Dynasty? But, if this Dynasty really existed, and disappeared from history, then of course it wonât be easy to find. After all, so many years have passed, and nobody, not a single historian, has ever speculated about it?â
âI donât think that no one had even speculated about it, itâs just that these speculations were never recorded in the Official History Books. We, as archeologists, mainly rely on the official history while looking for the âevidenceâ that still remains to this day. However, the past is unknown, and no matter how many things are recorded in history books, they can only be regarded as legends. Do you still remember that post that speculated about the tomb in Ninghua Village? Didnât it say that âPu Huang drank all the water in Changâan, Xuan Yuan took advantage of the wind to travel to the capitalâ?â
âYes, I do remember. That post did say quite a lot of things. But, do you think that there are many more mysteries?â
After looking at Wu Hai, Qin Cheng nodded: âThat post said that the person who wrote this verse knew that the Imperial Court didnât dare to say that Pu Huang army had died in Ninghua Villageâs tomb because they went there with the intention of robbing the tomb. However, it also said that âXuan Yuanâ should refer to the Emperor of the Tang Dynasty. I agree with the first guess, but I donât agree with the following one. Xuan Yuan is regarded as the first Emperor in Chinese legends and mythology. Since thereâs only one âmythologicalâ thing between these two sentences, I donât think that the person who wrote this verse would use legends to refer to a real Tang Dynasty Emperor. Since Xuan Yuan is a legend, this person must have thought that the Emperor buried in that tomb wasnât written in history books. Changâan was the name of Xiâan in the Tang Dynasty, almost 1500 or 600 years ago, which coincides with the time of Ninghua Villageâs tomb. My guess is that the person who wrote this verse, has really been to the Imperial Mausoleum located in Ninghua VillageâŚ.â
(o´ç˝`o) âĄ
Footnotes
<ol><b>äšĺ¤Š</b> <b>jiÇ tiÄn</b> ; This term can refer to many things, such as: âThe center of the sky and all directionsâ; âThe highest place in the Heavensâ; It refers to the âForbidden Palaceâ (this forbidden palace can also refer either to: âThe place where the Emperor and the Empress livesâ, âThe Haremâ, or to refer to the Emperorâs consort); it refers to the Emperor.</ol>