Why is Wu Zetian's tomb called Gan Ling?

Ganling is the only tomb in China where two emperors and their couples were buried together, and it is the best preserved ancient imperial tomb so far. Ganling is located on Liangshan Mountain, 6 kilometers north of Ganxian County, Shaanxi Province, and 76 kilometers away from the ancient city of xi 'an. It was built in 684 AD, and it took 23 years for the project to be basically completed. Liangshan is a naturally formed limestone peak, with three towering peaks, the highest in the north, with an altitude of 1047.3 meters, and the lower in the south, with an east-west direction. At that time, the masses called it "Nitou Mountain". Looking from east to west of Ganling, Liangshan is like a woman lying on her back, with the north peak as the head and the south two peaks as the chest. People often say that it is a wonderful symbol of Empress Wu Zetian. Due to the special identity of the owner of the tomb and the glorious historical background of the prosperous Tang Dynasty, a large number of treasures and cultural relics are bound to be buried in the tomb, which has aroused great concern of people in past dynasties. So, how many treasures are there in the mysterious underground palace of Ganling?

According to the existing literature, there is a "road of admiration" outside Ganling, which is also called "road of birth". It is what we usually call a tunnel. The tunnel consists of trenches and caves. The junction of these two sections is where the underground palace gate is located. From 1959 to 1960, archaeologists conducted two explorations and trial excavations of Ganling Tunnel, especially in March of 1960, when a large area of the tunnel was exposed. The exposure shows that the open-air part of Ganling tunnel is 63. 10 m long and 3.9 m wide. Located in the south of the main peak of Liangshan and east of the waist spine. It is sloping. The internal structure is made up of rectangular stone strips with a weight of one to two tons, with a total of 39 floors. There are about 4 10 stone bars on the surface. The stone bars are hung up, down, left and right with iron waist hanging plates and iron bars, and then iron slurry is poured between them to make the stone bars unable to move and become a whole.

What's in the underground palace? This is what people are most concerned about. We can get some information from the literature notes of the Six Canon of Tang Dynasty and Yuan Tomb of Tang Dynasty. First of all, there is a "coffin bed" in the middle room of the underground palace, and the emperor's "shrine", that is, the coffin, is placed on the "coffin bed". There are moisture-proof materials and treasures at the bottom of the coffin. Add a "seven-star board" with mats and mattresses on it, and put clothes and "six jade" such as silicon, Zhang, wall, Hu and Huang next to it. The emperor was wearing 12 big clothes, with jade in his mouth, lying on his back on the mattress, facing the coffin. The inside of the coffin cover is inlaid with yellow silk, on which the sun, moon, stars and arowana are painted. Secondly, there is a stone bed in the back room or behind, surrounded by clothes, swords, snacks and other things that the deceased fiddled with before his death. Three, there is a "treasure account" in the front room or front, and there is a shrine in the account. There are jade rings, mourning books and mourning books in the west of the shrine. Some "jade coins" are placed in the east of the shrine.

Among all the funerary objects in Ganling, the most precious one should be Wu Zetian's Hanging Arch Collection. According to historical records, on her deathbed, Wu Zetian asked Li Xian to take her Hanging Arch Collection as a funerary object and bury it in Ganling. Of course, so far, there are many different views on the archaeological excavation of the emperor's tomb in the cultural circles. Digging or not digging, archaeological excavation is to protect or destroy, the debate is very fierce. Anyway, these ancient people are our ancestors. Because of China's traditional morality and people's feelings for their ancestors, it may be our best choice to let these ancient people take their secrets and treasures to sleep underground.