What is Bo culture?
Bo people hanging coffins
Although Bo people have disappeared, as a nation that has made great contributions to the development of Southwest China in history,
China's history will remain forever. With the flourishing national culture, with the gradual deepening of reform and opening up, with the continuous deepening of the research on the "mystery of hanging coffins", and with the rapid development of Bo cultural tourism, the historical value of "hanging coffins for Bo people" is revealed. Gongxian County is located in the adjacent area of Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou provinces, and it is the most typical place for hanging coffins burial in ancient times. At present, 41 hanging coffins have been found, including 288 hanging coffins. China and even the world have the largest number of hanging coffins. Hanging coffins are commonly known as "hanging rocks". That is, placing coffins on cliffs tens of meters high is the burial system of Bo nationality in southern Sichuan in ancient times. As early as the Warring States period, Bo people lived in groups in Yibin area, and Bo Hou Guo and Bo Dao County were established. Because of its bravery, it was not allowed by its rulers in previous dynasties. They live among wild thorns and have the reputation of "cutting through thorns". In the Ming Dynasty, Bo people were called "Duzhang clan". In the first year of Shenzong (1573), the governor of Sichuan once saved me and Liu Xian, the general soldier, led a 14,-strong army to wipe it out. At that time, "the former army led the torch to burn more than a thousand villages in the city, and the flames spread all over the sky ... tens of thousands of people went to the cliff valley ... and duzhangman was completely destroyed" (Xingwen County Records). However, according to folklore, the Bo people were not killed, and the local He family was the descendants of the Bo people. It was also said that the ancestor's original name was "A" and he changed his name to "He" because he avoided the suppression of the current dynasty. In the Ming Dynasty, the leader of Bo people, King A, was killed in Jiusi City, the capital of Bo people. Someone once visited an old man surnamed He in the local area, saying that his ancestor He Daning was originally the same family as Emirates Ada and Ah Er, and later joined the army under a general named He and changed his name to He. In Gong County, there used to be a famous saying "You Ke Ke (Yi nationality), Fan Miao Zi, and He Jia Gua Yan Zi in the back mountain". As for why the Bo people have the custom of hanging coffins for burial, Gong County Records records: "According to legend, there are Luo Yin, and because the Bo people tasted their ancestors, they were taught to hang on the rocks and their descendants were high. So fight for high rocks to get lucky. " It is also said that Zhuge Liang used this method to consume the strength of Bo people.
During the Three Kingdoms, Zhuge Liang's southern expedition was blocked when he passed through the land. When he saw the dry land in the sky, he let people report it. The drought is due to the poor geomantic omen in the grave of Bozu. If the coffin is moved to the cliff, there will be a good harvest in the coming year. When the Bo people believed it, they abandoned the war and were busy moving the grave. Zhuge Liang took the opportunity to leave. Unexpectedly, the following year, the crops were abundant and people and animals flourished. As a result, hanging coffins were handed down from generation to generation. However, in the era of slash and burn, there are different opinions on how to put the hanging coffin on the cliff. It is said that drilling is the road, and after putting the coffin, it destroys the road; It is said that the cliff should be buried with soil first, and then the soil should be removed; It is said that ropes are put at the top of the cliff; There is talk of building a carriage frame. Exactly how, still can't understand. The hanging coffins of Bo people are mainly concentrated in Matangba and Sumawan in Gongxian County, with about 2 hanging coffins. Placement methods, such as drilling holes horizontally; There are drill holes embedded with wooden stakes, and the coffin is placed horizontally on the stakes; There are also several juxtaposition or stacking. The coffin is like a boat, with a big head and a small tail, and it is mostly made of whole nanmu. Around the hanging coffin burial place, there are many rock paintings of Bo people. The pictures and colors are clear and distinguishable, and most of them are painted in sand. They all use primitive flat painting techniques, with rough lines, vivid images and diverse themes. Its function, either as a tribal emblem or to comfort the dead, reflects the religious belief and spiritual world of the coffin bearer. What are the eternal mysteries of "Bo people hanging coffins"? In summary, there are six main mysteries, namely, the family, the age, why this burial custom was carried out, whether there are descendants of the people who carried out this burial custom, how to put the coffin with a weight of one thousand pounds on the dry cliff, the purpose of drawing rock paintings around the hanging coffin and the meaning of rock paintings, and so on.
ethnic group
there are different opinions and disputes about the ethnic group of hanging coffin burial. There are four main viewpoints in academic circles: (1) Bo people in southern Sichuan annals and local residents all think that hanging coffins in Gongxian County is the burial custom of Bo people, and they have always called it "hanging coffins for Bo people". Because Gong County used to be a "Bo people's" settlement, it was known as "Bo Road", and it was recorded in the Records of Gong County in Qianlong that the coffin rock ruled the southwest for 9 miles. In the past, the chiefs of Bo carved stone oak nails at the cliff end and placed them on the coffin, and the cliff was 1 meters high. (II) Widow In 1974, Sichuan Provincial Museum took down ten hanging coffins in Dengjiayan and Baimadong of Matangba for cleaning and excavation, and found that seven bodies had their maxillary lateral teeth knocked out, and the history books recorded that the widow had the custom of beating her teeth, so some people identified her as a widow. However, because the other three bodies that were cleared and excavated at that time did not have teeth, this statement is also questioned and it is difficult to become a conclusion. (3) It has been verified by some people in the same family that Sichuan has always been an important residential area of Pu people, and Bo people are Pu people, that is, the Wei and Jin dynasties and their successors. Because some of this people live in Duzhang, and later they are called Duzhang people, so they think that Bo and his family have different names. (IV) Not a specific ethnic group There is another view that hanging coffin burial cannot be a specific ethnic group or its descendants, because hanging coffin burial, as a similar cultural phenomenon, can be independently developed by several different ethnic groups under similar social development stages and natural geographical environment, or spread among different ethnic groups due to cultural communication. When all kinds of disputes are inconclusive, people respect local customs and call Gongxian hanging coffin "Bo people hanging coffin" according to the established principle. Why do people hang coffins on high rocks? Why do people put coffins on steep cliffs? There are five theories in academic circles: (1) Gui Zu said that the sun emblem rock painting is a symbol of Bo people's totem worship and hanging coffins to return to the ancestors. (2) The highest filial piety says that the people put the coffin of their ancestors on the cliff, and the highest one thinks it is the highest filial piety. (3) the history of protection says that the bones of ancestors are hung on high mountains, so that people and animals can't invade. (4) safari said that the safari people lived in peace with the mountains and along the river, living in rocks and dying in rocks. (5) The dignitaries made it clear that the Records of Gongxian County recorded that Bo people were buried by hanging rocks, and this life was noble.
How to place a coffin with a weight of one thousand catties on a high rock
How did Bo people put a coffin weighing several hundred catties or even more than one thousand catties on a cliff several tens to one hundred meters above the ground? Many experts, scholars and tourists have made bold speculations, which can be summarized as follows: hanging rope theory, ascending position theory, tying box theory, plank road theory, ladder theory, foundation soil theory and water level theory, etc., and there are three kinds of people who agree with it. (1) The hanging rope said that after the burial site was selected, the coffin-setters wrapped rattan ropes around their waists, hung them from the top of the cliff, attached them to the cliff, drilled holes and piled them from bottom to top, then hung the empty coffin to the selected position and put it on the nailed stake, then hung the corpse, funerary objects and sand to protect the corpse from erosion from the same way, and put them into the coffin, and finally covered the coffin lid to complete the burial. (2) Ascending means that some people hold one end of the rattan rope on the top of the mountain, and the other end is thrown off the cliff. First, they manually pull it to a pre-selected place to drill a hole, then pull the buried coffin above the hole, and then manually nail the coffin pile on the coffin hole, and then slowly put the coffin on the coffin pile. (3) tying the box said that bamboo and wood were tied and erected layer by layer from the bottom of the cliff, and the coffin was manually carried up along the box frame and placed at the destination. This approach seems simple, but if a coffin is put on a scaffold, the amount of work is too large, and if it is put on a scaffold for a long time, the safety will not be guaranteed. Therefore, this speculation is also reluctant.
Are there descendants of Bo people
After the first year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty, Bo people in southern Syria decreased on a large scale, and appeared in literature records from time to time during Chongzhen and Shunzhi years, and then mysteriously disappeared, leaving people with doubts. It is generally believed that a war should not make a nation completely extinct, and Bo people should have descendants. As for the whereabouts of their descendants, there are the following local sayings: First, they changed their names and surnames, afraid to admit that they are Bo people, and afraid to take the original "A", so they changed the surname of "A" to "He" next to "ィ", and the local "He" surname is Bo people's descendants. In the second way, the Bo people are scattered in a large area adjacent to Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan, and the Bo people in southern Syria are only one of the defeated parts. At present, there are still Bo people living in Hengjiang River Basin in Yunnan and Nanpanjiang River Basin in Guizhou. Even after the fall of Jiusi City, there were still many survivors, but they were afraid to use the family name of "Bo" because of the suppression of the imperial court, and they were gradually assimilated by other nationalities over time. (Supplement: The common family name of Bo people is "Duzhang", which can be found in literature records, and it was still used until the early Qing Dynasty)
Age
As for the issue of the age of Bo people's hanging coffin burial in Gongxian County, because the coffin has not been chemically tested, it is mainly calculated according to the literature. From the records since Wei and Jin Dynasties, it seems that Bo people settled in Yibin and its south area earlier, starting from the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. The history of their hanging coffin burial is generally consistent with the period when they settled in southern Syria, that is, in the fourth century BC, it began at the latest when Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty established Budao County, and the ending period should be the first year of Wanli of the Ming Dynasty (AD 1573) when the Bo people were suppressed by the court on a large scale. Of course, this inferred figure is not scientific and accurate enough, so it is also controversial.
the purpose of drawing rock paintings and the meaning of rock paintings
The rock paintings of Bo people distributed on the rock walls around the hanging coffins are extremely magical, and there are nearly 4 existing in Matangba, Gongxian County alone. These rock paintings have weathered the wind and rain without fading, and their themes and contents are rich and colorful, with vivid shapes and rich changes and dynamics. There are sports, hunting, fighting, animals, weapons, wheels, big Yang emblem and other patterns, as well as unknown monsters and some irregular geometric patterns, which are highly valued by all walks of life. There are also various speculations about the purpose of painting rock paintings around the hanging coffins. Most people think that Bo people, like the Han nationality and other ruling classes, attach importance to mural painting and carving in the tomb, and their purpose is nothing more than comforting the dead, or improving the prestige of the dead to frighten the living, or as a symbol of the clan and tribe to which the dead belong. What's the meaning of rock paintings? Some people think that it reflects the production and life scenes of Bo people and some funerals, such as the bronze drum patterns in rock paintings and many dance and game-like figure paintings, which are the real and vivid reflections of the scene of "playing drums and Lu Ge, drinking and dancing" in the process of hanging coffins. Others think that it reflects the religious beliefs and spiritual world of Bo people, with traces of ancestor worship and totem worship. However, for those grotesque and mysterious patterns, what significance they contain is currently unknown.
Edit this section of Bo People's Rock Painting
The Bo People's Painting in Matangba, Gongxian County, with its wide distribution, rich content and colorful images, should be said to be better among the 14 provinces and municipalities with hanging coffins (or rock tombs) in China. In 1935, Ge Weihan, an American scholar who worked in West China University, made a special trip to Gong County for investigation. He wrote in the article "White Graves in South Sichuan"
: "Another great surprise to the author is that there are many rock paintings on the rock surface very close to the white graves", and added a few rock paintings. This is the first copy of the "Bo Man Rock Painting" in Matangba, Gongxian County. Ge reasoned that "they don't seem to be works of art, but they may have been painted by the person who put the coffin." Then, in 1946, scholars who went to Gongxian to inspect the "Bo people hanging coffins" included Rui Yifu and Shi Jie Zhong Jian of the former Academia Sinica. In Shi Zhong Jian's two monographs, Study on Hanging Coffin Burial and Hanging Coffin Burial in Sichuan, there are some detailed or carved rock paintings in the hanging coffin burial area of Gongxian County, just like the Han nationality and other ruling classes. The purpose of painting and carving is nothing more than to comfort the dead, or to expand the prestige of the dead and to intimidate the living; Or the emblem of the nation or tribe to which the deceased belongs. The former is a figure painting, such as a rock wall painting, with pictures such as dancing and fishing, which are probably used to comfort the dead, and a fighting picture of the prancing horse battlefield, which is probably to boast about the mighty achievements of the dead and make the living respect him more. " In his view, "rock wall painting has a more important role, which is to reflect the religious belief and spiritual world of the people who hang coffins. It is from this religious belief that a whole set of funeral rituals gradually formed. The 11 rock paintings in Mr. Shi's appendix are the second batch of copies of "Bo People's Rock Paintings" in Matangba, Gongxian County. In the summer of 1974, during the first excavation and cleaning of "Bo Ren Hanging Coffin" in Matangba, Gongxian County, the author participated in the investigation of "Bo Ren Rock Painting" and shared the copying work of the whole rock painting. Together with the archaeological staff of the Sichuan Provincial Museum, I climbed the cliffs without fear of hardships and dangers, and searched more than 2 rocks on the east and west sides of Matangba repeatedly. Anyone who could not see clearly with the naked eye used a telescope. Because of the age, many pictures have been eroded by wind and rain, so the copying work is very arduous, but we also enjoy it. After some efforts, we call it "coffin shop", "lion rock", "big hole", "nine lights" < P >, "pigsty door", "Mamoshan", "nitrate cave", "Dengjiayan", and so on. The harvest can be great. After these rock paintings were sorted out and came out, they quickly attracted the attention of academic circles. Then, works by Mr. Shen Zhongchang and others from Sichuan Provincial Museum were published. The study of "Bo people's rock paintings" has been deepened. The "Bo people's rock paintings" in Matangba, Gongxian County are generally painted on the rock walls and frames around the hanging coffins, and most of them are red, and a few are white, and some of them are still fresh in color. Painting adopts the method of flat painting. Although the lines are rough, they are multi-shaped and vivid, and the characters are extremely varied and dynamic, with a wide range of themes and rich contents. There are dances, gymnastics, acrobatics, martial arts, fencing, riding, kicking shuttlecock, ball games, fishing, hunting, expeditions, various animals, knives and spears, wheels, the sun and the moon, Tai Chi pictures, various decorative patterns, etc. The composition is concise, the shape is moving, and at first glance it is really lifelike. In January, 1985, during the second excavation and cleaning of "Bo Man Hanging Coffin" in Matangba, more than 1 rock paintings that could not be seen clearly on the ground and had not been copied were corrected by cleaning up the aerial box frame at the scene and the rock eaves near the top of the "Nine Lights" cliff. These precious works of art are undoubtedly masterpieces of ancient Chinese Bo people. It vividly recorded the life and fighting style of the Bo people at that time, and it has a strong local flavor, which can be called the treasure of our national art.