Chapter 1,323 The First Shipwreck of the Southern Song Dynasty
Hailao porcelain from the Yuan Dynasty is very rare to begin with, while the box-shaped "Piyong inkstone" is even rarer in shape and mainly appeared in the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties.
Piyong inkstone is a traditional handicraft. Its inkstone surface is in the middle. The hall is connected to the ink pool. The center of the inkstone is raised high. There are deep grooves around the inkstone to store water for calligraphers and painters to moisten their brushes and dip in ink. This shows its
Practical functions.
The lower part of the inkstone is supported by numerous beaded feet, which are obviously prominent and often decorated with patterns.
The unique shape of Piyong inkstone shows the originality of the maker.
Piyong inkstone is a representative model of the Tang Dynasty. One of the treasures of the Tang Dynasty is now in the Guangzhou Museum.
That inkstone was unearthed from a Tang tomb.
It is 5.8 cm high, 22.5 cm in diameter, and 24.3 cm in base diameter.
It is round, the rim of the inkstone is wide, and the surface of the inkstone is convex, almost parallel to the rim of the plate.
Between the surface and the rim of the inkstone, there are circumferential water storage grooves.
The inkstone holder is tied around the waist and has 12 small round holes. The base encircles the feet, and the feet near the bottom are turned outward.
A piece of green-yellow glaze is applied to the outer wall, and the glaze surface is bright.
In the development history of porcelain inkstone, Piyong inkstone is a rather unique shape.
What is Piyong? This is the place where the emperor gave lectures in ancient times.
"Etiquette·Kingdom" records: "The university is located in the suburbs. The emperor calls it Biyong, and the princes call it Leigong."
Cai Yong of the Eastern Han Dynasty explained it in "Mingtang Danling Lun": "It is surrounded by water and the garden is like a wall. Later generations named it Biyong."
In the Northern and Southern Dynasties, ceramic craftsmen of the Sui and Tang Dynasties imitated Piyong and designed the Piyong inkstone, which is an art treasure with great ornamental value.
During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, due to the rapid development of the porcelain industry, a large number of ceramic inkstones emerged. Among them, the porcelain inkstone with a round foot shape was the most popular, which was also the predecessor of Piyong inkstone in the Sui and Tang Dynasties.
During the Wei and Jin Dynasties, three-legged or four-legged celadon disc inkstones were popular.
In the Southern and Northern Dynasties, it evolved into the Pearl-footed Inkstone, which ranged from five to ten feet, and the Piyong Inkstone.
During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the round and multi-legged Piyong inkstone was developed.
This inkstone box from the Yuan Dynasty is even more extraordinary. It has a five-clawed dragon painted on the top, which should have been ordered by the royal family of the Yuan Dynasty.
Such a royal creation was somehow brought aboard a sea ship and still appears here.
Among the ceramics salvaged from the sea, those with precise written records and pictures of the actual objects are mainly export products after the Tang Dynasty.
These ceramics include practical porcelain, display porcelain, as well as play porcelain and reward porcelain.
Some are products exclusively for export, and some are items used by people on board ships.
Some have obvious exotic customs, while others retain simple rural colors.
From "Haihai Porcelain", we can clearly see the achievements of my country's ancient ceramic art and the historical features of my country's traditional porcelain.
Of course, this piece of blue and white porcelain from the Yuan Dynasty accidentally broke into their salvage site, and apart from that, nothing else was found.
And just this is enough to make Chen Wenzhe happy.
The first phase of porcelain excavation has been completed, and no other Yuan Dynasty blue and white porcelain has been found.
At this time, it is time to enter the second stage, which is mainly about salvaging the sunken ship.
This time Chen Wenzhe can be regarded as an archaeological excavation, so this time the archaeological excavation of the Southern Song Dynasty shipwreck site focuses on the decomposition of condensation and the release of water from the hull.
If he does a good job, then this archaeological excavation will be in the field of underwater archaeological excavation in my country. The ancient wooden highly water-saturated sunken ship will be completely recorded as a whole, disassembled layer by layer, released into pieces, scientifically preserved and transported back over long distances, etc. Try out a series of projects.
The hull that emerged from the water this time is definitely rare in China. Salvaging such a ship is of great significance to the study of the history of ancient shipbuilding in my country.
First of all, its ship plates have many layers, most of them have five layers, some have six layers, and the ship plates are large in size.
Most of the main ship planks are more than five meters long, with the longest one reaching 14.4 meters, and the width is more than 30 centimeters, with the widest one reaching 48 centimeters (No. 63 plank).
A total of 511 numbered ship plates were extracted this time, and 48 numbered ship plates were collected.
A total of 177 wooden boxes of two sizes, 244x47x35 cm and 244x61x35 cm, are packed.
In addition, nearly 100 samples were extracted, including various parts of ship plates, shipwreck materials, coral sand, etc.
The total working time for this excavation was 40 days, and the total diving time was longer than that of salvaging porcelain.
The smooth release of this Southern Song Dynasty sunken ship also brought a perfect conclusion to this several-month underwater archaeological excavation project in the open sea.
The underwater shipwreck is essentially the largest cultural relic we have discovered underwater. It is not only the carrier of all ancient underwater ship cargo, but also a complete reproduction of my country's ancient shipbuilding technology and ocean navigation technology.
The high value of its cultural relics and the difficulty of extraction and protection far exceed that of a single cultural relic.
The successful release of this ancient sunken ship is definitely an important step for my country in the field of underwater cultural heritage protection.
At the same time, it is also of milestone significance for the overall development of my country's underwater archaeology.
Why do you say that? Because now there are more than 100 people here under Chen Wenzhe, not only the soldiers under Gao Qijing, but also many professionals among them.
Chen Wenzhe never asked about these people, he just watched.
Without this group of professionals participating in the salvage, how could they have completely salvaged an entire ship in three months?
He has money and no selfish motives, so he naturally cooperates with these people.
Of course, he can't say that he has no selfish motives at all.
After all, he provided money, equipment, and clues, and the final receipt must be placed in his museum.
Nearly 10,000 artifacts from the shipwreck site were salvaged from the water. The remaining ship planks were photographed and recorded underwater, and all were dismantled layer by layer before being salvaged.
Afterwards, these cultural relics and ship planks that emerged from the water will definitely enter Chen Wenzhe's museum after maintenance and restoration.
In addition to this sunken ship, there are also cultural relics out of the water.
The largest number is porcelain, with nearly 10,000 pieces.
7,000 of them are basically intact.
Among the porcelains, blue and white porcelain is the most common, followed by celadon and a small amount of sauce-brown glazed porcelain. These porcelains are common daily-use porcelain such as dishes and dishes.
After identification, these are porcelain produced for export during the Southern Song Dynasty in my country.
Combined with the location of the shipwreck, Chen Wenzhe concluded that it was a Chinese ocean-going trading ship from the Southern Song Dynasty, with a history of 800 years ago.
The ship has now been dismantled, numbered, and fully salvaged.
If it can be repaired successfully, then this sunken ship will be the first Southern Song Dynasty sunken ship discovered and salvaged in its entirety in my country.
The shipwreck itself is an extremely precious cultural relic.
However, if you think about it, you will know how difficult it is to salvage these rotten ship planks from the sea intact after being soaked in sea water for 800 years.