Zhouyuan, Shaanxi Province, a highland not far from the banks of the Wei River.
The high ground is obviously an ancient ruins, and many places have been excavated. The ruined city walls and building foundations have finally been exposed to the light of day after being buried for countless years.
But more ruins are still hidden deep underground and have not been excavated. Therefore, there are still many archaeological workers active in this highland.
However, this is not the focus of this archaeological activity. In the northwest, a larger excavation site is being excavated in full swing. The area within a few square kilometers of the excavation site is surrounded by cordons and "archaeological
Important place, no idlers allowed" sign.
There are still many heavily armed soldiers guarding the perimeter of the cordon, which fully illustrates the importance of this archaeological site. If there were no particularly valuable items unearthed, there would generally not be such a huge formation.
Inside the cordon, countless tents made of plastic films and steel pipes cover the excavated areas. The space inside the tents has been stabilized in a constant temperature world, and the air has been exhausted as much as possible. In archeology
Such measures are not common during activities. They are usually taken after the ancient tomb is excavated to ensure that the funerary objects in the tomb will not be exposed to the air and quickly deteriorate.
At this time, in the closed archaeological site numbered D-09, many archaeologists wearing protective clothing were coming in and out. Those who came out were carrying boxes that had already been numbered on them. These boxes were sent to
After arriving outside, he was picked up by the staff and placed in a more spacious tent not far away.
At the excavation site, a man with a gas mask on his face reminded the archaeologists below in a solemn voice to carefully extract the funerary objects from the ancient tomb.
"Xiao Zheng, pay attention to the stone letter on your left. Xiao Zhou, take the video first and record the location. Yes, that's it. Be careful and get the stone letter up first..."
The man's name is Chen Ziyun. He is twenty-nine years old and is a well-known archaeologist in China. The place where the excavation is being carried out is a site from the Western Zhou Dynasty. Originally, the ancient ruins in this area were discovered in the 1990s.
It has been discovered, but there has been no plan to excavate it. However, this place was recently discovered by tomb robbers, and many accidents occurred, so the government had to carry out protective excavations.
This ancient tomb has been excavated for several days, and the surrounding funerary objects have been cleaned up. Now only the bones in the coffin are left, which is also the most valuable part of the ancient tomb excavation.
"Professor Chen, someone is looking for you outside." A voice came from the communicator.
Chen Ziyun frowned, and without asking who it was, he said directly: "Let him wait, we are not free now." The excavation of tomb No. d-09 is entering the most critical period. If there is nothing particularly important, he will never be able to do it.
Will leave temporarily.
"It's Major Xie." The voice in the communicator hesitated for a moment before calling out a voice: "He said he has something very urgent to see you for... Hey, it's me, come out." The voice in the communicator immediately said
Replaced with another person's.
Hearing this voice, Chen Ziyun looked helpless and said, "What's going on? I really can't leave now. If there's nothing particularly urgent, please wait for me for a while."
"Another place was found to have been stolen." Xie Feng knew Chen Ziyun's temperament very well and said straightforwardly: "When we arrived, two tomb robbers had already died and the other one was mentally disturbed."
"I'll be out right away." Chen Ziyun's body stiffened and he quickly replied to Xie Feng.
Although the space was a little small, Chen Ziyun's tent was neatly packed. Xie Feng put his legs on the table, leaned against the back of the chair, had a cigarette in his mouth, and was puffing away.
Chen Ziyun stepped into the tent, looked at the smoke-filled room, his face became darker, and said: "Put out the cigarette, there are many cultural relics in my tent!"
Xie Feng didn't answer, but stretched out the cowhide bag in front of Chen Ziyun and said, "Look at this quickly. I haven't closed my eyes since last night. If I don't smoke to refresh myself, I can't bear it."
Xie Feng's voice seemed a little hoarse and his eyes were bloodshot, so he was obviously not telling lies.
"What's going on?" Chen Ziyun asked while opening the document bag.
"What else can happen? This is the fourth time in three months." Xie Feng yawned and said, "I still hope to get some clues from you."
Chen Ziyun lowered his head and said nothing, took out a few thin pieces of paper from the document bag, and flipped through it carefully. When he saw a rubbing, he frowned slightly and said, "This pattern again?!"
"Yes, it's Xuanniao, otherwise why would I come to you in such a hurry?"
The pattern on the paper is a pattern copied from an artifact. For Chen Ziyun, who has rich archaeological experience, this pattern is really familiar. This is the sacred object of the Yin and Shang dynasties: the black bird.
The rubbing pattern of the black bird looks very simple, but the knife skills are very skillful, and it does not look like an ancient artifact. So when he saw this pattern for the first time, Chen Ziyun determined that it was a modern imitation.
Xibei goods printed in handicrafts.
It's just that Chen Ziyun didn't understand why several groups of tomb robbers all carried such rubbings on their bodies, and why they all suffered accidental deaths many times during the process of robbing the tomb?
Recalling the behavior of these tomb robbers, Chen Ziyun was filled with doubts.
In fact, the first place that the tomb robbers who had rubbings of black birds on their bodies visited was the land at their feet. These tomb robbers, through some unknown method, actually found the ancient tombs in this place and carried out the investigation.
Robbery excavation. But it's a pity that perhaps because of poor technology, the quality of the robber cave they excavated was not up to standard, and it actually collapsed. The two men who went to the ground were buried alive in the tomb, and one person who was outside also died.
After falling into the collapsed tomb, he broke two ribs. Originally, this was not a particularly serious injury and would not be fatal. However, the broken ribs punctured the tomb robber's lungs. As a result, the unlucky tomb robber ended up in the cemetery.
He died painfully and was discovered two days later.
Because of this incident, the ruins of the ancient Western Zhou city and ancient tombs on the river bank were also forced to be excavated in advance. But this was not an isolated incident. In the following time, similar things would happen almost every half month.
Together, a total of four such incidents have occurred so far.
Xie Feng rubbed his temples and said: "The four tomb robbing incidents seem to be isolated incidents, but in fact they are closely related. For example, there are three people in the tomb robbing gang, and they all have black bird patterns on their bodies.
...all died in accidents. Moreover, the most puzzling thing is that no matter what method is used to investigate, these people cannot be identified, as if they appeared out of thin air."
"Isn't there one person who is not dead?" Chen Ziyun asked.
"Permanent mental trauma, in other words, I have become an idiot and can't even ask a question." Xie Feng's voice sounded very depressed.
"Actually, there are several characteristics." Chen Ziyun added: "The ancient tombs chosen by these people are all large tombs from the Western Zhou Dynasty. I can even confirm that two of them are large tombs of princes." When he said this,
, Chen Ziyun's voice was a little excited. You know, many ancient tombs have been unearthed in the Western Zhou Dynasty, but no large tombs of the level of royal tombs have been unearthed. If the ancient tombs discovered include the existence of royal tombs, it would be a quite sensational discovery.
.
After a while, Chen Ziyun continued: "From the drawings of the black bird they carried, it can be inferred that what they are looking for should be the funerary objects related to the black bird. But there is one thing that is difficult to understand, the black bird belongs to the Yin Shang Dynasty
Sacred objects, similar jade or bronze castings have been found in merchants' ruins. Why did these tomb robbers come to Zhou people's tombs to look for this thing? The era was wrong, right? If you want to steal items from the Yin and Shang Dynasties