Where is Sima Zhao’s tomb?

In the Mangshan Ancient Tombs Group, relevant information can be found in the "Visiting the Mangshan Ancient Tombs" series

Looking from a distance, there are layers of mausoleums on Mangshan Mountain. The group is easily reminiscent of the pyramids of Egypt.

The Mangshan Mausoleum Group is ancient, numerous and spectacular in scale. Can’t it be called China’s pyramid group?

What’s underneath these tombs? Who is buried here? With great curiosity, the reporter went to interview, but the results were mixed...

How much do you know about Mangshan Mausoleum

When I was driving from Zhengzhou to Luoyang, when I was about to arrive in Luoyang, The large mounds of dirt dotted along both sides of the highway are particularly eye-catching. The first time I saw these big mounds, I was confused: What is this? Common brick kilns in rural areas? Not like it! They are much larger than brick kilns and covered with grass. Most of them are conical or bucket-shaped, and they don't look like brick kilns at all. But why are there so many big mounds of soil in the farmland?

After asking, I found out that these large mounds were the sealing mounds of ancient tombs, a world-famous group of tombs at the southern foot of Mang Mountain. These tall, spectacular, ancient and mysterious mausoleums contain dozens of emperors and hundreds of royal family members and ministers from the Eastern Han, Cao Wei, Western Jin, Northern Wei and Five Dynasties. They have stood on this land for thousands of years. It is said that at the beginning of the 20th century, there were more than 900 such mounds, and there are still more than 300 today. The largest one is more than 100 meters in diameter and more than 50 meters high. This is one of the areas with the highest concentration of ancient tombs in the world, and it is also the largest national cultural relic protection unit in China.

What’s underneath these tombs? Who is buried here? With great curiosity, the reporter decided to write this article.

During the many subsequent trips to Mang Mountain, the layered and majestic tombs made me feel more and more mysterious and extraordinary. "Beimang Mountain is full of fresh wind, and there are many new tombs and old tombs. Where is the wealth and wealth so far? The broken monuments are scattered and plowed by savages." The poem "Travel to the North Mang" by Xue, a poet of the Ming Dynasty, truly reflects the historical conditions of the Mangshan ancient tombs. With the change of dynasties, ordinary tombs no longer exist. After thousands of years of wind, rain erosion and man-made destruction, those that can still stand on Mang Mountain are large tombs with a huge amount of engineering work.

In his book "Living on the Mengjin River", Mr. Sun Shuntong compared these tombs with the pyramids of Egypt. He believed that these tombs are ancient, numerous and spectacular in scale. They can be said to be the pyramids of China. . The more I learn about these tombs, the more I feel that Mr. Sun Shuntong’s words make sense.

These tombs not only have majestic earth mounds, but also mysterious underground palaces. The underground palaces of the excavated tombs are huge in shape, usually built with huge square stones and strips of stone, and topped with bricks. The stone materials used in a tomb often amount to hundreds of cubic meters.

In the 1980s, the Jingling Mausoleum of Emperor Xuanwu of the Northern Wei Dynasty was scientifically excavated with state approval. The mausoleum is the earliest imperial mausoleum among the tombs currently excavated and open in my country. The reporter saw in Zhongtou Village, Mangshan Township, Luoyang City that Jingling Mausoleum is a large-scale circular mausoleum with a diameter of 110 meters and a height of more than 20 meters. It looks like a hill. The 50-meter-long sloping tomb passage is spacious and spacious. At the end of the tomb passage is a huge stone door two people high. The tomb chamber behind the stone gate is forty to fifty square meters in size. The conical tomb roof is more than 10 meters high, and the inner wall is painted in solemn and mysterious black.

According to reports, when the archaeologists entered the tomb for the first time, they crawled through the stone door because the silt in the tomb was more than two meters deep at that time. After the silt was cleared, the tomb was basically empty. Archaeologists discovered two robbery holes, one of which was dug around the Song and Jin Dynasties and was accurately drilled into the stone gate. Sheep bones were found next to the tomb robbers' cave. It is speculated that the tomb robbers did not fill up the robbery holes after leaving, and the sheep grazing on the tomb lost their footing and fell. Experts have used the remaining fragments in the tomb to recover more than ten cultural relics, including celadon dish-mouthed dragon-handled pots, pottery inkstones, and broken stone lamps.

Despite their huge size, these tombs on Mang Mountain are generally heavily robbed. “A country that cannot be destroyed is a country that cannot be destroyed without digging its own grave.” After the change of dynasties, these conspicuous tombs became the targets of tomb robbers. The first disaster in the Mangshan tombs occurred at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. When Dong Zhuo burned Luoyang and fled westward, he sent Lu Bu to excavate the tombs of the emperor and nobles and plunder the treasures in them. Later, Sun Jian invaded Luoyang and drove away Lu Bu, and then "pacified the tombs".

In addition to official public excavations, there are also more stolen excavations.

In order to deceive others, tomb robbers usually build a house next to a large tomb as a cover, and then dig a hole in the house to enter the tomb. From the outside, no one would know that the tomb was being robbed, but the tomb was empty. During the tomb robbing trend that emerged in Luoyang at the beginning of the last century, these tall mausoleums were also the first targets, and many of the stones in the mausoleums were robbed. According to archaeological expert Huang Minglan, many of the yellow intestine stones in these ancient tombs were used to pave roads and build houses. Huang Jin, the great eunuch of Dongchang in the Ming Dynasty, lived near the White Horse Temple. When he raised funds to repair the White Horse Temple, he collected a large number of yellow intestine stones from the people. Now the gate of Baima Temple and the doorway of Jieyin Hall are both built with yellow intestine stone. Today, in the villages around Mang Mountain, you can still see this kind of yellow intestine stone stolen from tombs.

Today, these tombs still look tall and majestic from the outside, but the underground palaces may have all been stolen and emptied out. Huang Minglan said that when the Jiaozhi Railway was being built, he lived on Mang Mountain for half a year and presided over the excavation of six large tombs, but "not to mention cultural relics, there were no stones and bricks."

How much is known about the famous people in the tombs

The tombs on Mang Mountain have been preserved for thousands of years, but who owns these tombs has stumped many researchers. Mr. Huang Minglan told reporters that there are too few tombs whose owners can be identified. Very little written information about the location of the tombs has been handed down, and the tombstones are often lost and difficult to find. During frequent wars, the descendants of the tomb owners were often scattered throughout the country. Therefore, in the Tang Dynasty, "the pines and cypresses were half ownerless", and Yuan Haowen of the Jin Dynasty even lamented that "thousands of tombs are unknown". Now it is naturally even more difficult to determine the identity of the owner of each tomb.

During the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, Gong Songlin, the magistrate of Luoyang County, launched a "stele erection movement". Stone tablets were erected in front of large and small mausoleums, and the names of the tomb owners were engraved on them. However, Gong Songlin was eager for success and did not put enough effort into research. As a result, he often pretended to be the best and made many jokes. After his troubles, the Mangshan Ancient Tomb became even more chaotic, and it was no longer clear.

When Xu Maogong, a famous minister of the Tang Dynasty, was on an expedition to the Korean Peninsula, he brought King Buyeo of Baekje back to Luoyang. According to historical records, King Buyeo was later buried in Mangshan, Luoyang. A few years ago, some Koreans came to Luoyang to look for the tomb of King Buyeo. After being introduced, the Koreans found Huang Minglan, who knew the Mangshan Ancient Tomb best. But Huang Minglan could only tell the general location of King Buyeo's tomb, and could not determine which tomb among the tombs all over the place belonged to the king who died in a foreign land. Huang Minglan led the Koreans to search in Mang Mountain for a day, but found nothing. The disappointed Koreans had no choice but to dig a few grass trees on Mang Mountain and take them away to express their condolences.

Huang Minglan said that Koreans are very tenacious and unwilling to give in. Later, they came several times, promising heavy rewards and saying that whoever found the tomb of King Buyeo would be invited to travel to South Korea. Although the reward is very tempting, no one dares to agree to it, because searching for the tomb of King Buyeo among the ancient tombs in the mountains is tantamount to finding a needle in a haystack, and it is really a thankless task.

Despite this, some tombs can still identify their owners due to the evidence of unearthed tombstones. In the 1960s and 1970s, Huang Minglan traveled all over Mang Mountain to collect information, spent more than ten years and wrote several papers, basically identifying the Changling Tomb of Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty, who promoted sinicization and promoted the integration of northern ethnic groups. After Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty moved the capital to Luoyang in 494 AD, he adopted a series of reform measures. One of them was that the Xianbei people made Luoyang their home and were buried in Luoyang after their death. The first person to implement it was himself. In 499 AD, Emperor Xiaowen died of illness during the battle and was buried in Mang Mountain. The Jingling Tomb of Emperor Xuanwu of the Northern Wei Dynasty is far away from the Changling Tomb of his father, Emperor Xiaowen. The general location of the tombs of Cao Pi and others built on Shouyang Mountain can also be determined.

In the area of ??Pingle Town, Mengjin, there are three large tombs lined up. The locals call them the Tomb of the Great Han Dynasty, the Tomb of the Second Han Dynasty and the Tomb of the Three Han Dynasties. These should be the tombs of several emperors of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Zhang Zai, a poet of the Jin Dynasty, said in his "Seven Sorrows": "There are so many tombs in Beimang, but there are four or five tombs in Gaoling. If I ask whose family has tombs, they all belong to the Lord of the Han Dynasty." It should be these tombs he wrote about.

Interestingly, a few miles southeast of these Han Dynasty emperors’ tombs, there is the tomb of Liu Bei’s son Liu Chan. After the fall of Shu, Liu Chan, who surrendered, was escorted to Luoyang, where he was named An Le Gong and was placed under house arrest in the small town of Adou. Once, Liu Chan and Sima Zhao were drinking together, and when Shu music was played during the dinner, all the Shu ministers felt sad and had tears in their eyes, but Liu Chan was the only one who smiled calmly. Sima Zhao asked him: "Do you miss Shu a lot?" Liu Chan replied: "I am happy here, but I don't miss Shu." In 271 AD, Liu Chan died and was buried in the east of Zhaiquan Village, Pingle Town, Mengjin.

From Liu Bang, the emperor of the Han Dynasty, "the strong wind blows and the clouds fly" to Liu Chan's "luckiness to miss Shu", history seems to have completed a cycle. It is said that in the 1960s, Liu Chan's tomb also had a tomb that was 7 meters high and 15 meters in diameter. Later, farmers watered the ground, causing the tomb to collapse, and it has now been razed to the ground.

Another subjugated king buried on Mang Mountain was the talented Southern Tang Dynasty lord Li Yu. Historical records record that after the fall of the country, Li Yu died in Kaifeng without any explanation and was "buried as a king in Beimang Mountain, Luoyang". His tomb is probably in the area of ??Houli Village and Zhouzhai Village, Chaoyang Town, Mengjin County.

Su Qin also slept on Mang Mountain for eternity. This native of Luoyang in the Eastern Zhou Dynasty was a famous political strategist during the Warring States Period, almost equivalent to the current Secretary-General of the United Nations. He successfully lobbied the six countries to unite against Qin, and once admired the seal of the six countries, so that the powerful Qin did not dare to peek eastward at Han Valley for 15 years. 20 kilometers east of today's old city of Luoyang, on the north bank of the Luo River southeast of the ancient city of Han and Wei, there is a small village called Zhangsu Village, and a tomb in the village is the tomb of Su Qin.

Also buried here are Lu Buwei, Fan Kuai, Di Renjie, Tang Seng and other famous figures in history. Tang Monk's Tomb is located about 200 meters northwest of Tang Monk Temple in Fengshi Town, Yanshi. The tomb is in the shape of a bucket, surrounded by osmanthus trees and full of vitality.