Master Archaeologist

Chapter 255 Cleaning up the main tomb!
Because there is no yellow sausage in the main tomb, and Liu He has reserved a space for the yellow sausage.

Therefore, although it is a pity for the archaeologists, their cleaning work of the main tomb can be much smoother.

Of course, only in relative terms.

Although the top cover was opened, the archaeologists were still unable to enter the main tomb.

Because, the entire tomb is full of stagnant water!
The stagnant water almost formed a small pool!

Including the coffin, everything is in stagnant water.

Of course, due to hundreds of years of precipitation, the silt and other things in the stagnant water have all sank to the bottom of the water, and the stagnant water in the upper layer is still very clear.

On-site archaeologists can also see the outline of the mud underneath through the stagnant water.

And among the silt, there are shining gold and bronze wares!

The densely packed funerary objects either sank to the bottom of the water, or directly floated on the surface of the water!
Yes, there are funerary objects floating on the water!

Those that can float are obviously mostly lacquered woodware!
And part of the patent leather that has come off!

However, the archaeologists at the scene were not only not disappointed, but even more excited when faced with the tomb filled with stagnant water!

Good water!

With groundwater protection and anaerobic treatment on the wooden roof, the funerary objects in the main tomb are obviously better protected!

"How to deal with it?"

"Same as usual!"

After Kong Jianwen and director Wen discussed for a while, they decided on the excavation plan.

In fact, it is just to choose one of the plans made before.

For archaeological institutes in Shaanxi, Henan and other places, it is somewhat inexperienced to excavate such water-saturated tombs.

After all, the soil in Henan and Shaanxi is dry, and the underground tombs are basically buried for four to five hundred years, and only traces of wood are left. It is impossible to have a tomb full of water underground.

However, for areas such as Lianghu, Jiangxi, Jiangsu and Zhejiang on both sides of the Yangtze River Basin, unearthed tombs saturated with water are too common.

For this kind of water-saturated tomb, a set of professional excavation methods has long been formed.

To put it simply, it is to pump water first, and after the water is pumped to the same height as the pile of funeral objects, it is about five to ten centimeters above the horizontal plane, and a floating operating platform is built with wood.

Then the archaeologists squat or lie on the operating platform to clean up the cultural relics in the water.

After cleaning one layer, pump another layer of water down.

Repeating this way can ensure that these cultural relics are still soaked in water and will not be destroyed before they are cleaned up.

At the same time, it is convenient for archaeologists to clean up.

Members of the expert team drawn from various archaeological institutes also came to watch the process of pumping water and laying the operating platform.

The deputy director of the Shaanxi Archaeological Museum said excitedly: "This is incomparable to any of the tombs of the princes, and even most of the tombs of the princes and kings! The value is extremely high!"

Although the cleaning work of the main tomb has not yet started, they were very excited just seeing the cultural relics piled up under the water in the main tomb.

"In my decades of archaeological work, I have never seen a tomb with such rich funerary objects!"

As the stagnant water was gradually pumped away and the water level lowered, the funerary objects covered under the silt began to come into the eyes of archaeologists.

Gold, silver, bronze and iron, pottery, jade including precious stones, agate, turquoise...

All kinds of funerary objects, even if covered by mud, are still so conspicuous in the eyes of sharp-eyed archaeologists!
It took three full days to pump the water.

The archaeologists, including Chen Han, also surrounded the main tomb for three days.

Everyone has a rough mental preparation for the things placed in various places in the main tomb.

Of course, only the first layer that can be seen on the surface.

When the accumulated water was pumped up to three to five centimeters above the funeral objects, the pumping work stopped.

A piece of wood was set up in the shape of "Tian" to a position about five to ten centimeters above the ground.

When these boards are set up, it means that front-line archaeologists can enter the site.

Chen Han, Zhuang Yunpeng, and Lin Ya formed a team, followed other archaeologists from the Institute of Archaeology, Academy of Social Sciences, and entered the main tomb first.

According to the order of cleaning, the west room must be cleaned first, that is, the outer room, and the inner room where the coffin is placed is not in a hurry.

Although it is said to be divided into inner and outer rooms, in fact there is no door connecting the two, and there are only two passages that can accommodate two people walking side by side.

So the stagnant water actually runs through the inside and outside.

After entering the west room, Chen Han and the others immediately started cleaning up.

Not just them.

In the entire west room, there are thirty or forty archaeologists who are cleaning and excavating.

Because it is a wet tomb full of water, for archaeologists, their cleaning work this time is like digging lotus roots in a silt pond.

Even harder than digging lotus roots in a silt pond.

Because the lotus root and the mud will not be integrated after all.

However, because these cultural relics have been mixed with silt for a long time, after a long time, most of the cultural relics have been integrated with the silt.

How to strip these cultural relics one by one from the deep silt pit without destroying the cultural relics themselves.

This is obviously something that requires patience, care, and is difficult to do.

Even many of these cultural relics themselves are fused with each other.

Except for some large utensils, such as bronze sacrificial utensils, they can barely be cleaned out.

For most of the remaining cultural relics, in fact, everyone chooses to extract them as a whole.

That is, no matter how these cultural relics are glued together, as long as they are "clumps" or "clumps", they will be extracted directly.

As far as they're glued together and encased in silt, that's not a problem.

Later, these cultural relics extracted as a whole will be sent to the laboratory, and some chemicals will be used to peel them off.

It is definitely unrealistic to expect to clean up all these cultural relics one by one on the spot, or even clean them up.

This is different from the TV series about tomb robbery.

In TV dramas about tomb robbery, the cultural relics in the tomb are all neatly arranged and clean.

The protagonist group can go straight away with it.

But in fact, except for those that have only been buried for two or three hundred years.

However, for ancient tombs with a time span of more than 1000 years, the cultural relics inside have long since changed beyond recognition.

The north is okay, because the north is dry, and even after a long time, the cultural relics will only become more fragile, but they will not all stick together.

But in the south, it's really a muddy mass, and it's impossible to sort it out on the spot!
If a group of tomb thieves entered the main tomb of Haihunhou, they would also have to be blinded, and they could only take away some of the cultural relics that were still well preserved and did not "collide with the mud".

As for wanting to take them all away?
impossible.

This is why although the Han tombs are ten rooms and nine empty, the rescue excavations of Han tombs in various places have never stopped.

Even if the tombs have been visited many times by tomb thieves one after another, there will still be many cultural relics left behind that are difficult to take away.

And these cultural relics that take several years to clean up, it is just that only archaeologists and cultural relic restoration workers have the patience and accusations to take over!
(End of this chapter)