The mysterious disappearance of the ancient country of Xixia.

Xixia refers to the dynasty established by the Tangut clan in western China from 1038 to 1227. Dangxiang Qiang, the founder of Xixia Dynasty, once lived in the bend of the Yellow River. Once one of the Qiang people, it gradually became strong in the late Northern Dynasty. In the late Xixia period, the brave Mongolian fighters cut the summer six times, among which Genghis Khan personally marched four times, but met with unprecedented stubborn resistance in front of Xixia kingdom, and Genghis Khan was killed by the poisonous arrow of the Tangut. After that, Xixia finally surrendered because of the exhaustion of ammunition and food. Mongolian troops destroyed Xixia and burned its palaces and chronicles. The Xixia Dynasty, once a powerful country in China's history, thus perished.

The Confrontation between Xixia, Liao and Northern Song Dynasty

It was a feudal dynasty established by Tangut people in Xixia, with Xingqing House as its capital. Its ruling scope is roughly in Ningxia, Gansu, Xinjiang, Qinghai, Inner Mongolia and parts of Shaanxi. Its territory stretches for thousands of miles in Fiona Fang, bordering the Yellow River in the east, Yumen in the west, Xiaoguan in the south and desert in the north.

Originally a nomadic people in Xixia, unique Buddhist art and culture began to appear in Xixia after Buddhism was introduced into Gansu. Xixia also integrated its own national characteristics into the Mogao Grottoes, making it more brilliant. Emperor Xixia ordered the restoration of Mogao Grottoes many times, and made this Buddhist building more brilliant with its strong national spirit and unique culture.

The discovery of black cities

There is a saying in the historical circle: to study Xixia culture, please go to Russia!

Heicheng Ruins

Xixia is a minority regime in the northwest of China. Why should we study the cultural history of Russia thousands of miles away to find the answer? This is not because Xixia people died in Russia, but because there are countless Xixia treasures here, such as porcelain, jade, books and so on. There are even more precious Xixia cultural relics in Russia than in China. What? What's the matter? Everything has to start with a lost ancient city, the Black City.

At the westernmost tip of Inner Mongolia, east of the lower reaches of Ejina River in Alashan League and on the edge of Badain Jaran Desert, there is a remnant ancient city site. The site is rectangular, with a perimeter of about 1 km, surrounded by the remaining city walls. The east and west city walls have gates and urns. Although these city walls have experienced thousands of years of desert wind and sand, the remaining city walls are still as high as 10 meter. The wall is made of rammed earth, with iron bars, ropes and thorns inside. In the pool, streets, houses and walls protrude from the yellow sand. In the southwest of the city, there is also a complete chapel standing in the desert. This chapel is in the shape of a mosque, with a yurt roof and niches. In the northwest corner of the city wall, there are five stupas with different heights, which are very conspicuous. This is the legendary site of the Black City, the most complete and largest ancient city on the ancient Silk Road.

Xixia characters

Black City is the ancient capital of Xixia Kingdom established by the northern Tangut people, also known as Black Water City, and the Tangut language is also called Jijinai. Black Mongolia, which means Harriet, is a prosperous frontier fortress and garrison town in Xixia Kingdom. In order to consolidate the country, King Li Yuanhao of Xixia established the garrison division of Montenegro, which is a powerful Mazhuang. Due to the importance of geographical location, the Black City is guarded by princes with high status. When the city is prosperous, the natural environment is beautiful, not the yellow sand scene today. At that time, there were abundant aquatic plants, suitable climate and many trees, and people lived a comfortable and rich life.

After the demise of Xixia, the Yuan Dynasty set up the general management office of Yijinai Road here. In A.D. 1372, the Ming Dynasty general Sheng Feng attacked the Black City, and the Black City was abandoned from then on.

After Xingqing House, the capital of Xixia, was captured by Mongols, the Black City did not fall. During this period, some important historical documents and treasures of Xixia were transferred to Black City and hidden there. From then on, colorful treasure stories began to spread.

Folklore has attracted countless treasure thieves. Black City is famous for its cultural relics and historical sites.

1886, Russian scholar potanin was the first modern man to come to the Black City. When he was inspecting the Ejina River, he came across the site of Black City. His arrival unveiled the mystery of an ancient civilization, but it also brought disaster to this ancient civilization. 1908, Russian kozlov came to Black City, bribed local governors, made three excavations, plundered thousands of Xixia language publications and ancient books, and requisitioned nearly 100 camels to transport these cultural relics away. Among these literary books, there are only 34 rare books. In addition, there are manuscripts in Chinese, Tibetan, Uighur, Turkic, Jurchen, Mongolian and Syrian. These classics of kozlov were transported back to Petersburg, Russia, and collected in the Asian Museum of Russian Academy of Sciences and the Russian Museum respectively, which caused a sensation all over the world. In order to show off his achievements in exploring China, kozlov wrote a book called Ancient Cities of Mongolia, Amdo and Harahaote. In the book, he wrote: He presented the expedition with a large collection, a whole library of books, scrolls and manuscripts, as well as about 300 Buddha statues, exquisite pictures and papers painted on linen. These are valuable, reflecting the metal casting and wood carving, clay sculpture, sketchpad and tower models of different civilizations. During the days at the Harahaote site, the expedition got the following items in total: books and words. Paper, metal coins, women's decorations, some household appliances and daily necessities, Buddha statues and the like; In terms of quantity, the archaeological data we collected include 10 Pute mailboxes. Pute is equivalent to 16 kg, that is to say, kozlov stole 160 kg of Xixia cultural relics in China for the first time.

The treasure theft in kozlov, the Black City, attracted more treasure thieves to come here and dig up buried treasures in various names. Since then, Black City has fallen into another round of looting.

19 15, Oleiro Stein, an Englishman, led a Central Asian expedition to the Black City to steal treasures in the name of exploration. After some excavation, he and his expedition discovered 230 precious China ancient books and Xixia documents. 1923, Americans Langton Warner and Ray Jayne carried out excavation work in Black City for 10 days. During the period of 1927, a Sino-German scientific expedition led by Swedish Sven Hedin dug up a Tripitaka published in the Yuan Dynasty in Black City, northwest China. From 1930 to 193 1, a Sino-German northwest expedition team unearthed more than 10,000 pieces of Juyan Han bamboo slips, which are now in the Library of Congress and become the treasure of the town hall.

In this way, a huge library reflecting the ancient civilization of Xixia and the civilization of neighboring countries was dismembered.

China's most complete Xixia literature, such as the new method of celestial cultivation, the list of official titles, the palm prints when Wen Hai and Fan Han met, was found in the site of Black City. After conquering the capital of Xixia, the rulers of Yuan Dynasty wantonly burned, killed and looted, discredited the living beings, and many precious books and records of Xixia were looted and destroyed. However, the rulers of the Yuan Dynasty were even more dismissive of the history of Xixia, compiling the history of the Song and Liao Dynasties instead of Xixia. Since then, the history and civilization of Xixia have been buried by yellow sand and almost died out.

When Xixia Kingdom perished, the Black City was far away from Xixia's ruling center and close to Mongolian grassland, so it was not destroyed, and books and documents were not burned. The publication of a large number of Xixia documents and cultural relics in Black City made up for the fault regret of Xixia history and culture, and once again showed the Xixia civilization to the world.

Xixia palace

In order to further study the history and culture of Xixia, from 1982 to 1983, China specially organized a joint archaeological team to formally carry out the rescue excavation of Black City. During this excavation, archaeologists found out the layout of the city according to the site of Black City and found a large number of documents and other cultural relics. These musical instruments bring together many national languages in China, and also reflect their history and culture, including Chinese, Xixia, Mongolian, Tibetan, ancient Arabic and other national languages. Historians have found a lot of important information about the history and culture of Xixia through sorting out and studying the unearthed documents, and also interpreted the characters of Xixia according to the unearthed documents of Xixia, which provided extremely valuable documents for studying the social history and culture of Xixia and Yuan Dynasty.