Elementary school students play in the field and find the plaque of the Qing Dynasty Test Hall 　　 The
　　 inscription "Huzhou Test Hall" has been submitted to the cultural relics department

Photograph of the appearance of the plaque when it was just cleared out / Ding Liping

　　Recently, a group of children playing in the field in Chaoyang District of Beijing accidentally discovered a simple plaque, and with the help and guidance of their parents, they handed it over to the cultural relics department. Subsequently, a reporter from the Beijing Youth Daily saw this plaque at Dongyue Academy in Chaoyang District: 93 cm long, 35 cm wide, and 15 cm thick. The surface of the bluestone was slightly green and the corners were slightly damaged, but the handwriting was complete and clear, and the pen was strong. Unfortunately, the information is relatively simple, and there is no date or payment. According to the staff of Chaoyang District Culture and Tourism Bureau, the stone at the moment is "the wall-mounted plaque in the Huzhou trial hall of the Qing Dynasty". The plaque in the trial hall is relatively rare, and it is a physical testimony to the culture of the Beijing Guild Hall. The staff also thanked these families for their contributions to the protection of cultural relics.

　　Pupils found the plaque in the Huzhou Auditorium

　　Parents handed over to the cultural relics department

　　This stone was found in Changying District, Chaoyang District. A reporter from the Beijing Youth Daily learned that on May 31, when Ms. Ding Liping and several parents took their children to play near the vegetable field that they rented, a stone under the tree caught the children’s attention. There was a word on the surface of the stone. After cleaning up the floating soil, a rectangular plaque surfaced, with the traditional Chinese characters "Huzhou Trial Hall" inscribed on the surface from right to left.

　　The plaques are simple and vicissitudes, and the parents at the scene realized that this might be a cultural relic. As it happened on Sunday, there were many people around the vegetable plot. In order to protect the plaque, the four male parents worked together to carry it to Ms. Ding's car. The moment the plaque was put into the trunk, the tail of Ms. Ding’s Skoda Octavia car sank significantly, and the plaque was estimated to weigh nearly 200 pounds.

　　How can children discover monuments? Ms. Ding analyzed that the rain on the first day washed the floating soil on the forehead, which made the words appear indistinctly. In addition, the children have already been to elementary school and are more sensitive to handwriting. They can recognize the words Lake and State. The words were not recognized by the children for a while. The next day, Ms. Ding contacted the cultural relics department and the staff acted immediately. The two sides completed the handover of the plaque. Ms. Ding received a receipt stamped with the official seal of the "Culture and Tourism Bureau of Chaoyang District, Beijing". After that, the staff came to the first scene to shoot.

　　Ms. Ding believes that handing the plaque to the cultural relics department's personal experience is a very good cultural protection education for children. I hope that in the future they will be able to know the subordination and whereabouts of the plaque, and hope that the actions of the children will affect more people to contribute to the protection of cultural relics. A reporter from the Beijing Youth Daily learned from the Chaoyang District Culture and Tourism Bureau that the plaque had been transported to Dongyue Academy in Chaoyang District for preservation.

　　Huzhou Trial Museum is not a cultural protection unit

　　Was demolished in the late 90s

　　The “Huzhou Trial Hall” marked on the plaque found by the children was originally located in the northern half of Hutong, on the south side of the east end of Guang'anmen Nei Street. A reporter from the Beiqing Daily subsequently visited and found that because many courtyards had disappeared, the pattern of the hutongs from north to south had disappeared. The northern half of Hutong 41 used to be the former residence of Liuyang Assembly Hall and Tan Sitong in Hunan Province. It is now a residential courtyard and one of the only remaining courtyards in the northern half of Hutong. When a reporter from the Beiqing Daily asked the nearby residents about the Huzhou trial hall, everyone said that it was not clear.

　　A reporter from the Beiqing Daily found that in the early years, there were many hutong halls in the northern half, including Liuyang Hall in Hunan, Taicang Hall in Jiangsu, Tongchuan Hall in Sichuan, Chaozhou Hall in Guangdong, Wuxing Hall in Zhejiang, etc. Among them, Wuxing is an ancient name of Huzhou, which is now a district of Huzhou. Mr. Liu Zheng, the author of "The Chronicle of the Beijing Guild Hall", told reporters that the Huzhou Auditorium and Wuxing Guild Hall are the same thing. They are located at No. 13 West Hutong Road in the northern half, and later changed to No. 25, until they were demolished in the late 1990s. According to his research, the Huzhou trial building was built in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, and has more than 60 rooms. Before being demolished, it was already a large hospital, not a cultural protection unit.

　　Liu Zheng revealed that among the many halls in Beijing, the plaque of the trial hall is relatively rare. Beijing's halls are declining, and the loss of plaques is more common.

　　According to the "Gazetteer of Xuanwu District in Beijing", Beijing's halls flourished in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. In the early Qing Dynasty, the decree of Manchu inhabiting the inner city and Han inhabiting the outer city was banned, and it was forbidden to build a hall in the inner city. Therefore, Qianmen, Chongwenmen and Xuanwumen became the most concentrated places in the hall. The hall is mainly divided into business hall, literary trial hall, industry hall, and funeral hall.

　　The Literati Trial Hall is a product of the feudal social imperial examination system and accounts for the vast majority of the Beijing Guild Hall. The imperial examination sites of the Ming and Qing dynasties were in Beijing, and those who entered Beijing to rush to take the exam were eagerly looking forward to having a residence that cares for each other by virtue of their fellowship. After the exam, the famous students who stayed in Beijing on the list took part in the hall test. Those who did not enter the exam can stay in Beijing and stay at home to study hard so that they can take the exam again. These examples are unaccompanied in Beijing and have been exploited at high prices in small guest shops. This disastrous scene aroused the sympathy of the fellow countrymen in North Korea and China, so they invited officials, giant merchants, and gentry in the same country to raise funds to buy land and build houses in Beijing to entertain fellow citizens who came to Beijing to take the test. , Guild Hall.

　　The decline of the Beijing Guild Hall began for two reasons. One was that Cixi abolished the imperial examination system, and the hometown executor did not come to the exam, cutting off the economic source of the hall. The second was the reunification of the North and South in 1928. The country moved to Nanjing and a large number of officials went south with government agencies , So that the Guild Hall completely lost its pillar.

　　dialogue

　　The plaque of the trial hall is rare

　　Chaoyang after demolition

　　Interviewer: Any friend of the Cultural Relics Department of Chaoyang District Cultural Tourism Bureau

　　Beiqing Daily: Which historical period did this plaque come from? Where was it originally placed?

　　Ren You: The stone chosen for the plaque is small blue stone produced in the area around West Beijing. This is more common in stone inscriptions during the Ming and Qing dynasties. Combined with the large inscriptions in italics, it is preliminarily judged that it came from the Qing Dynasty. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Beijing Guild Halls were lined up, mostly concentrated in the area around Nancheng. To this end, I learned from my colleagues that the Huzhou Trial Hall is located at No. 25, the northern half of Hutong in Xicheng District (formerly Xuanwu District). This plaque should be inlaid on the wall of the building.

　　Beiqing Daily: Why did the plaque appear in Chaoyang District?

　　Ren You: Huzhou is a Jiangnan ancient city with a history of more than 2,300 years. The Huzhou Auditorium is a place for Huzhou Zhejiang to go to Beijing to take a test. However, with the decline of the imperial examination system in the late Qing Dynasty, the building of the Guild Hall in Beijing also withered. According to preliminary understanding, the Huzhou trial building was demolished about 20 years ago. The plaque is likely to be transported to the eastern suburbs along with the muck. The Changying area was relatively desolate.

　　Beiqing Daily: Is the plaque in the trial hall common in Beijing?

　　Ren You: I have been working in the cultural relics department of Chaoyang District for more than 30 years. Even in the whole of Beijing, there are only a handful of plaques left in the trial halls, which has high historical research value. The children and parents must be thanked for discovering and protecting cultural relics with their actions.

　　Beiqing Daily: How will this plaque be preserved and used in the future?

　　Ren You: After handing over with Ms. Ding, we shipped the plaque directly to Dongyue Academy. Considering that the academy often has cultural exchange activities, this not only protects the plaque, but also allows more people to contact, which is conducive to the further study of cultural relics.

　　Text/Reporter Cui Yifei