[Explanation] Since the Spring Festival, the Hubei Provincial Museum has been popular for appointments and visits.
With the completion and opening of the third-phase pavilion, the "treasure of the town pavilion" Yue Wang Goujian moved to a "new home", becoming the first national treasure in the pavilion to have a "mansion".
[Explanation] In the 400-square-meter exhibition hall, text display boards, interactive touch screens, audio-visual materials and other methods are used to fully display the king's style of "the first sword in the world".
Its "mystery of entering Chu" and why it is "stainless for thousands of years" have attracted tourists from all over the world to seek answers.
[Explanation] In the Cultural Protection Department of Hubei Provincial Museum, Jiang Xudong, the cultural relics conservationist of the museum, recently told reporters the story of "uncovering the mystery" of cultural relics with the help of modern scientific and technological equipment.
[Concurrent] Jiang Xudong, Cultural Relics Conservator of Hubei Provincial Museum
Many bronze wares in Hubei are black, because they are buried in water for a long time.
But some of them don't turn black. For example, the blade of Goujian's sword, the king of Yue, does not turn black, but the hilt turns black.
There are many other artifacts in the same tomb.
We also found that this feature is that some utensils will turn black, and some utensils will not be black at all, that is, they are completely shiny.
After testing, we found that all blackened utensils contain lead.
But whatever is not black, but still shiny, has no lead in it.
That is to say, its material is a very important factor affecting its rust.
[Explanation] "Post-80s" Jiang Xudong, graduated from Wuhan University with a doctorate degree in material physics. Out of his love for cultural relics research, he joined the Hubei Provincial Museum in 2013.
[Commentary] When talking about Gou Jianjian, the king of Yue, Jiang Xudong said with emotion "lucky to catch up with the opportunity".
As a national first-class cultural relic, the Yue King Goujian sword rarely has the opportunity to be used for scientific research.
He and his team took thousands of pictures of the Yue King Goujian Sword with a microscope, stitched them together into a complete picture, and observed it after zooming in. He was pleasantly surprised to find that the blade had a dendritic metallographic structure, thus revealing the sword body of the Yue King Goujian Sword. And the blade is cast in one piece.
[Concurrent] Jiang Xudong, Cultural Relics Conservator of Hubei Provincial Museum
It is impossible to say that the Yue King Goujian sword has been rusted for thousands of years. It still has some rust spots.
Then we see the whole sword, its diamond pattern is black.
Including its hilt, everyone noticed no, its hilt is also black.
These places are actually rusted.
But the only thing is that the blade part has no rust at all, and the whole blade part has no lead impurities, it only has copper-tin alloy.
In fact, I also observed this aspect at the time, why there is no rust on the blade.
And the hilt turned black.
This is actually the difference in its composition.
[Explanation] Later, Jiang Xudong and the team further analyzed the alloy composition of the sword with the help of advanced non-destructive testing equipment. The test showed that the lead content in the sword was less than 0.1%.
Jiang Xudong pointed out that this shows that the Goujian sword is made of high-grade copper with high purity, which is also the primary reason for its non-corrosion for thousands of years.
After multiple researches, he also pointed out that the protection of the scabbard and the good sealing of the underwater tomb environment are also important factors for its non-corruption for thousands of years.
[Concurrent] Jiang Xudong, Cultural Relics Conservator of Hubei Provincial Museum
That is, in our Hubei area, many of these puddle rust are found, and the bronzes of the puddle tombs are buried in the water.
Including the bronze wares of Zeng Houyi that we have seen, most of them are blackened, not green in our traditional sense.
Buried in this kind of water is relatively isolated from air and oxygen, which is the second reason why it is not rusted for thousands of years.
And the third reason is that it has a scabbard, and we find that in this place close to the hilt, it is relatively speaking.
The state of preservation is poor.
The sword's edge is where the sword is at the forefront.
The state of preservation is relatively good.
And this is not only the case on the front and back, so what does it actually mean?
In fact, it means that this scabbard has a very good protective effect.
[Explanation] At present, more and more scientific and technological equipment is used in the field of cultural relics research and protection, providing scientific support for restoring cultural relics and revealing the mystery of cultural relics.
Jiang Xudong introduced that the digital restoration of Zeng Hou Yizun disk is currently underway.
As the bronze ware with the most complex production process in China so far, the Zenghou Yizun plate adopts a variety of casting processes, among which the hollow pattern on the lip adopts the most advanced investment casting method at that time.
[Concurrent] Jiang Xudong, Cultural Relics Conservator of Hubei Provincial Museum
The core problem of restoration is actually to restore the original value of the cultural relics themselves.
It is often achieved through human experience.
Now we have a lot of this new technological means.
We can analyze some of its materials in depth. We just want to restore its craftsmanship to it, and finally present it to the audience to tell it the stories behind it.
[Explanation] Hubei is a big province of cultural relics, and the Hubei Provincial Museum has a large number of cultural relics, especially bronze wares.
Every artifact has its lifespan, and its aging is inevitable.
Preserving cultural relics for a long time is the lifelong goal of cultural relic restorers. Through various methods, they can "prolong life" on the basis of protecting the safety and authenticity of cultural relics.
[Concurrent] Jiang Xudong, Cultural Relics Conservator of Hubei Provincial Museum
How to preserve and protect cultural relics for a long time, so that they can be passed on better and continuously.
It has always been the lifelong goal of our conservationists to make it better play its value.
Every cultural relic actually has its lifespan, and its aging is actually inevitable.
What we can do is to delay its aging. Through various methods, on the basis of protecting the authenticity of cultural relics, we can restore the original state of its cultural relics as much as possible, so that its value can be fully displayed. , These are all about telling Chinese stories well, and telling our Jingchu stories well, they are all very important content.
Reporter Zheng Ziyan reports from Wuhan, Hubei
Responsible editor: [Ji Xiang]