Our reporters Zhang Miyang and Xue Yuan
An archaeological team is carefully excavating on the Jiankou Great Wall in Huairou, Beijing, which is known for its majesty and precipitousness.
According to a newly unearthed stele inscription "Twelve Years of Wanli", the Jiankou Great Wall was built 33 years earlier with archaeological evidence.
In June this year, at the Dazhuangke Great Wall in Yanqing, Beijing, which is an hour and a half drive away from the Jiankou Great Wall, the archaeological team released a batch of results-the deeply buried city wall, the carbides after the "barbecue" of the soldiers guarding the city, and firearms Projectiles, hilts, fragments of cups and bowls...
It is understood that the State Administration of Cultural Heritage approved the research projects for the above-mentioned two sections of the Great Wall last year.
The introduction of archaeological links for the first time in the renovation is a significant "bright spot" of these two projects, which has opened a new stage in the protection of the Great Wall: from focusing on rescue protection to both rescue and research and preventive protection; The protection of cultural relics is transformed to the overall protection of cultural ecology and heritage environment.
Archaeology before repairs
Along the southeastern boundary of Yanqing District, Beijing, there are precipitous cliffs and verdant mountains.
When the Xinhua Daily Telegraph reporter visited the archaeological site, the archaeologists were concentrating on "searching for soil" under the high temperature of 378 degrees Celsius.
"A piece of porcelain!" There was a burst of excitement at the scene.
Shang Heng, the project leader and an associate researcher of the Beijing Institute of Archaeology, took the porcelain piece and looked at it. "The radian should be a fragment of a porcelain bowl, which was used by the officers and soldiers of the Ming Dynasty when they were stationed here." Shang Heng judged, "And this bowl is still in use. It has been repaired, and there are traces of smashing, indicating that the soldiers lived a relatively hard life at that time, even if the bowl is broken, it must be used again after repairing."
Daily necessities are one of the three major cultural relics categories of the Great Wall archaeology. Together with the weapons and cultural relics, they have witnessed the traces of the ancients' activities on the Great Wall.
The third category is "architectural construction", which restores the dynamic process of the Great Wall from construction, abandonment to partial collapse.
The windows of the No. 4 enemy building on the west side of the Great Wall of Dazhuangke are well preserved, and none of the arched bricks are missing, but the lower edge of the window is only more than 1 meter from the ground, and there is a huge stone about 1 meter square and an estimated weight of 1 ton outside the window.
How to defend against the enemy at such a height in wartime?
Where did this boulder, which obviously does not belong to the Great Wall, come from?
Archaeologists believe that the height of the existing windows from the ground is by no means the height of the Great Wall in the normal use stage.
Through a large number of digging operations on the side, the city wall buried more than 5 meters underground has resurfaced, confirming the judgment of the archaeologists; as for this huge stone, the archaeologists deduce that it is very likely that after the Great Wall was abandoned for many years, because of a heavy rain, Rolled down from the mountain next to the Great Wall's watchtower.
After many discussions among the archaeology, design and construction parties, it was decided to excavate only the side walls of the enemy building, and not to excavate the boulders outside the window.
"The collapsed objects themselves are also an integral part of the Great Wall. This time, we did not follow the general archaeological procedures, that is, we continued to excavate the later-stage accumulation parts to expose the original ground, and then clean up the muck. Instead, we decided to collapse after many discussions. The whole thing is preserved, and then through the cross-section of soil layers and boulders, the time and space sequence, evolution trajectory and historical scenes are displayed here, which is one of the most vivid stories of the Great Wall." Shang Heng explained.
In fact, in 2019, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the State Administration of Cultural Heritage jointly issued the "Master Plan for the Protection of the Great Wall", which clarified the existing state of the Great Wall: the Great Wall is a coexistence of ancient buildings and ancient relics, with the relics of ancient sites as the main form. cultural heritage, and has outstanding cultural landscape characteristics.
Ancient buildings are like the Forbidden City, and ancient ruins are like Yuanmingyuan.
"If the Great Wall is treated as an ancient building to be repaired, then it needs to be restored to its most glorious architectural form period, which is not necessary." Shang Heng said.
Zhao Peng, the designer of the Great Wall research repair project, also said in an interview that the focus of repairing the Great Wall is not how strong the body is, but how to better preserve and display the value of cultural relics.
Although a consensus has been basically formed at the conceptual level, when it comes to the specific repair process, more project leaders rely on their own experience.
Even on the most basic issues, such as whether to use white ash or cement for the jointing material, whether to add glutinous rice pulp, and whether to use flat jointing or buckwheat ridges in craftsmanship, there is no consensus yet.
What's more, because of the chaos in the repairs such as "tiling maintenance" and "extensive construction", it has caused controversy.
This status quo of fighting each other and not being highly coordinated has hindered the high-quality protection of the Great Wall to a certain extent.
"If you have a full understanding of this section of the Great Wall through early archaeology, the design and implementation of the repair plan is equivalent to getting a 'instruction manual', which is more targeted and will reduce the number of rework." This is the expert who participated in the project. unanimous opinion.
Taking the excavation of the wall of the No. 4 enemy building on the Great Wall of Dazhuangke as an example, the archaeologists found that the architectural shape of this city wall is not the same as the original idea. It can ensure that the building is more sturdy and stable.
This archaeological discovery provides an important reference for later restoration.
A New Stage of Great Wall Protection
In October 2019, the broadcast of the documentary "Great Wall Rescue" attracted widespread attention, and "rescue" became a new model of Great Wall protection at that time; almost a year later, the country's first Great Wall protection and restoration practice base was established at the foot of the Jiankou Great Wall; In 2021, with the establishment of the base as an opportunity, the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Cultural Heritage listened to the advice of experts, selected the Yanqing Dazhuangke Great Wall and the Huairou Jiankou Great Wall as the first batch of pilot projects, and reported to the relevant departments to carry out research and repair projects to explore, "It is a heritage protection concept. Exploration in Conservation Practice".
"In the final analysis, 'rescue' is temporary, not a long-term solution. Follow-up maintenance is still required, and due to the time limit, it is difficult to pay attention to details. Therefore, we still need to have a deeper understanding and discussion of the Great Wall." Tang Yuyang, general manager of the research repair project and executive vice president of the Institute of Architectural Heritage of Beijing University of Civil Engineering and Architecture, said, "On the other hand, the rescue work on the Great Wall of Beijing has been carried out for several years, and the existence of some problems has also reached a staged summary and review. When it comes to giving back.”
Different from the relative separation of professional and technical personnel in the previous repair process, research repairs form a collaborative model from the start of the project—starting with archaeological excavation, multidisciplinary research as the means, and digital tracking records as the guarantee, archaeology, design, survey, Construction and other personnel cooperate in each link, and at the same time guide social forces to participate.
"Based on years of experience, we have prepared an assessment and a framework map in the early stage, and determined that the research mainly involves three aspects: the Great Wall itself, the Great Wall disease and the occurrence environment of the Great Wall. Archaeology, surveying and mapping, structure, materials, plants and other disciplines are all in the field work. There is a professional research team, and the design and construction are also closely integrated, and the whole process is involved." Tang Yuyang introduced.
In the protection and repair project of the Great Wall, there has been a long-standing disagreement on the treatment of the plants on the top of the wall.
Some scholars believe that plant growth is one of the main reasons for the damage to the main structure of the Great Wall and should be removed; some scholars believe that, as a site-type cultural heritage and landscape, the plants on the Great Wall are also an important part of it, and should also follow the minimum requirements. Intervention principle, appropriate reservation.
Based on such long-term discussions, in this research repair of the Great Wall of Dazhuangke, the project attracted the participation of the landscape botany research team to investigate and quantitatively evaluate the existing plants on the top of the Great Wall wall, so as to provide the basis for the follow-up selective cleaning technology. System construction lays the foundation.
It is worth mentioning that, as a classic case of Great Wall protection, the successful restoration of the Simatai Great Wall in Beijing is recognized as closely related to the strict and meticulous survey and design in the early stage.
The book "Simatai Great Wall", which contains most of the restoration engineering documents of the project, is still a classic Great Wall protection engineering material so far.
"Procedural materials are not only a summary of the current work, but also a reference for future generations." Shang Heng said, because of this, all the disciplines and data, engineering drawings, and scheme designs involved in this research repair process, After the project is over, they will be collected and assembled to form a complete set of engineering materials, which will be published to the society.
Social strength is still needed
Tang Yuyang believes that the smooth progress of the Great Wall research repair project has a lot to do with the feelings of the experts and social funds involved in the protection of cultural heritage.
The Beijing Municipal Bureau of Cultural Relics has confirmed that it will continue the research-based restoration project of the Great Wall to accumulate more experience for the construction of the Great Wall National Cultural Park in Beijing and provide reference for the restoration and protection of the Great Wall across the country.
This also brings a problem that has to be faced. The total length of the Great Wall, which is over 20,000 kilometers long and traverses 15 provinces, is the largest existing cultural heritage in the world. In addition, there are many historical debts. The protection and repair of the Great Wall is difficult to achieve with the support of government and financial funds, which requires the participation of more social forces and the participation of the general public.
The China Cultural Relics Protection Foundation has found in many years of practice that even with a series of work such as filming documentaries, publishing picture books, and producing related mini-programs, due to the vast and complex knowledge system of the Great Wall, the public's understanding of the Great Wall is still not in-depth, and more vivid information is urgently needed. Lively means to make the knowledge of the Great Wall "no longer obscure and difficult to understand", which is also the main purpose of its active development of digital technology to help the protection of the Great Wall in recent years.
Liu Yuzhu, chairman of the China Cultural Relics Protection Foundation, said that the wide dissemination of digital cultural heritage can enable people to better understand Chinese cultural relics and their connotations, appreciate the splendid Chinese civilization and national spirit carried by cultural relics, and enhance individual national self-esteem and self-confidence. Consciously share the destiny with the country and the nation.
"For a country, cultural relics can not only educate and guide the masses, especially young people, to better understand and recognize Chinese civilization, but also tell the story of Chinese civilization well, show the world a credible, lovely, and respectable image of China, and let the Chinese The light of civilization illuminates the road to national rejuvenation. This is also the value of the protection of the Great Wall and even the protection of all cultural relics to the country and every ordinary person." Liu Yuzhu said.