Editor's note:

The beauty of national treasures, through ancient and modern times, is magnificent. Behind each rare cultural relic is the ingenuity and wisdom of the ancients, engraved with the cultural genes of the Chinese nation, and witnessing the exchanges and mutual learning between Chinese and foreign civilizations. From 2023 May 5, China News Service "East-West Question" has launched the "Treasures of the Town Hall" series of planning (1), which explores the meaning of cultural relics and the stories behind them through experts.

Lanzhou, 5 May (ZXS) -- How did the East and the West communicate under the Yuan Dynasty?

——Interview with Li Yongping, Director and Researcher of the Research Department of Gansu Provincial Museum

China News Agency reporter Feng Zhijun

Among the successive Chinese dynasties, the Yuan Dynasty inherited the ancient effective talisman system and innovated in order to consolidate the vast territory, promote exchanges, and facilitate trade. The Yuan Dynasty talisman can pass through all parts of the country and the four major khanates of Mongolia, spanning the Eurasian continent, and some scholars call it an "international pass". These talismans have been extremely rare to this day, and one of the two "iron and silver medals" currently in public collection around the world is the "treasure of the town hall" of the Gansu Provincial Museum.

Li Yongping, director and researcher of the Research Department of the Gansu Provincial Museum, said in an exclusive interview with the "East-West Question" of China News Agency that this talisman plate that is collected and exhibited is very precious, and although it is not as famous as the peerless and unique copper galloping horse collected by the museum, it provides rare physical materials and research value for understanding and understanding the talisman system of the Yuan Dynasty, the style and language of Basiba scripture, and the cultural and commercial exchanges and integration between the East and the West during the Yuan Dynasty.

The following is a summary of the interview:

China News Agency: As the "treasure of the town hall" of the Gansu Provincial Museum, how was the silver character plate of Basibawen in the Yuan Dynasty discovered? What is the historical background of casting and use?

Li Yongping: The Yuan Dynasty Basiba Wen Tiger Rune Round Plate (also known as the "Basiba Silver Character Plate") collected by the Gansu Provincial Museum is very well preserved, which was collected by cultural relics workers from the Lanzhou scrap metal warehouse, and was later identified as a national treasure by the expert group of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage. This tablet is exquisitely designed and finely ornamented, which is not only a physical proof of the Yuan Dynasty's establishment of the rune system, but also makes us deeply impressed by the metal handicraft technology of the Yuan Dynasty.

Yuan Dynasty Basi Ba Wen silver character plate. Photo by Dai Wenchang

The symbol is made of iron-lead alloy, with a height of 18 cm, a diameter of 11.7 cm, and a weight of 247 grams. The text is silver, and the two sides are inlaid with raised official characters of the Yuan Dynasty, eight siba script, five lines, one positive and one negative, which means: "In the power of immortal weather, the emperor's divine will, those who do not obey will be punished." This silver-lettered round medal tiger talisman is a token used by princes for military emergency envoys, or military and political emergency envoys of the imperial court.

Yuan Dynasty Basi Ba Wen silver character plate. Photo by Dai Wenchang

There are many types of talismans in the Yuan Dynasty, including golden tiger talismans, gold talismans, silver talismans, Haiqing talismans and round tiger talismans, etc., golden tiger talismans are worn by 10,000 households, and silver talismans are worn by hundreds of households. The Haiqing talisman is a round medal with three textures: gold, silver and iron, and it is a talisman that can only be used in the early Yuan Dynasty when there are military emergencies. Later, the round tiger talisman was used, and there were two kinds of gold, silver, the difference of which was different in the urgency of the military situation.

China News Agency: Compared with the talisman system of previous dynasties, how does this silver character plaque, as a carrier of Basiba style and language, reflect the exchange and integration of multi-ethnic cultures, ideas, and languages?

Li Yongping: In ancient China, there were no identity cards, but there were two documents similar to identity cards, that is, talismans and messengers. In contrast, symbols focus on identification and messengers on access. Tracing the history of the rune, it was a kind of certificate token used by the ancient Chinese imperial court to transmit orders, transfer troops, appoint officials, reward meritorious figures, pass passes, indicate identity, and use various military and political, economic and trade, transmission, inspection and other affairs.

The name and form and function of the rune tablet varied at different times, and it was used through the generations, and the regulation was perfected, and the rune system also became an important canon system in ancient China. In the Yuan Dynasty, it inherited the talisman system of the previous generation, but with some innovations, such as the choice of Ba Si Ba script in terms of writing, and endowed with the natural legal right of "the emperor's will is irresistible".

Yuan Dynasty Basi Ba Wen silver character plate. Photo by Dai Wenchang

Since there are many kinds of talismans from previous dynasties and have been unearthed in modern times, why can the Basibawen silver character plate stand out as the "treasure of the town hall"? It is because there are only two pieces left in the world, and it is the most preserved, which reflects its preciousness.

Before and after the establishment of the Yuan Dynasty, the territory was vast, there were many ethnic groups, the language was huge, and it was quite inconvenient to issue government orders, and the Yuan ancestor Kublai Khan ordered the Tibetan Buddhist master Sakya Lama Basipa to recreate the Mongolian script, which later became the "Basiba script", also known as the "Mongolian New Character". As an official cipherscript based on a combination of Mongolian and Arabic, its use is limited to official documents and symbols.

Part of the silver character plate of the Eight Si Ba Wen of the Yuan Dynasty. Photo by Dai Wenchang

When mentioning Basi Bawen, it is necessary to mention the famous historical event "Liangzhou Huimeng" (also known as "Liangzhou Talks") that occurred in Wuwei City, Gansu Province. In 1247 AD, the religious leader of the Sakya sect of Tibet, Sakya Panzhida, and the prince of the Mongol Khanate and commander of the Western Road Army, Kuduan, held the "Liangzhou Talks" at Wuwei Baita Monastery, and issued the "Sakya Panzhida Letter to the People", and Tibet has since officially been included in the Chinese territory. As Sakya Pandita's nephew, Ba Sipa, who traveled with him, also witnessed the event.

After the establishment of the Basiba script, it was mostly circulated at the official level of the Yuan Dynasty and the four Mongol khanates, and the rulers did not destroy the writing and language of other ethnic groups or impose it on the people. In the process of the Southern Conquest and Northern War, the "Mongolian Iron Horse" also respected the historical and cultural traditions of various regions, preserved the characters and languages of different ethnic groups, including Chinese characters, and achieved mutual learning and common prosperity, objectively promoting the development of a unified multi-ethnic country.

In the vast civil society of the Yuan Dynasty, Chinese characters were still commonly used. As a result, the Basiba script was only used by officials of the Yuan Dynasty for 110 years, and the rune system was gradually abandoned with the fall of the Yuan Dynasty.

China News Agency: The Yuan Dynasty's policy represented by the rune card system promoted East-West exchanges to a certain extent, what impact did this have on the smooth flow of the Silk Road and East-West exchanges?

Li Yongping: Many people have the impression that the ancient Silk Road has been withering away since the Song and Jin Dynasties, but this is only slightly "bleak" compared to the Maritime Silk Road. In fact, the overland Silk Road did not decline in the Yuan Dynasty and was further developed, and its historical presence not only did not decrease, but was carried forward.

According to research, the Basiba silver character plate is likely to have been unearthed in the territory of Ganqing and Qinghai provinces, and the continuous archaeological discoveries such as blue and white porcelain of the Yuan Dynasty unearthed in Ili, Kashgar and Kuqa in Xinjiang after the founding of New China can reflect the smooth flow of the Silk Road in the Yuan Dynasty.

Yuan Dynasty Basi Ba Wen silver character plate. Photo by Dai Wenchang

According to historical records, although the Yuan Dynasty "conquered the world by horse", they actually attached great importance to the political, economic, cultural and other exchanges between the Central Plains and the West, and the central government not only protected merchants and missions traveling on the Silk Road through official orders, but also set up officials and troops to ensure smooth communication along the route.

At that time, a large number of Semu people from the Western Regions entered the Central Plains to accept and learn Confucian culture, and also became the propagators of Confucian culture. Through their familiarity and mastery of Confucian culture, some of them even served in the court of the Yuan Dynasty. Large-scale Western caravans and missions also reached the Yuan Dynasty from the Mediterranean coast, and Islam and Christianity were introduced to the Central Plains on a large scale during this period. The Yuan Dynasty also sent envoys to European countries many times.

Among them is the famous Italian merchant traveler Marco Polo. "Marco Polo's Travels" mentions that when he bid farewell to Kublai Khan and accompanied the messenger to escort Princess Kokuozhen to marry the Ilkhanate, Yuan Shizu gave two sides of the golden talisman plate; When Marco Polo was about to return to Italy from the Ilkhanate, Princess Kokojin also gave him four gold talismans.

All in all, during the reign of the Yuan Dynasty, the exchanges between the East and the West along the Silk Road could be described as integrated into all aspects of production and life. For example, in the popular Yuan songs, there are obvious labels and imprints of "East and West" from theatrical language, performing arts, character shaping, etc., and with the wider exchanges, eating styles and various condiments from the Western Regions have also poured into the Central Plains, further enriching the table of Chinese food culture.

China News Agency: After nearly a thousand years, what cultural thinking did the Yuan Dynasty's Basibawen silver character plate leave to today's people? What is its reference and enlightenment significance for the construction of the "Belt and Road"?

Li Yongping: The silver character plate of the Basi Ba script in the Yuan Dynasty played an active role in smoothing the exchanges and blending between the East and the West. Until now, in the Hexi Corridor area of Gansu, a prime location of the ancient Silk Road, many cultural sites, including the Dunhuang Grottoes, still retain precious Yuan Dynasty murals and painted sculptures, as well as many unearthed written relics and documentary materials. What is even more valuable is that there is a parallel presentation of multiple languages, reflecting the concept of mutual tolerance and equal coexistence.

Learn history wisely and learn from the past. Today, the construction of the "Belt and Road" is also "learning from history", learning from each other and learning from each other between countries and regions along the route, so as to achieve win-win cooperation. In fact, the deep integration with other civilizations and cultures has been the main theme of China's foreign exchanges for more than 2,000 years, extensively absorbing the excellent achievements of various ethnic civilizations, and is also the "historical gene" of Chinese culture. (End)

Respondent Profile:

Li Yongping is the director and researcher of the Research Department of the Gansu Provincial Museum, the director of the Gansu Historical Society, and the director of the Gansu Dunhuang Society. For more than 30 years, he has been engaged in research work, mainly unearthed Han Dynasty-Wei and Jin Jianshu documents from Gansu, ancient historical relics of Gansu, as well as museology and modern cultural relics. One of the authors of the outline of "Silk Road - Great Northwest Heritage Exhibition" and "Tea Horse Ancient Road - Southwest Silk Road Cultural Relics Exhibition", presided over the topic "Gansu Newly Unearthed Wei and Jin Sixteen Kingdoms Document Research".