After more than two months of hard work, renovation of the hanging
coffins of the Bo people in Gongxian County of southwest China's
Sichuan Province has now finished. This has been the biggest ever
project to stabilize and conserve hanging coffins in China. 43 have
been restored and 16 previously unknown coffins have been found. In
the process new light has been shed on the secrets of these
mysterious artifacts.
Preserving the Relics of Bo Civilization
The recent renovation of hanging coffins in Gongxian County started
in September 2002. It is the third time that large-scale
maintenance work has been undertaken at the site since the People's
Republic of China was founded in 1949. The two earlier projects
were in 1974 and 1985.
According to Cui Chen, curator of the Yibin Museum, hanging coffins
come in three types. Some are cantilevered out on wooden stakes.
Some are placed in caves while others sit on projections in the
rock. All the three forms can be found in Gongxian where most of
China's hanging coffins are located.
The coffins are mainly clustered around Matangba and Sumawan where
some 100 coffins are hung on the limestone cliffs to both sides of
the 5,000-meter-long Bochuangou.
Survey reports from the early 1990s show Gongxian County having a
total of 280 hanging coffins. However in the past 10 years or so
nearly 20 have fallen. The coffins were hung at least 10 meters
above the ground with the highest ones reaching 130 meters.
Unlike previous conservation work, which focused only on
consolidation of the wooden stakes, this time the experts also
worked on the coffins themselves. In addition they grouted the
cracks in the rock where this was necessary to stabilize the
limestone of the cliffs.
The Bo people have become lost in the pages of the history of human
civilization. There is now some urgency in the work to salvage and
protect the last somber record, which they have left us in the form
of their hanging coffins.
Remains of the Bo People
On
September 16, 2002 a field team composed mainly of cultural and
museum specialists and technicians, went to Matangba. On September
24 they examined their first coffin hung about 20 meters above
ground. Here they found the remains of one of the Bo People who had
lived some 400 years ago. The skeleton was that of a tall
individual. In the coffin they found sand and silt but no burial
articles and Cui says this points to the possibility of theft. The
coffin, weighing about 200 kg and measuring some 2.0 meters long
and 0.7 meters wide, had been cut from a single log. Both the body
and lid of the coffin were studded.
Members of the field team follow rigorous procedures in the
cleaning, measuring, classifying and recording of each coffin. Tung
oil is applied liberally to preserve the ancient timber then the
remains are gently put back and the coffin is returned to the place
it had occupied over all these centuries.
By
the second day, five coffins had been opened. A number of precious
cultural relics had come to light. These included two blue and
white porcelain bowls, an iron knife notable for its unassuming
simplicity, another smaller knife and two iron spear points. The
experts have dated them to the Ming Dynasty.
The old records told of only 29 coffins but this time, 16
additional ones were found. These were the ones most difficult to
find being located mainly in caves and concealed behind grass and
bushes. While examining the coffins some silk and linen textiles
were also found. The only coffin to be found on a rock outcrop was
not studded like the others. The cover and body of the coffins were
connected with timber fastenings.
Cliff paintings were also found. These are of great significance to
the study of the lives, work, politics, military affairs and
culture of the Bo People.
A Lost Culture
The Bo were an ethnic minority people living astride the borders of
modern day Sichuan and Yunnan provinces. There they created a
brilliant culture as early as 3,000 years ago. The ancestors of the
Bo helped the Western Zhou (c.1100 771 BC) to overthrow the ruling
Yin at the end of the Shang Dynasty (c.1600 1100 BC).
The Bo differed from other ethnic groups in their burial customs.
Typically hewn from durable hardwood logs, their hanging coffins
went unpainted. The most recent hanging coffins were made up to
about 400 years ago in the middle and later periods of the Ming
Dynasty (1368-1644), while many of the earliest ones date back
1,000 years to the Song Dynasty (960-1279). To date, the earliest
hanging coffin was one found in the Three Gorges area, dating back
about 2,500 years to the Spring and Autumn Period (770 BC- 476
BC).
The hanging coffin was the most widespread form of burial in
ancient southwest China. However, the practice ended with the
mysterious disappearance of the Bo People. Those who came after
knew them from the hanging coffins and the paintings they left
behind like faint echoes on the cliffs. Their ancient flowering of
culture like that of the Maya is no more.
Visitors to Matangba cannot help asking: Why did the Bo people bury
their dead in hanging coffins? How did they do it? And why did the
Bo people disappear?
Mysteries Revealed
The hanging coffins were once a hot topic among architects,
paleoanthropologists, folklorists and artists. In the Spring of
1941, experts on antiquities including Liang Sicheng, Lin Huiyin,
Liu Dunzhen and Chen Mingda arrived at Sumawan, which is today part
of Gongxian County.
From far off, they saw a cliff some 600 meters long and rising 120
meters. Nearly 100 coffins hung on the cliff side supported on
wooden stakes wedged into the rock. Other coffins rested on rock
outcrops. The sight aroused heated discussion among the
experts.
Some believed the coffins must have been lowered down with ropes
from the top of the mountain. Some thought the coffins had been put
in place using wooden stakes inserted into the cliff face to be
used as artificial climbing aids. Others felt that scaling ladders
were the answer. Lin said they could leave the mystery for later
generations to solve.
Why did the Bo people bury their dead so high? Li Jing writing
during the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) offers a clue in his Brief
Chronicles of Yunnan. "Coffins set high are considered
auspicious. The higher they are the more propitious for the dead.
And those whose coffins fell to the ground sooner were considered
to be more fortunate."
Cui Chen who is Curator of the Yibin Museum examines three
different ways the coffins could have been put in place. "Earth
ramps might have been used but experts discount this solution due
to the extent of the labor required, which would have been
difficult in an under-populated area. A timber scaffold supported
on stakes in the cliff might have offered a plausible explanation
but years of investigation have failed to find even a single stake
hole. On balance the third option of lowering the coffins on ropes
from above had always seemed feasible and now cultural specialists
have found the telltale marks of the ropes which were used all
these years ago. And so this part of the mystery of the hanging
coffins has now been resolved."
During the later years of the Ming Dynasty, the imperial army
cruelly oppressed the ethnic minority peoples of Sichuan and
Yunnan. In particular, the Duzhangman and Bo Peoples fell, victims
of massacre. To escape their oppression, the Bo migrated to new
locations. They hid their real names and integrated into other
ethnic groups. Like their culture they have disappeared but their
descendents are still here for they are a part of us.
(China.org.cn by Li Jinhui, February 10, 2003)