Discovery of the Tomb of Emperor Yuwen Jue of the Northern Zhou Dynasty in Shaanxi
On September 19th, the reporter learned from the Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology that archaeologists have discovered the tomb of the founding emperor of the Northern Zhou Dynasty, Yuwen Jue, in Xianyang City, Shaanxi Province. 146 pottery figurines and other burial relics have been unearthed.
The Yuwen Jue Tomb is located in Beihe Village, Zhouling Street, Weicheng District, Xianyang City. The area where the tomb is located is a concentrated distribution of high-grade tombs from the Northern Dynasties to the Sui and Tang Dynasties. The excavation indicates that the surface of the tomb was originally surrounded by a ditch, with only one tomb located in the central northern part of the ditch. The tomb faces north to south and is a single chamber earthen cave tomb with a sloping tomb passage and four courtyards. The total horizontal length from north to south is 56.84 meters, and the bottom of the tomb chamber is 10 meters above the current surface. It is a medium-sized tomb during the Northern Zhou Dynasty.
This is the tomb chamber of Yuwen Jue's tomb.
This tomb was once disturbed by theft, and currently 146 burial relics have been unearthed, mainly various types of pottery figurines, all of which are small half model figurines. The epitaph is placed on the east side of the entrance to the tomb chamber, with a square plain surface and a regular script on the front that reads "In October of the second year of the tomb of Duke Yuwen Jue of Lueyang, Zhou Dynasty," and is painted red with cinnabar. According to the content of the epitaph, it can be determined that the tomb owner was Emperor Xiaomin of the Northern Zhou Dynasty, Yuwen Jue.
This is the armored and cavalry figurine unearthed from the tomb of Yuwen Jue.
According to the "Annals of Emperor Xiaomin" in the Book of Zhou, Yuwen Jue was the legitimate son of Yuwen Tai and was granted the title of Duke of Lueyang County at the age of nine. He ascended to the throne of heaven in 557 AD. He was soon killed and passed away, and was posthumously named Emperor Xiaomin. His tomb was called Jingling. This excavation indicates that Yuwen Jue was buried in 558 AD as the Duke of Lueyang, and the tomb is known as the Jingling Mausoleum of the Northern Zhou Dynasty.
Zhao Zhanrui, an assistant researcher at the Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology, said that the archaeological discovery of the Yuwen Jue Tomb of the Northern Zhou Dynasty is of great significance. This is the second Northern Zhou Emperor's tomb excavated through archaeology after the Xiaoling Tomb of Emperor Wu of the Northern Zhou Dynasty. Yuwen Jue was buried as the Duke of Lueyang, providing physical evidence for political struggles during the founding period of the Northern Zhou Dynasty and supplementing historical materials of the Northern Dynasty. The determination of his location also provided important clues for the distribution of other imperial tombs in the Northern Zhou Dynasty.
