New Spring & Jinsha Sun Festival—Auspicious Beasts Show at the Jinsha Site Museum
Release Time: 2017-10-31
On Jan. 25, 2013, the auspicious beast finally landed in Jinsha with great concern from the local citizens. It will be showed at the sinking square of Jinsha Site Museum during the Chengdu Sun Festival. Just at the beginning of 2013, a beast was unearthed at the project site of Sichuan Theater by the side of Tianfu Square. As measured, the beast is 3.3m long, 1.2m wide, 1.7m tall and weighs 8.5 tons. A round body and short limbs earned it the title “The Most Lovely Beast in Chengdu”. Soon, the rhinocerotic stone beast became a favor of most media and newspaper. Preliminarily it is judged a product made during the Qin and Han Period, and buried from the end of Han Dynasty to the Western Jin Dynasty.
It is recorded by Yang Xiong in his book About the Shu Kings: “floods often occurred that the Shu prefecture chief Li Bing made five stone rhinoceroses, two kept in his mansion, one placed under the bridge and the other two sunk into water to expel the water demons.”Same records are also found in Volume 3 of State Records of Huayang.”Therefore, experts suspected that the stone beast should be one of the five rhinoceroses made by Li Bing from the Warring States Period to Qin Dynasty for the purpose of sacrifice to the river.
Possible Relation between the Stone Rhinoceros and Sacrifice to Jinsha
That many rivers flowed through Chengdu constituted a major issue of flood control to the local governors including Dayu, Du Yu and Li Bing. 3,000 years ago, with worship to the God, Jinsha is the center of ancient Shu kingdom on sacrifice. It is learned that on Jinsha Site, a 15,000m2-sacrifice site is built at a length of 150m, width of about 100m and stacking height of 4m. Distributed on the south bank of the ancient river, it is of large scale and long functionality for thousands of years. 63 sites have been found in relation with sacrifice, from where, over 6,000 pieces of cultural relics were unearthed, including goldware, bronze ware, jadeware, stone sculptures, ivory, bucktooth, antler and Rhinoceros bone. Such a unique way of sacrifice and the distinct religious connotation were granted with local features. Rhinoceros has long been taken as a holy object for sacrifice since ancient Shu period.
It is said that rhinoceros, an Amphibian, has psychic powers that its horn is capable of separating water. In a rather long period a Rhinoceros, especially engraved with red sandstone, was used to pacify water. The stone beast unearthed at Tianfu Square is in the similar shape of Rhinoceros and now in Jinsha Site Museum, it is back to the core belt of river sacrifice in ancient Shu.
New Spring & Jinsha Sun Festival
In Han Dynasty, the stone beast was regarded auspicious and the treasure of Chengdu for it could protect all the people and the city for everlasting. Water gives life to everything. Thousands of years have gone by, and now, at the beginning of the 2013, the beast once more reappeared; and its show on the Jinsha Sun Festival 2013 would be a better wish.
According to legends in ancient China, there was a kind of psychic rhinoceros only feeding on deleterious grasses and picky trees. Its purpose was to test every material with his body so that it could be a master of disintoxication. People then regarded it the beast of god and the transformer of the brave. A touch of it would bring us the best fortune. “A touch of his head, you would be smart; a touch of his horn, you would be married; a touch of his neck, you would be promoted; a touch of his back, you would be wealthy; a touch of his wrinkles, you would see the God of Wealth; a touch of his tail, you would be long living.” In the new spring, the beast brings you the best luck. What are you waiting for? Just go to our Museum and everything will go on well.
In addition to the show, some other correlated activities were also designed, including a large lamp set themed by the five stone the rhinoceroses shaped by Li Bing at the sinking square, lovely rhinoceros dolls at Chunxi Road, in metro stations and on the Sun Festival, solemn sacrifice shows representing the holiness for thousands of years. Moreover, the Museum was in search of 30 babies born in 2009 (Year of the Ox) for diversified activities such as making your New Year wishes. For more details, please visit the official website of Jinsha Site Museum and the official account on Sina or Tencent.
Office of Jinsha Site Museum
Publicity and Marketing Department of Jinsha Site Museum
