As one of the first batch of national historical and cultural cities, Changsha has remained unchanged for 3,000 years and is known as the "famous city of Chu and Han Dynasty". However, compared with Beijing, Nanjing, Xi'an and other cities, Changsha lacks the style of "ancient capital", coupled with historical reasons such as the eight-year Anti-Japanese War, the Wenxi fire and the "four olds", the ancient buildings and ancient cultural relics in the urban area are almost exhausted; Compared with Chongqing, a large municipality that occupies many natural landscapes, Changsha has a large terrain but no outstanding overall landscape, although the terrain is quite undulating. Fortunately, Changsha is the provincial capital, and the Provincial Museum must be located here. The outstanding design and excellent exhibits of the Hunan Provincial Museum make it one of the most valuable places for tourists to visit here.
The Hunan Provincial Museum is the largest historical and art museum in Hunan Province, one of the first national first-class museums, and one of the eight national key museums jointly built by the central and local governments, and its history can be traced back to the Chenzhou Society Museum established in 1897. In 1972~1974, one of the major archaeological discoveries in China and even the world in the twentieth century - the Mawangdui Han Tomb was rediscovered. The cultural relics of the Han tomb and the thousand-year-old incorruptible female corpse were moved to the Hunan Provincial Museum, making it the focus of world attention. In 2012, the Hunan Provincial Museum, completed in 1999, began a five-year renovation and expansion project, covering an area of 49,000 square meters and a total construction area of 91,000 square meters. The reopened Hunan Provincial Museum combines modern architectural aesthetics with a sense of historical significance for the cultural relics on display, and has been well received by all sectors of society.
The museum's current permanent exhibitions include the exhibition of the Mawangdui Han Tomb in Changsha, the exhibition of the history and culture of Hunan people and Sanxiang, and the temporary exhibitions that change from time to time.
Changsha Mawangdui Han Tomb display
Mawangdui is a mound raised in the impact plain of the lower reaches of the Liuyang River, which was falsely rumored to be the cemetery of Ma Yin, the king of Chu and his family during the Five Dynasties. At the end of 1971, the 366 Hospital of the Provincial Military Region near Mawangdui broke ground to build an underground hospital in response to the mobilization of "war readiness", and this ancient Han tomb was "discovered by chance" (in fact, in 1951, this place was judged by archaeologist Xia Nai to be a Han tomb, but the government did not carry out excavation work). This Han tomb named "Mawangdui" is actually the tomb of the prime minister of Changsha in the early Western Han Dynasty and the family of three of Hou Licang. There are three Han tombs, the largest of which unearthed the bone seal of "Concubine Xin Chai" ("concubine" is the name of Mrs. Xin Chai's self-moderation), indicating that the tomb owner is Xin Chai, the wife of Li Cang.
In fact, the scale of the Mawangdui Han Tomb is not first-class among the Han tombs, and it is much "inferior" to the Han tombs discovered later. However, the excavation of the Mawangdui Han Tomb has fundamentally changed the understanding of the archaeological community in the early Han Dynasty, and it is difficult to change the understanding of the academic community in the later Han tombs, so the historical significance of the Mawangdui Han Tomb is extremely significant.
The Mawangdui Han Tomb in Changsha has a high status in the Hunan Provincial Museum, and the main structure of the whole museum is basically around it. The exhibition is divided into four units: "Prologue Hall and Amazing Excavation", "Life and Art", "Silk Collection" and "Dream of Eternal Life", with an exhibition area of 5,243.8 square meters and three floors. The first three units are the more common museum layouts, displaying exquisite lacquerware, silk clothes, silk documents, colorful coffin silk paintings, etc., depicting the life of the Marquis family before their lives, and also reflecting the height of material and spiritual civilization at that time, as well as people's multi-dimensional cosmology, ascension fantasy, and eternal life.
The key exhibits in the exhibition of the Han tomb are the Western Han Dynasty straight silk shirt, the Western Han T-shaped silk painting, the Western Han Dynasty black ground painted coffin, and the Western Han Dynasty moire lacquer francium. One of the most well-known is the 49g straight-lined plain gauze shirt. In fact, Mawangdui No. 1 Tomb unearthed two plain gauze shirts, one curved and one straight, the former is lighter, only 48g. In 1983, the Mawangdui Cultural Relics Exhibition Hall was stolen, and the curved plain yarn shirt was destroyed, and the straight plain yarn shirt was washed into the sewer and was seriously damaged, which was later repaired. The Western Han Dynasty straight plain yarn shirt shows the characteristics of the Han Dynasty's superb textile craftsmanship - "thin as cicada wings, light as smoke". Many media have called it a miracle that cannot be replicated by modern craftsmanship, which is an exaggeration. The real situation is that the imitation failed in the early stage, but the reason is in silk. The Western Han Dynasty bred the Sanmian silkworm that dormant three times and molted three times, and now it is the Simian silkworm, which has thicker silk, higher yield and better economic benefits. However, the physique of the Simian silkworm is weak, and the ability to breed the Simian silkworm universally is an important progress in sericulture technology (about the Northern Song Dynasty). In 1988, the Erling Silk Factory produced an ultra-thin silk made of Sanmian silk, and the total weight of the same plain yarn single clothes was 25 grams. By drawing inferences, modern technology can replicate and surpass various pinnacle works of ancient times. Modern people should not be arrogant or arrogant.
The final Eternal Dream unit reproduces the structure of the pit of Tomb No. 1. The nearly 17-meter-high, three-storey tomb exhibition hall has shocked many audiences, and its timed 3D mapping (3D projection technology) images have enhanced the audience's audio-visual enjoyment. The museum projected the coffin and T-shaped silk painting on the surface of the tomb with the coffin and T-shaped silk painting of Mrs. Xin Chai, and moved with music, vividly outlining the cosmic space imagined by the people of the Han Dynasty and their pursuit of the dream of eternal life, which is very popular science and interesting. After the audience reaches the ground floor with the escalator, they can also pay homage to the remains of Mrs. Xin Chai. This wet corpse, which has not been decomposed for thousands of years, shocked the world after it was unearthed. Since then, the archaeological community has unified the similar ancient corpses found as "Mawangdui corpse type".
It is worth mentioning that the original site of the Mawangdui Han Tomb is now also a scenic spot, but only the No. 3 tomb pit and the exhibition room on the tomb pit are displayed, and the No. 1 and No. 2 tomb pits have been filled, and the tour value is not much because the archaeological documents have been transferred.
Hunan people, Sanxiang history and culture exhibition
The Hunan Sanxiang Historical and Cultural Exhibition is a "typical work in the industry" of the Provincial Museum to introduce the cultural development of its own province. The difference is that the display is displayed in the first person of "Hunan people", which improves the sense of participation and identity of tourists, especially Hunan tourists.
The exhibition is divided into five units, namely "Home", "Where Do I Come From", "Dongting Fish and Rice Town", "Footprints of Life", and "Hunan Soul".
"Home" shows the natural environment and development outline of Hunan life from the three units of topography and landform, animal and plant changes and historical evolution, and defines a geographical space for the later units. The 270° surround projection exhibition hall at the beginning gives visitors a very realistic feeling, but the flaw is that the 3D projection animation modeling is slightly rough.
"Where Do I Come From" illustrates the origin and changes of the Hunan people by displaying the unearthed cultural relics, historical records and genealogical materials of the past dynasties; In addition, there are ethnic characteristics of physical objects, dialects, oral history DNA testing, tracing the ancestors of contemporary Hunan people.
"Dongting Fish and Rice Township" is subdivided into three units: the source of rice, the prosperity of rice, and the granary of the world, and expounds the natural conditions, advantages, and historical reasons of Hunan as the "land of fish and rice".
"Footprints of Life" shows the life scenes of Hunan people at different times in chronological order. The main periods are divided into "Southern Ritual Music in the Bronze Age", "Hunan and Chu Customs", "Small Peasant Homes under Great Unification", "Social Atmosphere of Multicultural Integration", "Quality Life after the Center of Gravity Shifts to the South", and "From Clan Society to Modernization".
The last "Hunan Soul" depicts the spiritual outlook of Hunan people. Different from common museums, "Hunan Soul" does not introduce the history of modern and modern revolutions, but revolves around the spirit of Hunan people, showing history through historical figures. In this exhibition, the audience can feel the humanistic wonder of Hunan's modern and modern talents.
The key exhibits of the Sanxiang historical and cultural exhibition include the Tianquan Fang Wei (léi), Changsha kiln porcelain, pig-shaped bronze statue, and human-faced copper square tripod. The treasure of the current exhibition hall should be the whole of the vessel. Cast in the late Shang Dynasty, it belongs to the type of wine container in the wine vessel. The inscription on the mouth of the vessel is "Vessel Tianquan is the father and his own respect for Yi", so it is named, and because it is the largest and most exquisite piece of Fang Wei unearthed so far, it is called "the king of Fang Wei". In 2014, the Hunan Provincial Museum fully communicated with the president of Christie's Asia, and obtained the ownership of the Zhoutian Quanfang Body, which had been lost for nearly 100 years, for 20 million US dollars.
Information Reference
Permanent display
Ticket price: free (the audience can visit the basic exhibition for free after the security check with the second-generation ID card, and other legally valid ID documents must first go to the ticket window to collect the ticket, and then enter the museum with the ticket and certificate security check.) ）
Opening hours: 9:00-17:00 every Tuesday to Sunday (last admission at 16:00 every day);
The museum is closed on Mondays (postponed if Monday is a public holiday) and closed for one day on Chinese New Year's Eve.
Tips：
1. Admission fees may be charged for exhibitions other than the basic exhibitions;
2. Visitors can download the Hunan Provincial Museum electronic guide APP or scan the QR code through WeChat on their mobile phones in the exhibition hall to obtain the exhibit introduction and audio guide to achieve self-service viewing of the exhibition.
3. Visitors can log in to the museum's official website, official APP, and WeChat in advance to make reservations.
