T-shaped Silk Painting —— A Record of Lady Xin Zhui's Tomb

Before the invention of paper, human beings first recorded knots. Later, people in China recorded them on tortoise shells and animal bones of Oracle Bone Inscriptions and wrote them on bamboo slips, which were called silk books. Of course, painting on silk is a silk painting. China's silk paintings have made brilliant achievements.

Xin Zhui's tomb was well preserved from the Western Han Dynasty to 1972 when it was excavated, which is a great miracle in archaeological history. Many precious cultural relics were unearthed in the tomb. Among them, the T-shaped silk painting, which is more than two meters long and covered on the inner coffin, is a fine work of art, which is equivalent to the present flag and is the medium leading to heaven. Silk painting embodies the ceremony and way to heaven.

The content of silk painting is divided into three layers, and the top layer depicts the situation of heaven. There is the sun and the sun on the silk painting. The sun is actually equivalent to the sunspot we find now. This discovery has a high scientific and technological content. In addition, there are the moon, rabbits, toads and anticlimactic gods representing the Heavenly Palace. It shows people's understanding of heaven at that time.

The middle layer is the human situation. Shows the life scene of Mrs. Xin Zhui at that time. The two figures on the left in the painting show that the gods came to welcome Mrs. Xin Zhui to heaven, and Mrs. Xin Zhui was followed by a maid.

The underground world represented by the bottom.

This silk painting is clear in content and rich in meaning, which shows people's understanding of heaven and earth at that time and shows the spiritual world of the Western Han people. The picture is full of natural flavor, mysterious and romantic. Many ancient myths are seamlessly integrated with people's desire for eternal life. Silk painting is a milestone in the history of ancient painting in China.