There is such a letter, which is still very interesting to read today. One day in the thirty-second year of Qin Shihuang, the magistrate of Ganling County, a man named Se, humbly reported to his superiors that your letter had been received, and the word "dare to speak" appeared in the letter was a polite expression, which was equivalent to "greetings from here". "Express" means to let the postman send the letter as quickly as possible, which is equivalent to express mail. "Xin shou" is the name of the secretary who copied official documents. These are different from modern Chinese, reflecting the language style at that time.
In Xiangxi, a plant called reed grass can be seen everywhere, and its stem can be used as the core of candles. 2200 years ago, under the light of candles made of reed stalks, official documents were copied down in this way, and then sent to other places along the Youshui River by special messengers.
The "postman", that is, the postman, was a state official in the Qin Dynasty and could enjoy tax reduction and exemption. Therefore, although this position is hard, it is also a position that many people dream of. According to the bamboo slips, the head of Qiling Township asked his superiors to appoint a man named Cheng as a postman. Perhaps the superior leader saw the township head's attempt to sponsor his relatives, or the postman had a candidate in the mind of the superior leader, and the report for instructions was refuted.
Another note tells us that the keeper of the tomb told another official that the money and cloth you asked for had started to be shipped according to your order. In other words, the postman at that time had to shoulder not only the task of delivering letters, but also the task of delivering parcels.
Youshui River was the main channel for letters and materials in those years. It took a day to go down the river to Shui Yuan. The rugged mountain road on the mountain is still steep and rugged, but before 2200, this path was the only way for Ganling to lead to Sichuan.
The reeds and wild fruits that grow all the year round here have ever experienced the dust raised by the postman when he runs on the postal road? In Qin bamboo slips, there is a fine for moving to Lingxian County. Among them, "one shield" and "one armor" refer to the amount, which means making the wrong person pay a shield or a pair of armor.
"Patience" means shaving your beard and sideburns, which is not beauty. Before 2200, it was a punishment similar to disfigurement. Write his mistakes on his face and let others know that he is a punished person. Many unearthed bronze razors are still sharp today. I wonder how many people shaved their beards and sideburns that year.
It is intolerable for officials to make mistakes. According to Qin bamboo slips, within one year, the county magistrate of Ganling County was changed from color to capital.
The crossbow inventory of Ganling county armory is recorded in detail in an inventory document of Ganling county armory. The quantity and surplus inventory of crossbows sent to Yiyang and Yuanling are recorded in detail. Crossbow was the most advanced weapon in the war at that time, with a range of 300 meters. Judging from the exquisite blood groove on the bronze arrow, it is quite lethal.
One day in February of the thirty-third year of Qin Shihuang, the guards who moved the mausoleum asked the higher government whether the number of slaves they bought was legal. This passage shows that after Qin Shihuang unified China, there was still slave trade here. Judging from the unearthed cultural relics, the owner of the tomb should be a person below the nobility and above the civilians. These people can't afford slaves.
The Qin Dynasty only existed for 15 years in the history of China. For historians, the history before the unearthed Qin bamboo slips in Liye is an extravagant hope. There are 36,000 Qin bamboo slips with hundreds of thousands of words, and the history of more than 2,000 years is within reach. From the end of the Warring States Period to the early years of the Western Han Dynasty, decades of war displaced people living on both sides of Youshui River. Immigrants from afar merged with the indigenous people here, forming another group of new ancestors.
Dongting is definitely a place name, and it is the superior unit of Ganling County. The meaning of this sentence is that the mail from Ganling County is sent to Dongting County. Sima Qian, a historian of the Western Han Dynasty, probably didn't expect that his book Biography of Historical Records and Qin Huang, after Qin Shihuang unified China, divided the world into 36 counties, among which there was no Dongting County. As a result, these seven essays will overturn the authoritative record of more than two thousand years.
The short period of 15 years in the Qin dynasty is like a cloud in the mountains of western Hunan, which can't be seen clearly.
Burning books and burying Confucianism was a means of Qin Shihuang's rule. According to legend, at that time, two old people couldn't bear to burn those precious books, so they risked their lives to carry a large number of books and came to the mountainous areas of western Hunan.
In the northwest of Yuanling15km, there is a Yule Mountain. On the cliff on the mountainside, there is a Yule Cave. Two old people hid their books in the cave. Later, there came the idiom "Learn through Yule, learn through five cars", which means that you can become a knowledgeable person after reading in Yule Cave. But so far, no books have been found here, but a large number of Qin bamboo slips have been found in the ancient well of Liye Town, 50 kilometers away from here. Could this be an ancient well? Huang Moya, a writer, questioned the legend of book collection in Head China. Li Jiahao, a professor of Chinese Department in Peking University, pointed out that most of the characters and fonts in Liye Qin Bamboo Slips belong to Qin Li, which evolved from Xiao Zhuan, similar to Sleeping Tiger Bamboo Slips in Longgang, Hubei. The professor said that after Qin unified China, characters were written in the same language, and seal script was used all over the country. However, there are exceptions on some occasions. For example, in order to pursue practicality, convenience and conciseness, official documents are written in Li Qin.
Guo Weimin, deputy director of Hunan Institute of Archaeology, said that a large number of bamboo slips found in Liye Qin Bamboo Slips include ancient seal script, ancient official script and official script with regular script in the middle. Characters are written in pen and ink, with neat handwriting and smooth brushwork; Bamboo slips have different fonts and postures.
Zhang Chunlong, an ancient philologist, thinks that the characters in Liye Qin bamboo slips are centered, with vigorous brushwork and bright artistic conception. Many strokes in Qin bamboo slips, especially the left, right, vertical and dotted strokes, are very beautiful. There are so many bamboo slips that it is of great significance to study the evolution of Biography and Li Shu.
The reporter saw in the Hunan Institute of Archaeology that a small part of these bamboo slips have been cleaned for archaeologists to visit and appreciate, and the rest are still kept in the warehouse. Director Yuan said that the characters of Liye Qin bamboo slips will be published one after another after washing, numbering, photographing and textual research, which will provide rich learning and research materials for calligraphy circles.