[Travel Notes] One of the least visited places in the Silk Road heritage - the ruins of the ancient Xiaohan Road

Speaking of the Silk Road, everyone is too familiar with this name. Especially in recent years, the rise of the Belt and Road concept has made the name of the Silk Road known to the majority of citizens. I think everyone knows that the Silk Road was a road network from Chang'an to Rome. However, do you know what the “road” that carts, horses, and camels actually walked in history looked like?

With the great changes in the world and the great innovations in science and technology in the past century, transportation methods have made great progress that has not been seen in the past two thousand years. People no longer need to ride horses, drive cars, or drive camels to travel the Silk Road. As early as the Republic of China, new highways were built across the country to meet the driving demand after the large number of automobiles appeared in China in the 1930s. Later, after liberation, the opening of trains and highways further updated the traffic conditions between cities and villages along the Silk Road.

High-speed rail in recent years has overturned many ancient concepts of Silk Road transportation. Today's people, sitting on comfortable high-speed trains and driving on the Silk Road, can hardly imagine the hardships of the ancients. If there is an expressway that is closest to the ancient Silk Road, it is today's Lianhuo Expressway. It starts from Lianyungang, Jiangsu Province in the east, goes all the way west, passes through Luoyang, Xi'an, Lanzhou, Hexi Corridor and Xinjiang, and finally reaches the G30 Expressway at the Horgos Port in western Xinjiang. The total distance is 4395 kilometers.

There is no road in the world. If people travel too much, it becomes a road. When highways were expanded in modern times, national highways were often built based on ancient roads. There was no need to find new roads when old roads could be used. Therefore, many traditional dirt roads have gradually disappeared. In the 2014 World Heritage application, many places jointly applied for the Silk Road World Heritage. Among all 33 heritage sites, the real ancient roads really fit the narrow concept of the name Silk Road. Road remains. Only one. The other 32 places are all ancient cities, ancient buildings, ancient tombs and other types.

So this heritage point is the Shihao section of the Xiaohan Ancient Road. This section of the ancient road is located about 2,000 meters southwest of Chehao Village, Xiashi Township, Shaanzhou District, Sanmenxia City, Henan Province. At present, it is no longer used as a traffic road. It is an ancient road that has been abandoned for more than 80 years and has been excavated by archaeology in recent years.

The ancient Weihan Road is very important in history. It connects Tongguan to the west and Luoyang to the east. Entering Tongguan is the Guanzhong Plain, not far from Chang'an. If the Silk Road started from Luoyang in the east, passed through Sanmenxia, ​​ended in Xi'an, and then continued westward, this ancient Xiaohan Road can be said to be the first section of the Silk Road. It is more than 300 kilometers from Luoyang to Chang'an, and the Weihan Ancient Road accounts for 200 kilometers.

In fact, we can well understand the importance of the Weihan Ancient Road without the concept of the Silk Road. Because Luoyang and Chang'an were the two most important cities in China for 3,000 years in ancient Chinese history. You may not think that Luoyang was very important during the Western Zhou Dynasty, but in fact Luoyi was another large city in the Western Zhou Dynasty built by Duke Zhou. The earliest "Zhaizi China" appeared on the famous He Zun. The China here refers to Luoyi.

The man who lives in China is King Cheng of Zhou. He was the youngest son of King Wu of Zhou, the second generation king of the Western Zhou Dynasty. Luoyi is the place where King Zhou Ping, his son, escaped and settled after King You of Zhou was killed by the Northern Dog Rong in Fenghao. Starting from the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, Luoyi naturally became the nominal national capital. From Xianyang in the Qin Dynasty, Chang'an in the Western Han Dynasty, Luoyang in the Eastern Han Dynasty, Luoyang in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, Luoyang in the Northern Wei Dynasty, Daxing City in Chang'an of Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty, Luoyang of Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty, all the way to Chang'an of the Tang Dynasty and Luoyang, which Wu Zetian liked. For two to three thousand years, Chang'an and Luoyang staged a tale of two cities as the capital of China.

——The road between these two most important cities naturally became an extremely critical economic artery in ancient China.

So, let’s take a look at how the first section of the economic artery was formed geographically. The Yellow River flows from north to south between Shanxi and Shaanxi. After leaving Longmen Canyon from Hancheng, Shaanxi, we went south to Fenglingdu. There is a long and tall mountain range in the south, which lies across the Yellow River on its way south, which is the Qinling Mountains. The Yellow River also had to turn eastward here, flowing eastward between Qinling and Zhongtiao Mountain. On the north bank of the Yellow River, there are level 3 and 4 terraces with an altitude of 500 to 700 meters, and there are many gullies, making it difficult to travel. Only on the first-level platform on the south bank of the Yellow River, the terrain is gentle, narrow and slender, and it is a natural traffic road. This is the ancient Xiaohan Road.

Li Shimin, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, praised in his poem "Enter Tongguan": "The Han is said to be a dangerous place, and the lapel belt strengthens the two capitals. The crowns and covers come and go, and the dust is shaken day and night." It describes how important this road, which occupies two-thirds of the mileage of the east-west traffic trunk line between the two capitals, is in history.

Why is this road called the Weihan Ancient Road? As a transportation place name - "崤" means "崤山" and "Han" refers to Hangu. "崤汉" is the joint name of "崤山" and "Hangu". Yellow River. The rugged mountains and valleys from Xin'an County, which is adjacent to the west of Luoyang, to Tongguan, are called "Han Valley" and are known as "natural dangers". Wei and Han are combined into one.

Nowadays, the old bustling scene on the ancient loess road in Xiaohan is gone forever. This section of the ancient road has also been built into a World Heritage Park, and is remembered by tourists as a nostalgic site. When I went to explore this place last summer, I found it completely deserted. The wormwood was waist-deep and almost submerged the ancient road. Standing on the viewing platform, you can see that the ancient road was built with the help of natural terrain. This section of road is winding and winding, in the middle of the hillside, from northwest to southeast, with a total length of 230 meters, and the widest The height reaches 8.8 meters and the narrowest point is 5.2 meters. Three types of rut marks can be seen on the site: The main road mark as one lane and the second and third lane mark as auxiliary road.

In the southern section of the site, there is a small village about 1.8 kilometers northeast. It lies quietly deep in the valley bottom, and is shaped into a long and narrow shape by the mountains. A curved stream passes through the village. This ordinary village is famous in Chinese history because of the accidental stay of the "Poetry Saint". This is Shihao Village. More than 1,200 years ago, one spring evening. The 47-year-old Du Fu, who was tired of life, hurriedly walked through the stone trench section. At dusk, he stayed in a villager's house. It was on that night that "some officials arrested people at night", and Du Fu witnessed the shocking scene. "At dusk in Shihao Village, there were officials arresting people at night. The old man walked over the wall, and the old woman went out to watch. Why are the officials so angry! What's the trouble with women crying!..."

Du Fu used the contrast between "hu" and "anger" with "cry" and "bitter", and used the dialogue between the old woman and the police officer to describe the suffering caused by the war to the people.

300 years later, it’s spring again. Su Xun, Su Shi and Su Zhe, father and son, came west from the ancient road and went to Bianliang via Chang'an to take the exam. At this time, the spring on the ancient road in Xiaoshan was extremely cold, and the cold wind was biting. Their hands and feet were frostbitten, and two thin horses also froze to death on the road. This freezing experience made the brothers "afraid of slush and slush over long distances". Three years later, Su Shi passed the imperial examination and was appointed as an official in Fengxiang, Shaanxi Province. When he walked this road again, he wrote "Hezi Nostalgia from Mianchi", "Everywhere in life, we know how it is, it should be like a flying hero stepping on the snow and mud. Occasionally, there are fingers left on the mud. Claws, Hongfei’s complex things... Do you still remember the rugged past, the long road and the neighing of the donkey?” From this, the “snow and mud claws” became a poetic symbol of an attitude towards life.

The northern section of the ancient road is a one-lane road with rutted tracks of varying widths. There is a small pool on the north side of the driveway, overgrown with weeds and remaining stagnant water. This is a water storage facility built by ancient people by taking advantage of the naturally formed concave terrain. There are three other such water storage tanks on both sides of the north slope and Poding Road. The terrain of the Shihao section is high, there is a lack of water sources, and the steep slopes and dangerous roads inevitably make people trapped and horses exhausted, so people store rainwater to provide drinking water for pedestrians and livestock.

On the east side, between two ruts, there is a small stone pit 0.5 cm deep, which is a hoof-shaped mark formed by horses and camels trampling many times. At the top of the hillside, on both sides of the main lane, an auxiliary lane is added to facilitate passing vehicles. They are built in trenches two to three meters deep. Experts speculate that the trenches were formed based on naturally formed hillsides, as well as artificial carvings, natural weathering and long-term vehicle rolling.

The terrain in the southern section of the ancient road is high and steep, making it difficult for people and animals to walk. The cultural relics department detected that there are neat layers of cushion stones underneath the road to keep the sides of the road level with the middle.

"The road to Luoyang east of Chang'an City is filled with endless dust." Between the two capitals, whether it is the exchanges between emperors and officials, common people, the travel of envoys and monks, or the transportation of trade materials, the Weihan Ancient Road is the only one s Choice.

A true and complete ancient road has become a "precious record of historical information" during the most glorious, prosperous and prosperous period of the Silk Road. The iron horseshoes, broken iron nails, iron axle fittings and other relics unearthed in the site bear witness to the frequent carriages and horses in those days; The ancient tombs of the Han and Tang Dynasties in Liujiaqu Village, Yadi Township near the site Among them, ancient Persian coins and Japanese Kanei Tongbao coins were unearthed, telling the story of the prosperity of trade between the East and the West; A large number of barbarian lantern figurines unearthed in Shaanzhou District and Lingbao City, with deep eyes, high noses, and beard hats. , wearing a Han robe with a right gusset, reflects the fusion of traditional Han culture and foreign culture.