Now that the stone chime has been discovered.

It shows that the sacrificial activities of the ancient Shu people were also carried out completely in accordance with the rituals and music etiquette.

Although the text has still not been found, the discovery of the stone chime shows that the ancient Shu people must have had a system of rituals and music that we still don't know about.

Ritual and music were a very important tool in the Shang and Zhou dynasties.

It is not only used to restrain the king, but also to regulate the behavior of the people, thereby maintaining the stability of social order.

You can imagine that a huge stone chime is hung at the entrance of the ancestral temple. Whenever there is a sacrifice, the priest will hit the stone chime hard to make a clear and long sound, which can both shock and comfort people's hearts. It will make all the ancient Shu people...

Unite together and form an indestructible force.

The birth of music was originally intended to enrich the human spiritual world, soothe people's hearts, and unite people's hearts.

Everyone has heard "lullabies" sung by their mother when they were young, and these lullabies and nursery rhymes are actually the earliest birthplace of human music.

Soothe people's hearts and comfort their hearts.

This is a spontaneous behavior of human beings, and it is also something engraved in human DNA.

Human beings have evolved step by step from ancient times to modern humans.

Maybe words are not necessarily something that will evolve.

For example, in the jungles of Africa and the Amazon, there are still a lot of primitive tribes that practice slash-and-burn farming and have no writing. They have no writing, and they are still living to this day.

However, even these primitive tribes still have a culture of "music".

They would sing together around the campfire and use some bones to make primitive percussion instruments.

The culture of Africa is not brilliant, but the musical instruments of the indigenous Africans are not many at all.

Music is an innate talent of human beings.

As long as we are modern Homo sapiens, we will definitely develop our own music and musical instruments.

This is the same all over the world.

Whether it is the Angsa people on the British Peninsula, the Indians in North and South America, or the Chinese people, they will all develop their own musical instruments in the process of civilization development.

It's just that the Chinese people have developed "music" from a simple form of entertainment to a part of the ritual system.

It can be said that music is a necessity for human beings, but words are not necessarily.

The discovery of musical instruments in the Sanxingdui sacrificial pit can only be said to be in line with the laws of human evolution.

But what was discovered was a stone chime, so that was different.

The stone chime is the earliest ceremonial instrument in Chinese civilization, and it was born earlier than chimes and the like.

The chime originated from some kind of flaky stone working tool. In the ancient Jia script, the left half of the character chime resembles a hanging stone, and the right half resembles a hand holding a mallet to strike.

Its shape has changed in many ways later, and its texture has also evolved from the original stone to jade and copper chimes.

It evolved from a labor tool and was originally used in the music and dance activities of our ancestors.

The name of the chime is found in "Shiben·Zuopian", and it is said that it was made by Yao and Shun.

Or it is said: "The chime was made by my uncle."

It can be seen that by the late Neolithic Age, equivalent to when Yao or Shun were chiefs of tribal alliances, chimes were already in use.

"Lu's Spring and Autumn Period: Ancient Music Chapter" records: Yao ordered Kui to hit the chime "to resemble God" and "to dance with all the beasts", which depicts a scene of music and dance life in ancient primitive society.

In the 1970s, a large stone chime was unearthed at the Dongxiafeng site in Xia County, Shanxi Province. It is 60 centimeters long and has a hole in the upper part. The sound when struck is pleasant.

It has been determined that this chime is about 4,000 years old. It is the earliest physical chime ever discovered.

A physical stone chime was also unearthed from the Longshan Culture between 4000 and 4500 years ago.

It is basically certain that the stone chime, a musical instrument, appeared at about the same time as silk fabrics.

By the time of the Shang Dynasty, the chime-making instrument was relatively complete. During the Shang Dynasty, the chime had been widely circulated and was used by the royal court orchestra.

In the Zhou Dynasty, the chime became even more important. It was already an important ritual instrument in Zhou rites and an important part of elegant music with percussion as the main body.

From then until the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, chimes were the most important part of the court ritual and music culture.

It was not until the chaos of the late Qin Dynasty that all the rituals and music in Zhou rites were completely lost in the war, and the traditional Chinese musical instrument, the chime, gradually disappeared from history.

The Han Dynasty was the last period when the chime existed. After the Han Dynasty, this instrument no longer appeared in "ritual music".

It is worth mentioning that.

Stone chimes appeared in many places at the same time during the Longshan period, containing special social functions and political overtones.

The stone chime is mainly used as a special tool for tribal chiefs to summon tribesmen and direct battles, and as an instrument for dance music.

As a funerary object, its appearance is very meaningful.

In ancient China, the stone chime was a ceremonial instrument used by clans to jointly supervise chiefs' etiquette and command clan members.

According to "Shang Shu Shun Dian": "The emperor (Shun) said, Kui, I ordered you to perform music and teach Weizi... The gods and men made peace, Kui said, I will knock the stone and pull the stone, and all the beasts will lead the dance."

It can be determined that from the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors to the Shang and Zhou dynasties, the stone chime was not a musical instrument for the ruler Yan Xiang, but a ritual instrument used for sacrificial occasions.

"The Book of Songs·Shang Song·Na" says that in the sacrifice of "Yanwo Liezu", there are both "playing drums and bamboo slips", and "the sound of pipes and pipes", and finally reaches the level of "the sound of the chime".

"Peaceful and peaceful".

This shows that chime music is an indispensable sound for large-scale ceremonies such as sacrifices and festivals, and it has a strong hierarchical significance.

What is recorded in "Song of Shang" is how merchants once lived, and is the folk customs of merchants.

In the Shang Dynasty, the chime was already a very important ritual instrument.

In the Zhou Dynasty, as the chime became more and more prominent in sacrificial activities, the ruling class gradually joined in the development of this instrument and regarded this instrument as a symbol of their identity and status.

As we all know, the Zhou Dynasty was a dynasty with etiquette regulations everywhere, and everyone paid attention to etiquette in food, clothing, housing and transportation.

The people of Zhou Dynasty also had a clear classification of the suspensions of stone chimes at that time.

For example: The monarch - all four doors hang bells and chimes, which are called Gongxuan.

The princes - go to the bell to the south, named Xuanxuan.

Doctor Qing - only hung on the east and west sides, named Fanxuan.

Scholars - only hanging chimes but no bells are allowed, so they are called special hangings.

The names of the hanging chimes also vary depending on the direction. In the east, it is called Sheng Chime, and in the west, it is called Song Chime.

All these have given the musical instrument "Qing" a very strong "identity".

It has a completely different status from later generations of musical instruments such as pianos and guitars.

Moreover, in the tombs of Longshan Culture where stone chimes were unearthed, ox shoulder blades used for sacrifice and divination were also unearthed from the same period.

Divination bones were commonly used in prehistoric religious rituals. Religious sacrificial activities based on divination should have been objectively popular during this period.

The fact that the stone chimes were buried together with the divination bones also shows that in the Longshan culture, the stone chimes buried with them not only had the function of percussion instruments, but also had the nature of a ceremonial instrument as an offering to the gods.

Coincidentally, the Sanxingdui people also placed the stone chime and the priest's items in the sacrificial pit.
Chapter completed!