In the Eastern Jin Dynasty, there was a famous physician named Ge Hong. When he was studying the elixir of life, he paid attention to and studied a kind of wood fossil called Shizhi, and made relevant records. Ge Hong (284-344) was born in Jurong County, Danyang (now jurong city, Jiangsu Province) and lived in seclusion in Luofu Mountain, Guangdong Province, where he worked as an alchemist and herbalist until his death. His main works are Bao Puzi, Saving Death by Elbow, and Synopsis of the Golden Chamber. Is one of the top ten famous doctors in China. Because of the long history, these works can only find some clues in the Compendium of Materia Medica by Li Shizhen, a famous doctor in Ming Dynasty. According to the textual research on the varieties of new drugs in Compendium of Materia Medica, Ge Hong said, "History is the same as history. ..... In Shi Guizhi's grottoes, there are branches like osmanthus trees, but they are solid stones. High feet, bright and spicy. " Li Shizhen said, "There are rockeries and trees in Puding, Guizhou. Trunks and branches are all stony, among which there are leaves like durian, lush and luxuriant, and flowers like cinnamon. Ding Si, Jia Jing and Jiao Xicheng wrote poems in order to break the pine fossils with Bikang, but their names are unknown. According to the picture and Bao Puzi, this is Shi Guizhi. There is Shi Mei by the sea, with branches and cypresses, leaves like Platycladus orientalis and clouds like laurel. " According to the above research on the morphological characteristics of Shi Gui, Shi Mei and Baishi, Shi Zhi is obviously a wood fossil. Li Shizhen didn't elaborate on its medicinal value, but quoted Ge Hong as saying: "Zhu Zhi is smashed into powder or taken with water, which makes people mentally fit and immortal." Therefore, as a kind of wood fossil, Shi Zhi has been recorded in the works of Ge Hong, a medical scientist in the Eastern Jin Dynasty.
In ancient times, it was impossible for people to make a scientific explanation of natural phenomena, so they regarded natural phenomena as supreme gods, thus deifying nature, and naturally deifying the production and origin of hard stones. It is believed that "the mountain is the bud of qi, so it contains essence and clouds, so it touches the stone and comes out", which is called "cloud root"; It is believed that "negative soil comes out and turns into stone" and there is a saying of "soil knot"; Others think that "when the stone falls, so do the stars." There are "meteors" and "rain stars"; Turquoise is often considered to be loose, which is the so-called "what is stone and what is loose?" (Preface to two poems by Lu Guimeng). "Stellar fossils, loose solid energy." (Song, Che Ruoshui, "Dong Yuan Shi Song"). There are "loose change", "wood change" and "cypress change". According to the investigation, about the Tang and Song Dynasties, turquoise has been covered with a mysterious veil, giving it a mysterious color, and there are many myths and legends about turning it into stone.
In ancient times, the ancient Kanggan River was the earliest and widest legend. The Book of the New Tang Dynasty, edited by Ouyang Xiu and Song Qi in the Northern Song Dynasty, records: "To pull out the wild ancient, that is, to pull out the wild ancient, or to pull out the ancient, scattered in the north, thousands of miles away, straight to the east, and adjacent to the cymbals. ..... and the Kanggan River in Sichuan, which was broken and thrown in. Three years later, it turned to stone, white in color, but the joints were still there. The world is called Kangganshi. " The ancient "loose fossils" and the use of "Kanggan" to refer to turquoise all originated from this code. Ba Gu Ye is one of the northern Tiele departments, located at the northern border of Kulun and Hailar, near Heilongjiang. The mysterious Kanggan River has since become an important birthplace of China turquoise culture in the north.
In Yongkang, Zhejiang, pine fossils have been famous all over the world since the Tang Dynasty. According to the historical records, temple view and immortal interpretation in Yongkang County Records, it is said that there is a thousand-year-old pine tree here that wants to turn dragons into heaven. On August 15th, the sixth year of Tang Jianzhong, Ma Ziran, a famous Taoist priest, returned to Yongkang City from Tongvolcano, extending his true view. He pointed to Gu Song in front of the court and said, "This pine tree has been 3,000 years old. It can't be turned into a dragon, but should be turned into a stone." No sooner had he finished than a storm blew, and Gu Song shook for several periods and turned to stone. Suddenly, a stone rose on the ground, six or seven feet high, exceeding the encirclement, and a loose scale appeared. When I touched it with my hand, Shi Leilei made a noise and deliberately pushed it, but the stone did not move. Between Songjiatai and Songjiatai, there is a pavilion next to it, called Songshi Pavilion. Later, it was repeatedly abandoned and built, becoming one of the "Eight Scenes of Yongcheng" and known as "Songshi Zhaoyun". Wang Zheshan's poem "Pine Fossils" in the Qing Dynasty said: "The predecessors were like dragons, and the roots of clouds could not wake up. There should be a fairy to give you some pointers and turn it into something spiritual. " This is the reason for the allusions of "Finger Pine Fossil" and "Dragon Tree" in ancient times. Zhejiang Yongkang has thus become an important birthplace of turquoise culture in southern China.
There is also a legend about Yue Fei's loyalty to cypress, which is more humanistic. In Hangzhou Wang Yue Temple, there is a "Jingzhong Baiting" near the southwest wall of Martyrs Temple. There are eight wood fossils on display in the museum, which is the legendary "loyal cypress". According to legend, there was an ancient cypress in the prison of Dali Temple in the Southern Song Dynasty. On the day of Yue Fei's wrongful death, the heavens and the earth were suddenly uneven and turned into stones, as hard as stones and motionless. People think that this is a symbol of Yue Fei's spirit of "serving the country faithfully" and unyielding national integrity, so it is called "loyalty to cypress". Legend has it that this Cooper was later destroyed by fire. During the Tongzhi period of the Qing Dynasty, Wu, the prison director, excavated several sections of destroyed loyal cypresses in the soil near the prison site of Dali Temple in the Southern Song Dynasty, moved them to Zhongyue Temple, built the soil into a platform, placed loyal cypresses on it, and personally drew a picture of loyal cypresses, which made a monument. 1922, Wang Fenghao, the envoy of Zhejiang Province, moved these loyal cypresses from Yuemiao Temple in Zhong 'anqiao to the present Wang Yue Temple and built the loyal cypress pavilion. For thousands of years, people revered Yue Fei's patriotism and national integrity, sympathized with his unfortunate experience, and created many folk stories and historical legends to commemorate Yue Fei. The legend of "Zhong Bai" is a typical example.
Turning pine into stone has an unusual origin.
Are "throwing pine fossils", "finger pine fossils" and "Zhong Jing Baixianling fossils" really relics of Tang and Song Dynasties? That was not the case. Scientifically speaking, these fossils are ancient plant fossils belonging to Pinaceae, which are called "silicified wood" in paleontology. In terms of their history, it is much farther than thousands of years since the Tang and Song Dynasties, at least1.200 million years. Due to the crustal movement, the virgin forest was quickly buried by sediment and gravel. Under the influence of formation pressure and geothermal energy, the physical and chemical properties of trees have changed. When the high concentration of silica solution permeates into trees, it will displace the carbon-containing substances in trees and form silicified wood with clear wood grain rings. Silicified wood is widely distributed in China and even the whole world, such as Xinchang, China, Zhejiang, Yanqing, and Qitai, Xinjiang. These silicified wood is an important witness of the whole geological history and biological development history, and it is a non-renewable ancient treasure.
During the Tang and Song Dynasties, people could not explain the origin of living silicified wood, which was completely understandable. With awe of nature and reverence for loyal ministers and immortals, they made up some fascinating legends.
In fact, according to the survey, among the ancient scholars in China, some people paid attention to and studied silicified wood as early as 1000 years ago, and there were also records about silicified wood in ancient literature. Joseph Needham, a famous British sinologist, once wrote in the History of Science and Technology in China: "The discovery of ancient plants should be attributed to China people, and China people knew about the petrochemical phenomenon of pine trees as early as the third century A.D."
As mentioned earlier, Ge Hong, a medical scientist in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, studied Shi Zhi in Bao Pu Zi, which showed that he had noticed the silicified wood like osmanthus tree at that time and studied the medicinal value of Shi Zhi. He is the first person to study silicified wood in the world.
Du Guangting (850-933), a scholar at the end of the Tang Dynasty, mentioned in Notes on Different Notes: "There are dead pine trees in Yongkang Mountain Pavilion in Wuzhou (now Jinhua), which were broken into stones by mistake. Try water if you don't melt it, and it will melt with you. Its branches and bark are the same as pine, but they are hard. A few people have broken their faces and kept foreign objects. " He not only described the appearance characteristics of Yongkang pine fossils, but also discussed the causes of pine fossils, which are related to water.
Shen Kuo, a scientist in the Northern Song Dynasty (1030- 1090) mentioned various mineral crystals, fossils and meteorites many times in Meng Qian Bitan, from which the word "fossil" came. He even explained the origin of fossils scientifically, more than 400 years before Europe. Shen Kuo described the bamboo fossils in Yanzhou (now Yan 'an, Shaanxi Province) in Volume 21 of Meng Qian's Bi Tan: "In recent years, the Yongningguan river bank in Yanzhou has collapsed into the ground for dozens of feet, and there are bamboo shoots under the soil, and hundreds of stems are connected and turned into stone." And compared with Jin Huashan turquoise in Wuzhou. Like the scene of silicified wood described by Shen Kuo in his article, there are still new discoveries in the area near Yan 'an, Shaanxi.
Che Ruoshui, a scholar in the Southern Song Dynasty, vividly described the silicified wood in Xinchang, Zhejiang Province in the Story of the Stone Pine in the East Garden written for Prime Minister Wang Xian: "In the Tang Dynasty, there was a Kanggan River in the ancient wilderness, and pine trees turned into stones in 3,000 years. Thought dongyang had something to do with it. Stellar fossils, pine trees and solid energy. Yue, later, Xiu Zhai Gong, loves turquoise. It is said that there are strange stones among the natives in Fiona Fang for several miles, but they are all walls, so I bought them. The local people said,' You can't break the wall because the land is straight and there are valleys everywhere.' Test, there are ten, long five, heavy hundred jun, return to the east park. It can be seen that the reserves of silicified wood in Xinchang area were abundant at that time.
According to "Mo Ke Bo Xi" written by Cheng Peng, a native of Putian, Fujian in the Northern Song Dynasty, "There are cypress trees on the lake and mountain, which are several feet long, half turned into stone and half made of solid wood. Cai has different opinions, but it is private because of traffic. "
Xu Xiake (1586-1year), a famous traveler in Ming Dynasty, described another kind of wood fossil in water curtain cave, Yongchang, Yunnan Province in Volume XI of Xu Xiake's Travels: "Branches hung from the cliff, which were soaked in water and solidified after being plastered for a long time." He made a scientific observation and description of the causes of this silicified wood.
In the Yuan Dynasty, Wu Shidao also recorded turquoise in "Wu Li Bushihua": Shen Cunzhong (Shen Kuo) said: "Wushan Jinhua has turquoise." Lu Guimeng's Li Ze Series: "Turquoise is recommended for piano." Jiang Teli's Song of Turquoise: "There are not enough cypress trees in Hushan, and the old friend of Kanggan Festival is." Note: "There are cypress trees in the lake and mountain, half of which are turned into stones, and the rest are hardwood. The Kanggan River in Uighur is loose. When people throw it into the water, it turns to stone in three years, and the joints are loose. "
In the Qing Dynasty, the description and understanding of pine fossils became clearer. Most of the turquoise in the capital came from the northeast and Shandong, so the appreciation of turquoise was mainly popular in the north of China at that time (see Yao's Miscellanies of Bamboo Leaf Pavilion).