The Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum is coming! The Paper reported that the Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum in Meishan City, Sichuan Province is expected to start trial operation in June this year. After completion, it will become the only gold and silver themed museum in the country. After completion, the museum will not only reproduce Zhang Xianzhong's escape route and the scene of the Jiangkou sunken silver, but also exhibit precious cultural relics such as the golden book of conferring titles on concubines, the golden treasure of the King of Shu, the treasure of the Prince of Shu, and the gold coin of the King of West for rewarding merit, becoming a large-scale comprehensive professional museum integrating education, research, tourism, and activities.
The museum design rendering. Photo courtesy of the Publicity Department of Pengshan District Committee
The Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum is located in Jiangkou Street, Pengshan District, Meishan City, Sichuan Province, at the intersection of Fuhe River and Nanhe River, close to the Jiangkou battlefield site in the late Ming Dynasty. The total planned area of the project is 200 mu, of which the museum covers an area of 60 mu, with a construction area of 36,300 square meters, a total investment of 862 million yuan, and a construction period of 2020 to 2025. The project is expected to start trial operation in June this year, and after completion, it will become the only gold and silver themed museum in the country.
Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum renderings
Back in June 2018, an exhibition titled "Silver from the Jiangkou: Archaeological Findings of the Jiangkou Ancient Battlefield Site in Pengshan, Sichuan" set off a craze at the National Museum of China. The 500 fine cultural relics recovered from the water seemed to tell people stories about politics, military affairs, and social life in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, allowing everyone to more directly touch the history buried by the river. Although the exhibition lasted only three months, the idea of "finding a new home for the cultural relics" became more and more urgent.
"The construction of the Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum is not only to provide a safe home for these cultural relics, but also to make that dusty history shine again and let more people feel the warmth and depth of this history." said Zhou Siyuan, deputy general manager of Sichuan Pengzu Mountain Tourism Development Co., Ltd., the project builder.
In September 2020, the Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum project was announced to start construction. The museum is located next to the original site. The project includes a visitor center, the main museum, and an archaeological workstation. "The underground first floor of the main building of the museum is a cultural relic warehouse, and there are four exhibition halls on the first and second floors; the archaeological workstation is specially used by the Sichuan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, and there will be a youth science popularization base inside." Zhou Siyuan introduced.
Construction site of Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum. Photo by Tan Xiaofei
"In order to highly restore history and reproduce the archaeological site, we adopted the industry-leading GRC exterior wall decorative panel technology, which not only restored the shape but also achieved color simulation." Wu Linhong, a construction worker, pointed to the exterior wall material of the main building and told reporters, "This brick red color is to reproduce the color of the riverbed when the archaeologists were excavating the cofferdam."
Panoramic view of the excavation area
Gold artifacts unearthed from water
The Jiangkou Ancient Battlefield Site (formerly the Jiangkou Sunken Silver Site) is located in the Minjiang River in Jiangkou Town, Pengshan District, Meishan City, Sichuan Province, about 60 kilometers north of Chengdu City and about 20 kilometers south of Meishan City. It is the third batch of municipal cultural relics protection units in Meishan City. The protection scope of the site extends to the highway in the east, the river bank in the west, 1,000 meters south of the Minjiang Bridge in the south, 500 meters north of the confluence of the Minjiang River and Fuhe River in the north, and 500 meters from north to south. The protection area of the site is about 1 million square meters.
Jiangkou Ancient Town, Pengshan, Sichuan
Jiangkou Ancient Battlefield Site Protection Monument
Jiangkou Ancient Town has a long history and a strategic location. It has been a battleground for military strategists since ancient times. In 1646, Zhang Xianzhong, the leader of the peasant uprising in the late Ming Dynasty, led his troops from Chengdu and moved south along the Minhe River. When they reached the Jiangkou section of Pengshan, they were attacked by Yang Zhan, a lieutenant general of the Ming Dynasty. The ship was burned and a large amount of property sank to the bottom of the river. Since then, there have been many records about the Battle of Jiangkou and the salvage of sunken silver in historical documents. For hundreds of years, there have been many different opinions on whether Zhang Xianzhong sank silver and where it was sunk. In April 2016, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage approved the archaeological excavation of the "Jiangkou Sunken Silver Site". The project was launched on January 5, 2017. After several excavations, the location of Zhang Xianzhong's Battle of Jiangkou was basically confirmed. The tens of thousands of cultural relics unearthed are the most direct and powerful evidence to confirm this major historical event.
It is understood that the Jiangkou Sunken Silver Site has unearthed more than 76,000 cultural relics, which can be regarded as a major world-class archaeological discovery. In 2021, the Jiangkou battlefield site in the late Ming Dynasty was rated as one of the "Top 100 Archaeological Discoveries in a Century" along with the Guanghan Sanxingdui Site and the Chengdu Jinsha Site. At the same time, the museum aims to become a national first-class museum. After completion, it will become the only museum in the country with gold and silver as its theme.
The Golden Seal of the Prince of Shu
Changsha Prefecture Tianqi first year fifty taels gold ingot
The King of the West's Reward Coin (used by Zhang Xianzhong to reward his generals for their military exploits when he was the King of the Great West)
earrings
bracelet
Golden Book (used by the princes in the Ming Dynasty to confer titles on their concubines and by Zhang Xianzhong)
"Up to now, the main project of the museum and the exterior curtain wall project have been completed, and supporting infrastructure projects including interior decoration, overall floor area, archaeological workstation, etc. have entered the construction site. At the same time, the museum's exhibition and information projects have also been started." Zhou Siyuan said that the next step will be to seize the construction period and go all out to promote the project to be delivered on schedule.
After the Jiangkou Sunken Silver Museum is completed, it will not only reproduce Zhang Xianzhong's escape route and the scene of the Jiangkou silver sinking, but will also exhibit precious cultural relics such as the golden book of conferring titles on concubines, the golden seal of the King of Shu, the seal of the Crown Prince of Shu, and the gold coins of the King of the West for rewarding merits. It will become a large comprehensive professional museum integrating education, research, tourism and activities.
(This article is compiled based on Chengdu News, Sichuan Daily, etc.)