What is Hehuang ancient culture?

Three Topics of Hehuang Culture

Hehuang refers to the upper reaches of the Yellow River, the Huangshui River Basin, and the Datong River Basin. It was called "between the three rivers" in ancient times. Many ethnic groups have thrived in this area since ancient times. At least since the Qin and Han Dynasties, the ancestors of many ethnic groups have farmed and herded here, creating the splendid Hehuang culture. Hehuang Culture is the crystallization of the spiritual civilization of ancestors in the eastern Qinghai and western Gansu areas bordering Qinghai on the basis of a certain material civilization. It has its own unique connotation and characteristics. It is very important to study its connotation and characteristics to inherit and unify traditional culture and modernization.

1

The Hehuang Culture is an important symbol of the human civilization process at the source of the Yellow River. Since ancient times, our country has regarded the Yellow River Basin as the cradle of the Chinese nation and the birthplace of Chinese civilization from the Chinese to the Han and Tang dynasties, and even to the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties. The ancients regarded the source of the Yellow River as holy and distant. Li Bai lamented, "You don't see the water of the Yellow River coming up from the sky." That is, the above-mentioned "Three Rivers".

Looking at the status of the Hehuang Culture in the ancient civilization of the Yellow River Basin, I divided the Yellow River Basin into four outstanding traditional cultures for comparison: namely, the Hehuang Culture in the Qinghai-Gansu region; the present-day Ningxia and Inner Mongolia regions The Hetao Culture; the Central Plains Culture in present-day Shaanxi, Henan and other areas; and the Qilu Culture in present-day Shandong. Hehuang Culture is an important symbol of source civilization among the four traditional cultures in the Yellow River Basin mentioned above. It is both connected with and different from the three traditional cultures in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River Basin. Take the cultural relics unearthed from Liuwan in the Hehuang area, one of the 100 major archaeological discoveries in my country in the last century, as an example. The local unearthed the Majiayao Culture Banshan Type, Machang Type, Qijia Culture, Xindian Culture and other cultural relics from the New Age to the Bronze Age. There are 1,730 tombs and 37,925 cultural relics unearthed, including nearly 20,000 pieces of painted pottery, which is unparalleled in other areas. The simulated frog patterns in the painted pottery patterns are also used as patterns of gods and humans, reflecting the ancestor worship of our ancient ancestors. Frog with baby, the earliest visual representation of the ancient myth and legend that Nuwa created humans from clay. The author believes that the Hehuang Culture, the Hetao Culture, the Zhongyuan Culture, and the Qilu Culture jointly created the early cultural connotation of the traditional Chinese culture in the process of civilization in the Yellow River Basin. At least before the Northern Song Dynasty, these four outstanding traditional cultures had a dazzling effect. of light. If the Hetao culture is mainly based on the cultural content of the grassland cultural corridor, that is, the nomadic road; the Central Plains culture is based on the cultural content of the agricultural cultural corridor, that is, the Silk Road; and the Qilu culture is based on the cultural content of the sea and land culture, that is, the Penglai myth, then, Hehuang Culture combines the cultural contents of the two major corridors of grassland culture and farming culture.

II

Hehuang Culture is a treasure of the cultural gathering place of the Grassland Culture Corridor and the Farming Culture Corridor.

It is easy for people to understand that Hehuang area is one of the areas in the agricultural cultural corridor. But why is it one of the grassland cultural corridors? The author believes that the ancestors of various ethnic groups in northern my country relied on the natural environment of the areas where they lived. They farmed and pastored. In many areas, farming and animal husbandry alternated between farming and animal husbandry, and agriculture and animal husbandry production complemented each other. Take the Xianbei people as an example. Their tribes were engaged in agriculture and animal husbandry in today's Liaoning region of Northeast China. Later, humans and animals multiplied. The Xianbei tribes gradually entered the Mobei Plateau from the northeast and grazed at the foot of Yinshan Mountain and Longshan Mountain. Some of them were nomadic to the northern foothills of Qilian Mountain. Crossing the Qilian Mountains and entering the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and even northwest Sichuan; the Tuyuhun people in Qinghai history mainly engaged in animal husbandry and agriculture; while the people of Nanliang State mainly engaged in agriculture and animal husbandry; several generations of people in the eastern part of Qinghai There are many examples of ethnic groups who have switched from animal husbandry to agriculture, such as the Tu ethnic group and the Tibetan people in the east. Therefore, the folk song "Youth", which is widely spread among the people in Hehuang, has the duality of the culture of nomadic people and farming people.

In the Hehuang area, the exchanges between farming people and nomadic peoples are very frequent, forming the diversity of Hehuang cultural connotations. There are many cultural phenomena that are not unique to a certain ethnic group. For example, the sheep totem worship has been practiced since ancient times. It is still common to many ethnic groups in agricultural and animal husbandry areas. The Tibetan people still have the "longevity sheep" CAI LOU, and the Han people call it the "god sheep". , that is, leaving one Jie sheep among a group of sheep and not slaughtering it for the rest of its life. This custom is in line with the ancient custom of "Qiang people serving the sheep", that is, the argali. The author once heard the folk proverb "Fuzi in Xining, drums in Lanzhou". "Fuzi from Xining" is the main theme of the art of sitting singing in Pingxian. It is elegant and distant, giving people a sense of lingering sound. The art of singing in Pingxian is also called "Eighteen Miscellaneous Tune", and the singing tunes are mostly based on historical themes. Mainly allusions, it is the product of Qu-shaped farming culture. The author once had the honor to hear the singing of Guzi Ci in Lanzhou. The tone was desolate and tragic, deep and high-pitched, and it obviously has the charm of the northern desert grassland culture. Xining and Lanzhou are the two closest provincial cities in western my country. Going north from Lanzhou is the grassland cultural corridor; going east from Xining is the farming cultural corridor. Fuzi Ci and Guzi Ci have been preserved in the evolution of the times. Aren't they representative works of Hehuang culture?

The neglect of research on the grassland cultural corridor and its culture is a mistake in our cultural academic circles. The way to make up for this is not only to study historical records carefully, but also to travel thousands of miles for on-the-spot inspections in today's convenient transportation environment.

In particular, important grassland cultural heritage should be discovered, sorted out, protected and carried forward with the help of today's scientific and technological means, such as Lanzhou's Guzi Ci. When the author was in Lanzhou many years ago, I saw that the artists were old and frail. If they were not rescued, there would be dangers. There is no danger of having any successors. Qinghai's shadow puppet music is rarely inherited, so it needs to be recorded as soon as possible. Rescue measures should also be taken for the folk music, dance and painting of ethnic minorities in Hehuang area. The author once wrote an article and pointed out that efforts should be made to revitalize the two major cultural corridors in western China's history. Cultural self-improvement is an important part of the Chinese nation's pursuit of a well-off society and must not be ignored.

Three

The Hehuang culture is the inevitable result of the coexistence of multi-ethnic cultures

The Hehuang area has a history of cultural creation. Such ancient ethnic groups as the Rong, Qiang, Di, Xianbei, Xiaoyuezhi, Tatar, Tuyuhun, Tubo, etc. were not only engaged in alpine animal husbandry, but also agriculture and handicrafts, and actively developed commerce and culture with surrounding ethnic groups. comminicate. For example, an ancient Tang-Tibetan road has left many cultural relics. Only a ravine in Qinghai Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture surrounding the Princess Wencheng Temple has left countless stone carving artistic heritages by ancestors of past dynasties. The well-preserved temples, towers, and caves from before 1840 in the Hehuang Valley are all cultural heritage left by the ancestors to future generations, such as Qutan Temple, Longwu Temple, Kumbum Temple, Xining Dongguan Mosque, etc. Broadly speaking, the Yungang Grottoes, Maijishan Grottoes, Bingling Temple, and Guohuang Art are all the inevitable results of the coexistence of multi-ethnic cultures in the history of western China.

During the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, the motherland experienced a unified situation, and cultural exchanges among various ethnic groups became more frequent. During this period, opera as a comprehensive art developed unprecedentedly. With the emergence of a large number of handicraft workshops in the Hehuang area, The folk art of sitting and singing has also achieved unprecedented development. The author has listened to many folk artists singing, and some of the tracks were not created by folk artists, including music artists. More than 20 years ago, the author heard the folk art program "Gongmen Hanging" sung by the deceased old man named Zhang in Luoma Village, Xiaonanchuan, Huangzhong. Judging from the way they choose words and sentences to describe the past and praise the present, they must have been written by down-and-out literati in the Hehuang area in history, and were only passed down through the mouth of folk artists. "Fang Siniang" performed by a blind artist surnamed Liu in a small amusement park in Xining many years ago is also related to the "Four Sisters Baojuan" circulated in mainland my country. It can be seen from this that Hehuang culture is the inevitable result of the blending and coexistence of multi-ethnic cultures. There is no doubt about this.

In this case, our attitude towards Hehuang culture can only be innovation based on inheritance. Although we have done a lot of useful work in this regard in the past, due to many constraints, we have not done enough. Qinghai has had many successful projects such as the three ensembles, the 618-meter painted grand view, and the adaptation and performance of traditional music, but there are also some unsatisfactory things. Especially under the conditions of the socialist market economy, how to make Hehuang Culture exert greater social benefits is a major historical mission before the people of Hehuang Culture.

Here I would like to compare the traditional culture of the Yangtze River Basin, another mother river of the Chinese nation, to illustrate the importance of inheritance and innovation. The author has also divided the Yangtze River Basin into four major traditional cultures, namely: Jiangyuan culture, southern Qinghai area, Yushu Kangba culture is the main culture, Bashu culture, Jingchu culture and Wuyue culture. Among them, some far-sighted people in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province founded the Wu Cultural Park to realize the policy of moving academics to the private sector, using social forces to develop culture, and found a successful path. They put forward the slogan "Economy cures poverty, culture cures ignorance" , believes that the concept of "today's culture, tomorrow's economy" is completely in line with the spirit of the times. Qinghai Province holds the Tulip Festival, China's Summer Capital Cultural Tourism, Kunlun Culture and Art Festival, and the Western China Literature and Art Expo. I think it is also surprising. to this concept. It's just that we have done too little in-depth research on the connotation and characteristics of Hehuang culture. In view of this, in response to the invitation of "Hehuang" magazine, I will use the above humble opinion as a starting point.