By June 24th, 2023, the bull's head, the monkey's head, the tiger's head, the pig's head, the rat's head, the rabbit's head and the horse's head in the bronze animal heads of the zodiac in Yuanmingyuan have returned to the motherland in different ways.
In 2000, Christie's and Sotheby's auctioned bronze heads of cows, monkeys and tigers, which ignited the anger of Chinese people for the first time. Finally, China Poly Group Company bought back the cultural relics at a high price.
At the beginning of 2003, the China Special Fund for Saving Lost Overseas Cultural Relics searched for the whereabouts of the bronze statue of pig head in the United States. After hard work, American collectors agreed to transfer the bronze statue of pig's head, and patriotic entrepreneur Stanley Ho bought it back through donation.
April 20 13, the French Pino family announced in Beijing that they had decided to return the bronze statues of the mouse head and rabbit head of Yuanmingyuan, which had been lost overseas, to China free of charge. On June 3, 2023 165438+ 10/KLOC-0, Mr. Stanley Ho, a well-known entrepreneur and patriot from Hong Kong and Macao, donated the bronze statue of horse head to National Cultural Heritage Administration and returned it to Yuanmingyuan for permanent collection. The remaining five statues are still missing.
Textual research on the animal heads of the zodiac in Yuanmingyuan
As the largest European-style building in Yuanmingyuan, Haiyan Hall in Yuanmingyuan contains more than 60% of western Baroque style, and its fountain of the zodiac represents the peak of scientific and technological level at that time.
The animal head of the zodiac was originally a part of the fountain. The most interesting thing is that animal heads spray water in turn every day. Among them, each animal head represents a different time. Every time the animal head belongs to this time, it will automatically spray water. If at noon, these twelve animal heads will spray water at the same time, so they are called "hydraulic clocks". When all the fountains are opened at the same time, the flood-like sound can be heard for miles.
1860 17 years16 to 17 days, British and French allied forces looted treasures in the garden 1 1 day and set fire to it for three days and three nights. It is roughly estimated that the number of looted cultural relics is about 6.5438+0.5 million, ranging from bronze ritual vessels in the pre-Qin period to famous paintings and calligraphy in the Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties and various rare treasures. The twelve animal heads were also cut down one by one and scattered all over the world.
The above contents refer to Baidu Encyclopedia-the bronze statue of the animal head of the zodiac in Yuanmingyuan.