Between 1965 and 1966, during an archaeological survey in the surroundings of the capital of the ancient Chinese kingdom of Chu, fifty burials were discovered and excavated, accompanied by grave goods. Among the thousands of objects recovered was an unusual bronze sword, which, thanks to being kept in a wooden sheath, was in an excellent state of preservation, hardly affected by the water that flooded the tomb. The weapon, exhibited today in the Hubei Provincial Museum, is magnificent, with rich inlays and inscriptions on the blade that allow its owner to be identified and, consequently, to be named:the Sword of Goujian.
Goujian was the ruler of Yue, a kingdom in the southwestern area of present-day China, spread around the lower area of the Yangtze River. He lived at the end of the penultimate period of the Chinese Ancient Age, known as the Spring and Autumn period (722-481 BC), and succeeded to the throne by succeeding his father, Yunchuang, in 496 BC. He almost immediately became involved in a war with the neighboring state of Chu, then called Jing or Jingchú, which stretched across the southern and central interior with its capital at Ying, in what are now Hubei and Hunan provinces. The reason for the conflict, the chronicles say, was in the asylum that Yunchang granted to a princess of Yue who, married to a prince of Wu, decided to flee and return to her country.
The story is somewhat reminiscent of Helen of Troy, after all a very common legendary way to explain the uncertain origins of long fights. The fact is that Chu was a strongly militaristic state that had been expanding its borders at the expense of the surrounding kingdoms; in fact, one of its rulers, King Zhuang, is included in the lists of what is known as one of the Five Hegemons, that is, the strongest Chinese leaders of his time. The problem was that Goujian would also be part of that relationship, so the clash was inevitable sooner or later.
The first disagreement was when Fuchai, the last king of Wu, (a state located north of Yue), began a campaign against the newly enthroned Goujian to avenge his father Helu, who died during an attempted conquest of Yue. Fuchai emerged victorious and even held his adversary prisoner for three years, at the end of which he set Fuchai free to restore the status quo convinced that he no longer posed a danger. He was wrong. Goujian dedicated a decade to rebuilding his kingdom with the help of important ministers such as Wen Zhong, who had been the de facto regent in the absence of his lord, or Fan Li, who had remained with the monarch in his captivity and on his return promoted a series of of reforms that enriched the country and himself (and, by the way, he married Xi Shi, considered one of the most beautiful women in Chinese history).
With Yue transformed into an economic and military power, Goujian considered the time had come to take revenge and engaged with Wu in a discontinuous war that in the end he ended up winning, annexing the enemy territory; the crown prince, You, was killed in action and his father Fuchai, who had neglected the government to lead a dissipated life, committed suicide. Since Wu was also in conflict with Chu, Chu was suddenly freed from one front and was able to focus his efforts on expanding at the expense of the territories of his northern neighbor, Chen. All these struggles determined the beginning of a new stage in Chinese historical evolution, that of the Warring States (481-212 BC)
The Yue army was fearsome and often won its battles by resorting to psychological pressure, since, according to tradition, it put capital prisoners in the front line so that, in exchange for the promise of caring for their families, they would cut their throats. themselves horrifying the enemy (another version says that the correct translation would not speak of prisoners sentenced to death but of soldiers willing to die). Likewise, it had something as unusual then as a war fleet and the quality of the weapons it manufactured achieved fame. But everything has an end and that king passed away in the year 465 BC. His successors were able to maintain the level for six generations, but in 306 BC, Chu ended up invading Yue with Qi's help and dividing it up.
That was probably how the Sword of Goujian appeared in Jiangling, Hubei, Chu area two and a half millennia ago. Specifically, in the so-called Site 1 Wangshan, seven kilometers from what was once Ying, the capital of Chu, today renamed Jinancheng. It was part of the trousseau of one of the fifty graves excavated between 1965 and 1966, along with a coffin with a skeleton that, however, was not Goujian's. It was so called because on the blade there is an inscription in two columns with eight characters of a type of seal script known as Bird-Worm , an evolution of the oracular bone, which became popular in the southern kingdoms in the late Spring and Autumn period , reaching its splendor in the next to later give way to the small seal .
The Worm-Bird script It is called that because of the intricacy of its lines. It is usually found in objects, rather than in documents:weapons, cauldrons, tiles... A very opportune example to cite could be the Spear of Fuchai, which was also found in Jiangling but later, in 1983; on its blade is the legend "King Fuchai of Wu made this spear for his personal use" . It is practically the same as what can be read on the sword, only changing the weapon and the owner: "The king of Yue made this sword for his personal use" . The exact name is missing, but initially two of the six characters could not be identified, something that caused an intense debate between archaeologists, historians and linguists until it was finally accepted that it was Goujian.
The weapon, cataloged within the model called Jian, typical of the aforementioned chronological periods, is relatively short compared to the length that other similar ones usually have:it measures 55.6 centimeters, of which 8.4 correspond to the handle, which is lined of silk and in the guards it presents inlaid blue enamel (obverse) and turquoises (reverse). It weighs 875 grams and the blade, which is double-edged, is a little wider at its base than at the rest, reaching 4.6 centimeters there. It is precisely there where, on a background of rhomboid decorative motifs, the aforementioned inscription is located. In addition, to balance its weight, it has a pommel made up of 11 concentric disks, presenting a peculiar archaic but at the same time elegant appearance.
What is really unheard of is that the blade of the sword remains perfectly sharp; the archaeologist who discovered it cut his finger slightly and took a test to prove it, sectioning a stack of papers. Likewise, there is no trace of rust, despite the fact that the tomb where he spent two and a half millennia was flooded. All this is due to two reasons. On the one hand, to be stored inside a tight lacquered wooden case that closes almost hermetically. On the other hand, chemical analyzes show that it is composed of a combination of copper, tin, lead, iron, sulfur and arsenic. In the body of the blade, the former predominates, which gives it special flexibility and resistance to breaking, while in the edge there is more tin to harden it and the sulfur, together with the copper sulfide, prevent oxidation.
These magnificent qualities did not prevent that in 1994, when the weapon was to be transferred to Singapore for an exhibition, an operator accidentally hit the case and produced a seven-millimeter crack in the sword. Since then, it is forbidden to take it out of the country and has only been moved to take it from the National Palace Museum in Taipei, where it was originally deposited, to the Hubei Provincial.