ancient sword discovered

[MooNiNite]

 

 

Article:

https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/08/14/2500-years-old-sword-discovered-china-untarnished-condition/

 

Comment:

"""Ha, don’t forget to also show the Spear of Fuchai, a weapon once used by the archrival of Goujian, another precious artefact dug up not long after the Sword of Goujian was discovered.

A brief summary about these two figures: the kingdoms of Wu and Yue, located in the southern part of modern China, led by King Fuchai and King Goujian respectively, were two prominent rivaling powers of the Spring and Autumn period (771-476 BC) in Chinese history, the long and bloody struggles between them generated many legends that later turned into enduring fables and are still quite popular among Chinese people today. So the fact that both of their personal weapons (a sword and a spear) were discovered 2,400 years later came as great surprises for modern archaeologists in China who had only heard stories about the two legendary rivals.

Now the longer version goes like this: Fuchai’s father King Helu of Wu was an ambitious but cruel king. In 496 BC, he heard that his long time rival, King Yunchang of Yue (Goujian’s dad) was dead, so he immediately raised an army to invade Yue. The young Goujian, who had just taken over his father’s throne to be the new king of Yue, hastily responded by leading the army of Yue against the invader. Surprisingly, through ambush and strategic maneuver, not only was he able to expel the invading Wu army, but also managed to injure Helu in the leg with archers. Helu retreated with his army, but his leg wound by arrow had gotten worse, he summoned his young son Fuchai, told him “You shan’t forget to avenge me” and died from the wound soon after.

Fuchai saw his father’s defeat as a great humiliation of the state, so he heeded his father’s word and focused solely on managing his kingdom after he took over the throne, he also appointed Sun Wu (the guy that wrote the Art of War) as commanding general to retrain the Wu army. Only 2 years later opportunity presented itself: king Goujian of Yue, seeking to expand his state (also to repay the favor of Helu’s invasion 2 years ago), decided to bring the battlefield to his enemy’s land so he led the Yue army to invade Wu. This time the Wu army, commanded by General Sun Wu, decisively defeated the invading Yue army and reversed the invasion by pursuing the retreating Yue army all the way back to the capital of Yue, captured it, and held Goujian hostage. After Goujian admitted defeat, surrender to Wu and paid a heavy ransom, the Wu army agreed to pull out of Yue but as a payback of humiliation Goujian was forced to leave his own kingdom to go to Wu as Fuchai’s servant. 

In the state of Wu Fuchai made sure to humiliate Goujian in every single way he could, and to the extreme, such as using Goujian as a mounting block for Fuchai to get on his horse, and had Goujian taste his feces, etc. Goujian endured all of it for 3 years before Fuchai agreed to release Goujian back to his kingdom Yue. After he returned to Yue Goujian swore to annihilate the state of Wu, so he started looking for capable officials to manage Yue, reviving the state’s economy and military, he also insisted on sleeping in a pile of hay at night and hanged a bag of guts in his room and licked it everyday, all so he wouldn’t forget the bitterness and humiliation that he endured in Wu. Meanwhile after defeating Yue, Fuchai became more and more self indulgent and tyrannic: he killed off officials and fired able generals (including Sun Wu) that didn’t agree with him, waged unnecessary wars against many states around him, challenging other kingdoms in the northern part of China for the title of “Hegemon of China”, in less than 20 years the state of Wu was greatly weakened. 

Goujian realized the time had come, so he started a series of war against Wu, first captured and killed the crown prince of Wu (son of Fuchai), then laid siege to the capital of Wu for 3 long years; in 473 BC, after the Yue army finally broke through the Wu capital, Fuchai surrendered. Goujian agreed to let Fuchai live if he accepted to be exiled onto an island far away from Wu, but Fuchai refused and committed suicide instead. Yue then annexed Wu, ending this long and bloody struggle between the two kingdoms."""

Edited November 29, 2016 by MooNiNite