The World's Number One Sword

The World's Number One Sword

The discovery of the giant iron sword took place in the spring of 1988, when the Si River to the south of Yanzhou City was in a dry season with no flowing water. As usual, local residents were digging for sand on the dried-up riverbed when someone’s shovel struck something very hard. Normally, the riverbed is filled only with soft silt — there shouldn’t be anything hard. Could it be that a large rock had sunk to the bottom for some reason? While some were still puzzled, others had already brushed away the sand layer, revealing an iron lump underneath. The iron lump seemed quite long, and curious people gathered around. Judging from its shape: “It’s a sword!” “What a long sword!” The news spread quickly, and people gathered in groups, enthusiastically speculating about the sword’s origin and purpose. When cultural relics workers heard the news, they hurried over excitedly. Carefully, they transported the giant iron sword to the museum using a truck. The workers measured the sword: it was 7.5 meters long and weighed 1,539.8 kilograms. The iron sword was nearly as tall as a three-story building and couldn’t be stood upright, so it had to lie flat. Such a heavy iron sword is extremely rare. It’s said that in the early years of the Republic of China, the famous martial artist Ma Yongzheng from Shanghai lifted a thousand-jin (500 kg) bronze tripod in front of the City God Temple and walked around the hall three times without changing expression, scaring off a challenging Belgian strongman. If Ma Yongzheng had seen this sword, would he have wanted to try lifting it too? This sword weighs two or three times more than that bronze tripod at the temple!

After the sword was moved into the museum, the story didn’t end there. At the time, journalists joined in spreading the news of the unearthed iron sword. Their sensational reports almost set the entire city of Yanzhou ablaze. In every street and alley, people were talking about the magical giant iron sword. Since people couldn’t think of any other sword in their knowledge that could compare in size, they unanimously dubbed it the "World's Number One Sword." The mystery that had been puzzling everyone was soon unraveled by the well-versed cultural relics workers. On the hilt of the sword was engraved an inscription — 金一凤 (Jin Yifeng), a native of Shaoxing, Zhejiang, who served as the Prefect of Yanzhou during the reign of Emperor Kangxi in the Qing Dynasty. During his tenure in Yanzhou, he achieved remarkable accomplishments: building bridges, constructing city gate towers, dredging canals, and overseeing the compilation of the 《Yanzhou Prefecture Annals》, truly doing many good deeds for the local people. But why did Jin Yifeng cast such a long iron sword? Checking the 《Ziyang County Annals》, records related to this sword were found. It turned out that there was once a major bridge over the Si River outside Yanzhou City — a strategic passage to southern Shandong. Originally built during the Wanli era of the Ming Dynasty, it had been repeatedly destroyed by floods and rebuilt many times. In the summer of 1712, during the 51st year of Emperor Kangxi’s reign, the Si River flooded again, destroying the middle three arches of the South Bridge. At that time, the Prefect of Yanzhou was Jin Yifeng. Given the bridge’s importance, it had to be repaired. But the local people were suffering from the flood, barely having enough to eat — where would they find the money to repair the bridge? Jin Yifeng, deeply sympathetic to the plight of the people, generously donated his own funds to lead the reconstruction effort. Several years later, the bridge was completed. To prevent future flooding and subdue the water monsters that often caused trouble, Jin Yifeng also cast a giant iron sword three zhang (approximately 10 meters) long and erected it beside the central arch of the South Bridge, hoping to protect the bridge from being washed away by floods. However, as ruthless as the floods are, at some point, the towering iron sword was knocked down by the raging waters and buried under the riverbed for hundreds of years, unknown to anyone — this is the full story behind Yanzhou’s giant iron sword.