The Guandi Tomb Cluster in Lingyang Town

The Guandi Tomb Cluster in Lingyang Town

The Guandi Tomb Cluster in Lingyang Town is a cultural tourism attraction.

【The Guandi Tomb Cluster in Lingyang Town】

The tomb cluster is distributed across a slope about 300 meters long and 200 meters wide to the west of Cili County town. Between 1969 and 1981, eight of the tombs were excavated and identified as dating back to the Warring States period. The tombs are vertical earthen pits and were severely damaged. Excavated artifacts include multiple relics such as bronze ding (tripods), spoons, swords, halberds, spears, duo (bells), as well as pottery ding (tripods), dun (oval vessels), hu (jars), and dou (stemmed bowls). 【The Tomb of Zhou Ji】 Zhou Ji was a native of Tianmen Mountain in Dayong (present-day Yongding District) during the Jin Dynasty and served as the Neishi (an official title, initially established in the early Western Han Dynasty to govern civil affairs within the fiefdoms of feudal kings, continued into the Jin Dynasty but abolished in the Sui Dynasty) of Yidu (present-day Yidu, Hubei). According to The Book of Jin · Biography and General Records of Loyalty and Righteousness, Zhou Ji was “a man from Tianmen.” After his death, he was buried at the foot of Tianmen Mountain. A poem titled "Inscription on Yang Zhou’s Painting of Tianmen Mountain" by the Ming Dynasty poet Zhang Dui contains the line “Alas, the Yidu Neishi Zhou, whose ancient tomb lies piled upon the hills.” Today, many ancient tombs can still be found at the foot of Tianmen Mountain, but the exact location of Zhou Ji’s tomb is no longer traceable.