Wooden coffins hanging on the rocks is an eerie sight. Not for the faint of heart. Nevertheless, it is this method of burial that has been adopted by the Chinese people since ancient times.
Bo air cemeteries
High in the mountains, among the rocks, coffins hang on wooden wedges-props - the only reminder of the mysterious and almost disappeared people who lived in the southwestern part of modern China.
Bo has always remained an ethnic minority in this populous country. But, despite this, they were able to create a vibrant, distinctive culture that would have developed further, if not for the bloody wars with the Ming dynasty. Four hundred years ago the Bo people were practically wiped off the face of the earth. There are no cultural monuments left, with the exception of strange air burials, the nature of which is still debated by scientists.
It is worth noting that in China they are especially sensitive to funeral traditions and, in general, to everything related to the dead. Most of the inhabitants of the Celestial Empire still, according to an old tradition, bury their dead on the slopes of the hills facing human habitation. This is believed to bring good luck to descendants. From this point of view, the coffins hanging on the rocks are not only a mystery, but also sacrilege. What made people adhere to such a strange tradition? And how did they lift a coffin weighing up to 200 kilograms onto rocks 100-200 meters high?
There are legends that the people could fly and the air element was subject to them. That's why they buried their dead so high. But all this is speculation.
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Scientists, noting that most of the burials are found in gorges where mountain rivers run, put forward a hypothesis: the people were waiting for spring floods, and the rising water helped them to carry out "high-altitude work".
But there is another version, according to which the climbers hammered wooden wedges into the rock and climbed them as if along an improvised staircase. The likelihood of this assumption is confirmed by holes found in the bases of some rocks.
More recently, in the archives of one of the libraries located in the south of China, researchers have found a description of another very plausible way of lifting a coffin on a rock - with the help of ropes.
But if the question "how?" scientists at the very least have found the answer, then the question "why?" still remains open.
According to some experts, Bo, who believed that the soul of the deceased went to heaven, erected the coffins as high as possible in order to facilitate the soul's way up.
Others see the reason for such a strange burial not at all in the religious views of this people. Bo hung the coffins on the rocks so that enemies could not desecrate the bodies of the dead. A very viable version, given the fact that no one has reached many cemeteries to this day …
Coffin as a cultural monument
The coffin manufacturing technology was simple and unpretentious. They were hewn out rather crudely, from hard wood. It is strange that many of the sarcophagi have survived to this day, because the paint that protects the tree from destruction has never been heard of. By the way, modern scientists have found that the "freshest" coffins were installed on the rocks along the Yangtze River just 400 years ago. The oldest are about a thousand years old. Well, the most ancient coffin of bo dates back 2.5 thousand years!
Today, bo coffins are cultural monuments. Therefore, the Chinese authorities constantly make sure that they remain safe and sound. The restoration work has already been carried out three times - in 1974, 1985 and 2002.
These works, among other things, helped the researchers to "balance debit with credit." It turned out that over the past ten years, 20 coffins have fallen into the water. But in the thickets of trees growing on one of the rocks, restorers discovered 16 previously unknown burials. Thus, today there are 290 “exhibits” in the rock cemeteries of Bo.
Stairway to Heaven
But if you think that such a dark exotic is characteristic only of China, then you are wrong. Hanging cemeteries are also found in some other Asian countries, such as Indonesia and the Philippines - in the province of Sagada.
The Filipinos, before putting the deceased in the coffin, fumigated his body with special mixtures so that it was less subject to decomposition. The result was something like mummies. They were put in a ball in improvised coffins, the function of which was performed by hollow tree trunks inside, and placed in narrow "single" caves or hung on rocks.
For the sake of fairness, it should be noted that scientists managed to find here caves filled to the brim with coffins. This led them to believe that ordinary mortals were buried in such "hostels". And "single apartments" were intended for people from high society.
Experts have determined that the oldest Sagadan burial is about two thousand years old, and the youngest is 15 years old. Yes, yes, the custom of hanging coffins on the rocks existed here until the 90s of the XX century. Only recently have Filipinos begun to bury their dead in the ground. But the locals yearn for the old days, when the souls of the dead were closer to heaven, and the ashes were reliably protected from the floods so frequent in Sagada.
There are not enough rocks for everyone …
What is Tana Toraja? Region on Sulawesi - the third largest island in Indonesia. And he is known for his unique funeral rites. Many centuries ago, local residents, sending their dead on their last journey, erected for them carved coffins-sarcophagi in the form of boats and animals, put there the things that the deceased used during his lifetime, and left the coffins at the foot of the rocks.
But over time, descendants indifferent to the past and traditions began to plunder the graves, and the ceremony became more complicated. The bodies of the deceased were placed high in the mountains - in caves or in specially hollowed out niches. And sometimes they were hung on rocks, much like the Chinese did.
It seems incredible, but in such a strange way the islanders bury their dead to this day. The body of the poor man who died outside of Tana Toraja, the relatives, like hundreds of years ago, are trying to bring home. The only difference is that each village used to have its own steep mountain for burials. And today, due to the lack of free rocks and cliffs, local residents use common cemeteries. Life rises in price, and death rises in price. There are not enough separate rocks for all …
Max Maslin