Generally speaking, mermaid cream has two possibilities:
One is the fat of giant salamander.
The so-called giant salamander is called giant salamander, which is a fish with a flat body and four short feet. This kind of fish is a special kind of fish, and its cry is like that of a baby, so it is called giant salamander. The giant salamander will not starve to death if it doesn't eat for 2~3 years, and its life span is as long as 50~60 years. Now it is an endangered animal.
Shan Hai Jing Bei Shan Jing: There are many mermaids among them. They are shaped like fish, have four feet, sound like babies, and eat without idiots. But in the Qin Dynasty more than two thousand years ago, there must have been a lot of this kind of fish, because the ancient book Shan Hai Jing recorded the giant salamander, and its description is the same as the giant salamander we see now. It has four feet and sounds like a baby. Eating it can cure dementia.
According to research, the giant salamander originated in Devonian 350 million years ago and is known as a "living fossil". Of course, it also existed in the Qin Dynasty, but it is the first time to use the fat of giant salamander to make candles. Candles in the pre-Qin period are still high-grade items, and only princes and nobles can afford them, but there is no problem in using this mermaid cream candle in the mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor.
Fire was discovered as early as primitive society. Primitive people knew how to use fire and save kindling. If they want to keep the fire, they must use grease. Primitive people gradually found that adding grease to combustible materials can preserve fire for a long time and last for a long time. In the Qin dynasty, they will naturally know how to save the fire.
Generally speaking, as long as it is animal fat, it can basically be burned and preserved, but why is it a giant salamander?
Because according to research, the most wild giant salamander in China is in Shaanxi, Gansu and Sichuan today, which is the core area of the Qin Dynasty. This kind of fish must have been so rich that it could not be eaten two thousand years ago, so a large number of them were caught to make mermaid cream and used in the mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor. You know, when the mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor was built for 37 years, there was enough time to make this mermaid cream.
The second is whale or shark fat.
Historical Records of Qin Shihuang: It is to make people who enter the sea catch huge fishing gear for the big fish to shoot. From Langxie North to Rongcheng Mountain, you can see it. When you see a big fish, you shoot a fish. Then merge with Haixi. So let people who go to sea carry equipment to catch big fish, and then shoot them with their own crossbows and other big fish. From Langxie to Rongcheng Mountain, I didn't see any big fish. When I arrived, I saw a big fish and shot one. So the coast extends westward.
In other words, Qin Shihuang shot a big fish off the coast of Shandong. The reason is that an alchemist told Qin Shihuang: Penglai in the sea has an elixir of life, but it is often attacked by mackerel, so we can't reach Penglai. We hope to send some archers to join us. When the mackerel appears, we will shoot it with a crossbow.
This giant mackerel is generally considered to be a whale or a shark, because both kinds of fish are giant fish in the ocean, weighing from tens to hundreds of tons. As long as one is caught, at least a few tons of oil can be squeezed out, and its fat and oil can be used for a long time. Even if you burn 0.5 kg of oil in an hour, whales or sharks can extract 5 tons of oil, so the oil of whales or sharks can burn 65438+.
65438+ 100000 hours is 4 16 days, almost more than a year. It can burn for more than a year without anyone, which is a miracle in itself. So how long can candles made from these mermaid creams burn in the underground palace of Qin Shihuang's mausoleum?
Let's talk about why candles are made for the illumination of imperial tombs.
First of all, fire had the functions of exorcism and lighting in ancient times. The so-called exorcism is mainly to avoid some imaginary ghosts and bring good luck, while the function of lighting is relatively easy to understand. Ancient emperors generally liked brightly lit places. When they were alive, they were all emperors admired by the world, and they wanted to enjoy the treatment before their death. They even built their palaces in proportion and put them in one hundred tombs.
This was the case with Qin Shihuang, for example. His mausoleum not only buried a large number of terracotta warriors and horses, so that the late Qin Shihuang could enjoy this treatment, but also contained a large number of palaces, even rivers and lakes made of mercury, and things made of the sun, the moon and the stars in the sky, which symbolized that the emperor still enjoyed all this after his death, including the light brought by lighting wax.
Finally, candle burning will consume a lot of oxidation and produce a lot of carbon dioxide, which exists in the relatively closed space of the underground palace, making it impossible for grave robbers to survive in the mausoleum and effectively preventing grave robbery. Therefore, ordinary emperors like to place ever-burning lamps or candles in their tombs, such as the mausoleum of Qin Shihuang and the mausoleum of Emperor Wanli of the Ming Dynasty.
In the mausoleum of Qin Shihuang, there must be a candle made of fish paste, which is generally divided into three parts:
One is the wick.
The second is animal fat.
The third is a container for oil.
Candle burning consumes wick and animal fat. The storage of animal fat is relatively simple and can be packed in containers. However, it is difficult to automatically replenish wick consumption. I remember that kerosene lamps were lit at home when the power went out, and there was a wick made of cotton rope in kerosene. The flame burns mainly at the wick, and the kerosene lamp is lit. If there is no wick, the kerosene lamp will go out.
Mermaid cream candle should be based on the same principle, and the wick made of cotton rope is soaked in oil. Through the principle of connector, grease can be connected with luminous container through large container, but it is difficult to solve the wick. If you want to burn for a long time, you must make the wick made of cotton rope infinitely long, but this is almost impossible.
In addition, the size of the lighting container determines that the wick will not be long. Once the wick burns out, no amount of mermaid cream can burn. Not only this principle, the mermaid cream candle in Qin Shihuang's mausoleum can only burn for a few days at most, but not more than ten days.
Another reason is the oxygen content in the underground palace. Qin Shihuang's underground palace has two floors, with a length of 260m, a width of160m and a depth of 26-37m, with an average of 31.5m.. According to the principle that the oxidation content in the air accounts for about 2 1%, the total space volume is 13 10400 cubic meters.
Therefore, the short board that affects the burning time of mermaid cream is the length of wick. According to the wick length of burning 10cm in one hour, the total wick length of burning 10 day needs 24 meters, and the total wick length of one year needs 876 meters. Such a long wick length is impossible for anyone, so I said that the mermaid cream candle in Qin Shihuang's underground palace burned for no more than 10 days. Nobody knows.