Under the Helan Mountain in Ningxia, there is a place where you can appreciate the rough and delicate ancient civilization. It is the "Yinchuan World Rock Art Museum".

The Yinchuan World Rock Painting Museum is located in the Helan Mountain Rock Painting Scenic Area, covering a total area of ​​72,000 square meters, with a construction area of ​​4,106 square meters, an exhibition area of ​​2,000 square meters, and a continuous front of 556 meters.

The entire rock art museum is mainly composed of 8 parts, including the preface hall, the middle hall, the world rock art exhibition hall, the Chinese rock art exhibition hall, the Helan Mountain rock art exhibition hall, the original art exhibition hall, the special exhibition hall and the rock art data information center, and has a report hall, an expert research room, and a restoration room. . Concentrate on displaying 546 most representative high-quality petroglyph catalogues, rubbings, demoulding replicas, oil painting imitations, real objects, and original works of art produced in more than 200 regions in 31 countries around the world.

Petroglyphs are pictures drawn or carved on rocks by ancient ancestors using realistic or abstract artistic techniques for a long time before the creation of writing. They are the concentration and historical accumulation of ancient human life and a kind of ideological The crystallization reflects the history of civilization and evolution of human society, reproduces the production and life of people at that time, and becomes the history left on the rock.

The Yinchuan World Rock Art Museum covers an area of ​​4,106 square meters and is the first special museum in China with rock paintings as the theme. The museum displays pictures and catalogs of petroglyphs from more than 60 countries and regions. Not only petroglyphs, but also stone tools in the life and production of early primitive ancestors and statues of mother goddesses for reproductive worship have been displayed. You can learn about rock paintings from all over the world. It will be closed for refurbishment from November 2016. The exhibition area is divided into preface hall, middle hall, world rock art exhibition hall, Chinese rock art exhibition hall, Helan Mountain rock art exhibition hall, rock art research and exchange hall, special exhibition area, rock art information archive area, and focuses on Helan Mountain (including the whole Ningxia), China and other parts of the world. Pictures, rubbings, individual petroglyphs, replicas of petroglyphs, stone tools, scenes, research results, etc. The time relationship only browsed the Chinese Rock Painting Exhibition Hall, and popularized the knowledge of rock paintings before visiting the Helan Mountain Rock Paintings.

There is a preface in the Preface Hall of the Yinchuan World Rock Art Museum, which was written by Mr. Chen Zhaofu, the leader of my country’s rock art industry. The old man is also our honorary curator. 70% of the artworks in the museum are provided by the old man. The Yin carving wall depicts many works in the rock paintings of Helan Mountain, including human faces, animals, plants, human bodies, handprints and various symbols and patterns. The petroglyph is a huge epic solidified on the rock. There are 700,000 petroglyphs and about 20 million petroglyphs in more than 150 countries around the world. In China, petroglyphs have been found in more than 20 provinces and cities, and more than 100 counties, and the number is increasing year by year. The pattern symbols in the rock paintings are all for the actual reflection of the environment and way of life of the primitive ancestors in the primitive society. Later, various witchcraft activities gradually evolved, which are fully reflected in the rock paintings of human faces. When modern people don't understand it, they only think that it is a picture of a human-like head, but experts have discovered through anthropology, history, and archaeology that it is actually a picture of gods and ghosts imagined by primitive ancestors. It is used for sacrifice, entertainment and dancing, and for descending the gods. Just like our current religious beliefs, but our society today is very advanced in science and technology, and people's education is relatively high, but primitive humans are naked and drink blood, so they need all kinds of worship to be firm Faith, keep living.

There is a symbolic column in the central hall of Yinchuan World Rock Art Museum, named totem pole. The ancestors and the clan emblem of the clan are called totem worship. The totem pole, which was later worshiped by the primitive ancestors, also shouldered the function of going up to the sky. Through the sacred pillar, people's prayers could be conveyed to the heavens, and it became a medium. This is the prosperity and inherited functions of the wizards later. . The totem pole in the Yinchuan World Rock Art Museum is 15 meters high and is divided into 9 floors, which also means 9 heavens. The upper three floors depict many images of human faces in rock paintings, most of which are wearing feather ornaments and double-ringed eyes, which represent gods and clan leaders. Representative work - the sun god. Besides, the middle three floors are the state of many human lives, including hunting, fighting, and ritual entertainment and dancing. The bottom three layers are the basis of our human existence, that is, animals and plants. The whole tall totem pole shows the overall phenomenon that the three worlds of heaven, man and earth are still highly unified after being harmoniously divided into nine layers.

The rock paintings of Helan Mountain are located in Jinshan Township, Helan County, in the middle of Helan Mountain, more than 50 kilometers away from Yinchuan, Ningxia. The mountain is high and steep. There are more than a thousand individual rock paintings distributed on the rock walls of the mountain stretching for more than 600 meters on both sides of the valley. The art form of the picture is rough and vigorous, the composition is simple, the posture is natural, and the realism is strong. "Time is aphasic, only stones can speak." It should be said that these two short sentences reveal the important historical status of the rock paintings of Helan Mountain. .

As well as various animal patterns and abstract symbols such as sheep, cattle, horses, camels, tigers, and leopards, it reveals the cultural connotations of primitive clan and tribe nature worship, reproductive worship, totem worship, and ancestor worship. A cultural treasure trove of primitive art history.

The academic circles have not yet agreed on the age of the Helan Mountain petroglyphs, but most scholars tend to believe that the Helan Mountain petroglyphs were produced in the late Neolithic period, that is, 6000-4000 years ago.

It is believed that with the development of archaeological excavation work and the deepening of research work in the Helankou Rock Painting Scenic Spot, more scientific and convincing conclusions will be drawn on the age of the Helan Mountain Rock Paintings. The rock painting of the Sun God is known as the treasure of the rock paintings of Helan Mountain, and it is also the only rock painting of the Sun God in Asia. Its pattern is a human face, facing the east, with strange and symmetrical eyes and ears. It is a pity that after long years of wind and sun, coupled with increasingly frequent human activities, the rock surface is mottled and peeled off, and the petroglyphs have been seriously damaged.

Among the tens of thousands of petroglyphs in Helan Mountain, the human face is very distinctive. Looking at the petroglyphs of the entire earth, most of the petroglyphs are concentrated in the Pacific Rim, but Helan Mountain, which is far away from the Pacific Rim, has become the area with the most concentrated human faces and the richest graphics in the world with nearly a thousand pieces. Amazing.

To visit Ningxia, you can choose the local professional tourist transportation Ningxia Tourist Scenic Spot Through Train. The staff all wear yellow vests, and the little yellow people are hospitable. There are two tourist distribution centers in the new city railway station and the crescent moon in the old city. The square is convenient for accommodation nearby, there are many hotels, and the transportation is convenient. It is not far from the civil aviation bus, and it is very convenient whether it is by train or plane. The through train of the scenic spot has opened the line from the urban area to the scenic spots around Yinchuan, such as Shahu, Huangsha Ancient Ferry, Shuidonggou, Zhenbeibao Western Film and Television City, Xixia Royal Tomb, Helan Mountain Rock Painting, Shapotou, etc., which is very convenient.