老挝发现“死亡石罐“

Unknown to many travellers in southeast Asia, the 'jars of the dead' in Laos are a 2,000-year-old mystery that has never been solved.

许多来东南亚的旅行者并不知道，老挝有一个2000年来的未解之谜：死亡之罐。

Speckled across thousands of square kilometres of the Xieng Khouang plateau - now known as the 'Plain of Jars' for that very reason - these empty megalithic structures from the Iron Age number in the thousands, with some reaching nearly three metres in height (10 feet).

几千平方公里的川圹高原(现在因为某些原因被称作是石罐平原the Plain of Jars)上散落着大量中空的巨石结构，它们来自于数千年前的铁器时代，其中一部分高达3米。

(ANU)

No one knows for certain where they came from or even why. Local legend has it that they were once used as chalices by a bunch of drunk giants. Others think they were used for body decomposition in local funerary rites. The leading theory among archaeologists is that these jars were actually tombs for an ancient civilisation.

没人确切知道这些石罐来自于哪里，以及为什么要制作这些石罐。当地传说这些石罐被一群喝醉酒的巨人拿来当杯子，也有人认为它们是被用来存放葬礼之后腐烂的尸体。考古学家们比较主流的理论是，这些石罐是古代某种文明的墓葬方式。

In 2016, tiptoeing around unexploded bomb parts from Vietnam in what is considered one of the most dangerous archaeological sites in the world, researchers at the Australian National University found several pits full of human bones dating back approximately 2,500 years.

2016年，Australian National University的研究人员在某个危险的考古遗址(四周都是爆炸的哑弹)里小心行进，他们发现了几个装满了人类尸骨的土坑，这些人骨的年份可以追溯到2500年前。

Today, those same archaeologists are still leading the hunt. Just recently, the team discovered hundreds more of these stone urns in an area where few humans have been.

今天，这些考古学家们仍然在领导着搜索工作。就在最近，一个小组在人迹罕至的一个地区发现了类似的石罐。

"These new sites have really only been visited by the occasional tiger hunter," says Nicholas Skopal, "Now we've rediscovered them, we're hoping to build a clear picture about this culture and how it disposed of its dead."

考古学博士Nicholas Skopal说：“这些新地点实际上只有一些老虎偷猎者才会造访。现在我们重新发现了这些罐子，我们希望能够对这种文化以及死亡崇拜方式有清晰的认识。“

Alongside the huge jars, which were roughly 1,000 years old according to the university, the team also found typical Iron Age artefacts, including decorative ceramics, glass beads, iron tools, discs worn in the ears and spindle whorls for cloth making.

在这些约有1000年历史的罐子的边上，小组还发现了典型的铁器时代的文物，包括玻璃珠，装饰用瓷片，铁制工具，戴在耳朵上的圆形饰物等。

Around the jars, they noticed a collection of beautifully carved discs, which they think are burial markers, although strangely enough they were found buried with the intricate side face down.

在罐子周围，他们还注意到了一些雕刻精美的圆片，他们认为这是墓葬记号，奇怪的是他们发现这些圆片都是复杂花纹的那面朝下被埋藏。

"Curiously we also found many miniature jars, which look just like the giant jars themselves but made of clay," says one of the team, archaeologist Dougald O'Reilly.

“奇怪的是我们还发现了许多微型陶罐，它们的长相和大罐子一样，却是用粘土制成。“团队成员表示。

"We'd love to know why these people represented the same jars in which they placed their dead, in miniature to be buried with their dead."

“我们感兴趣的是这些人为什么用长相相同的小型复制品来标记他们的尸体，他们的遗体被放入大石罐中并被埋起来。”

With the nearest quarry several kilometres away, all 137 of these heavy objects, weighing several tonnes, must have somehow been transported to their new locations. Still, O'Reilly says they don't know why the remote region was chosen, especially since there is no evidence of anyone ever having lived here.

由于最近的采石场在几公里之外，这些重达几吨的物体一定是通过某种方式被运到这里。不过考古学家们也表示，他们不知道为什么会选择这个偏僻的地区，特别是没有证据证明有人在这里居住过。

The team's work has not yet been detailed in a peer-reviewed study, but the archaeologists are hopeful that their work will eventually help us solve the mystery of these jars.Or maybe it will leave us with even more questions than before.

考古学家们希望他们的工作能帮我们解开这些石罐的谜题，抑或者会给我们留下更多的疑问。