China Archaeological Museum and its "Super National Treasures"

The China Archaeology Museum is located in Beijing Olympic Park. It is the first museum in my country named after archaeology. It relies on archaeological artifacts and precious ancient books and documents to tell the long history and brilliant splendor of Chinese civilization. The museum has four floors and five thematic exhibition areas, including "Origins of Civilization", "Home in China", "Unification of a Great Power", "Harmony among All Nations", "National Awakening" and other themed cultural relics and archaeological stories. The museum's treasure is a turquoise dragon-shaped vessel known as a "super national treasure". It was unearthed from an aristocratic tomb at the foundation of Palace No. 3 at the Erlitou site in Yanshi City, Luoyang City. This turquoise dragon-shaped vessel from the Xia Dynasty is made of more than 2,000 turquoise pieces of different shapes glued together. The entire object is about 70 cm long. The huge amount of labor, fine workmanship and large size of the vessel are extremely rare among early Chinese dragon-shaped cultural relics. It can be called a "super national treasure" and is considered to be the most direct and orthodox root of the Chinese dragon totem. It is known as the "First Dragon of China."