Probing the historic thermal and humid environment in a 2000-year-old ancient underground tomb and enlightenment for cultural heritage protection and preventive conservation

Abstract The development and utilization of urban underground space have contributed to more excavation of ancient tombs in recent years. The microclimate in the burial environment is crucial for the sustainability of historical artifacts. In this paper, the variation in thermal and humid conditions during the burial time from the closure of a tomb to excavation was investigated by field testing and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling. The selected object is the famous M1 tomb chamber of the mausoleum Zhang An-shi, which has a 2000-year history. It was found that the average air temperature (T) and relative humidity (RH) of the M1 tomb chamber before excavation were 12.7 °C and 93.0%, respectively. The results of the CFD simulation suggest that the burial time of an ancient tomb consists of a very short variable phase and a long stable phase. The very beginning phase may be as short as 0.3 h. The dramatic changes in temperature and RH were more than 10 °C and 20%, respectively. Consequently, dramatic changes in the thermal and humid environment will trigger the deterioration of historical artifacts. Current findings further suggest that the local annual average temperature is optimal for the conservation of underground artifacts excavated from the soil thermostatic layer. This study paves the way for characterizing the environment of an ancient tomb chamber, as well as museum design, energy savings that support cultural heritage protection and preventive conservation.