Later, after the fall of the Qing Dynasty, this post was seen by the famous collector of the Republic, Zhang Boju.
Zhang Boju first paid a deposit of sixty thousand silver dollars, and then paid another one hundred and forty thousand silver dollars before he managed to buy the post.
If this amount of money were converted into today's value, it would be approximately 4.6 billion.
Later, the Japanese were also very covetous of the Shangyangtai Post, so they detained and imprisoned Zhang Boju for several months, but Zhang Boju never disclosed the whereabouts of the post to the Japanese.
This ensured that this only authentic work of Li Bai remained in the country and was eventually exhibited in the Forbidden City for anyone to appreciate.
Yet now, this Japanese person actually told him that there is another authentic work of Li Bai in Japan?!
"Where did you get this authentic work of Li Bai?" Chen Yiyang inquired.
Chen Yiyang knew the origin of the poem "Satirizing Wang Liyang's Refusal to Drink Wine."
During the Tianbao years, it was snowing heavily at the time.
Li Bai was invited to a banquet by the then local county magistrate Wang, and spontaneously composed a poem to satirize the host due to the absence of a drinking companion.
Thus, this five-character poem of eight lines and forty words was born.
But he had never heard of this five-character poem's original manuscript by Li Bai being in Japan.
Moreover, the handwriting was just too damn ugly.
Although it was not the same writing method as the Shangyangtai Post, the disparity in skill level was too apparent.
"According to our academic records," this Japanese middle-aged man solemnly explained to Chen Yiyang, "this precious piece was gifted by the Poetry Immortal Li Bai to the Japanese envoy to the Tang Dynasty with whom he had close relations and was then taken to Japan for collection.
This post was long housed at the Chikushi Kannonji Temple in Dazaifu City, Fukuoka Prefecture, and during the Edo period, it became part of the private collection of the Hosokawa family, the feudal lords of Kitakyushu. After the Meiji Restoration, Japan abolished the feudal domains and set up prefectures, and the former feudal lords had to relocate to Tokyo. The Hosokawa family was forced to gradually sell off parts of their collection. The 'Satirizing Wang Liyang's Refusal to Drink Wine Post' changed hands several times and was acquired in the mid-20th century by the Japanese ancient manuscript collector, Asuka Ningfan, who housed it in his Shumokubun Library in Kyoto.
In the 1980s, Asuka Ning frequently visited Huaxia and exchanged academic insights with Huaxia scholars on this post.
Even many scholars from your Huaxia acknowledge that this post is indeed an authentic work of Li Bai."
After hearing what the other party said, Chen Yiyang analyzed it.
This Japanese middle-aged man's mention of exchanges between Japanese and Huaxia scholars about the authenticity of this post definitely happened.
After all, the two countries had a period of close exchanges.
However, since the authenticity of this post was not recognized on an official level, it means that the appraisals of those civil scholars need not be considered.
Because these private scholars could say anything for money.
Previously, Chen Yiyang had witnessed this.
For instance, a hapless fellow bought a practice piece from a famous painter.
Someone stepped up to claim it, saying it was their own, but it was still authenticated by experts as a work of the famous painter.
This illustrates that these private appraisal scholars, if paid, could even claim that a stone you hold is the Heshibi jade disk.
In Japan, this 'Satirizing Wang Liyang's Refusal to Drink Wine Post' probably has a genuine mid-to-late circulating history.
So the problem lies at the source.
As everyone knows, exploiting information asymmetry is the most lucrative way to make money.
Chen Yiyang's findings were somewhat similar to this.
In those days, exchanges between Japan and Huaxia relied entirely on envoys or merchants.
Essentially, whatever these people said, the Japanese believed.
For example, many merchants used local kiln porcelain from Huaxia to deceive Japan, and Korean nobles claimed it was royal porcelain from Huaxia, making a considerable profit.
At the time, Li Bai, as a top figure in the Tang Dynasty, was also quite popular in Japan.
It's likely that either the envoy created a fake post disguised as Li Bai's authentic work or found a random writer in the Tang Dynasty to write it, which could have happened.
Upon pondering this, Chen Yiyang carefully scrutinized this so-called authentic work of Li Bai once again.
And indeed found numerous issues.
Firstly, the signature.
The Shangyangtai Post is signed as "Taibai." Taibai is Li Bai's style name, a name he gave himself, typically used for signing.
However, this 'Satirizing Wang Liyang's Refusal to Drink Wine Post' is signed with the characters Li Bai.
This poses a significant problem.
Because not just in the Tang Dynasty, but even in the subsequent Song or previous Sui Dynasties, scholars didn't have the habit of signing their own names directly.
There are only two scenarios when a scholar signs their own name on their works.
One is when it's for official documentation, such as when registering someone's details like Li Er or Zhang San.
The other scenario is in more formal documents, such as memorial essays.
'Satirizing Wang Liyang's Refusal to Drink Wine Post" is neither of these two.
So, under normal circumstances, it's unlikely that Li Bai would've directly written his full name at the end of a post, at most he would write Taibai.
Moreover, even if Li Bai didn't want to sign Taibai today and wanted to play creatively.
According to usual practice, he would add a region or official title before his name.
For example, Sword South Li Bai, Mianzhou Li Bai, or Hanlin Daizhao Li Bai.
Upon further investigation, Chen Yiyang discovered an even more fatal flaw.
Because this poem mentioned Tao Yuanming.
Yet in the Tang Dynasty, the founding emperor was named Li Yuan, and there was a tradition of avoiding the taboo.
So during the Tang Dynasty, poets usually changed the name Tao Yuanming to Tao Quanming when mentioned in poetry or sentences.
For example, in one of Li Bai's poetic lines: "Borrow moonlight temporarily from Dongshan, sing a drunken song all night to bid farewell to Quanming."
Here, Quanming refers to Tao Yuanming.
After all, avoiding taboos was so crucial that neglecting it during imperial examinations could ruin one's career.
No matter how much Li Bai drank, he wouldn't forget to avoid taboos when writing by hand.
Based on the above.
Chen Yiyang believes there is a high probability that this so-called authentic work of Li Bai is actually a fake created by a Tang envoy or a Japanese merchant to make money.
It might not even have been written by a person from the Tang Dynasty, but perhaps by a Japanese student familiar with Chinese characters.
After all, if it had been penned by someone from the Tang Dynasty, it would not have overlooked the taboo, resulting in directly writing Tao Yuanming's name.
With this conclusion, Chen Yiyang had figured out the ins and outs of the matter.
At most, this is an ordinary calligraphy work from the Tang Dynasty, with too many flaws.
Japan has been persistently relying on informal claims without officially clarifying the authenticity of this post, likely because Japanese scholars themselves find it unreliable.
If there were even a fifty percent chance of authenticity, Japan would probably begin large-scale promotion.
However, Chen Yiyang didn't bother debating this with the Japanese on the spot, he just nodded, then left the collection room with Moy Hua.
"Was there something wrong with that piece of writing just now?" President Moy Hua noticed something was amiss, and thus inquired of Chen Yiyang.
