Page 551 - The Golden Age of Chinese Archaeology: Celebrated Discoveries from the People’s Republic of China

acter, ao ("concave" or "sunken"), to resemble a squared U, and measured 17.6 meters wide
4
(east to west) and 21.4 meters long (north to south). An unfinished pit, which corresponds to
accounts in the historical texts of an uncompleted mausoleum, was found between Pits 2 and 3.
The horse-and-soldier pits north of the axis formed by the mausoleum replicate the
Emperor's imperial guards, arranged in inspection formation. Pit i was divided into eleven
trenches, each of which contained 6 chariots and 18 to 20 rows of life-size warriors holding
bows, crossbows, swords, and spears. The fourteen trenches of Pit 2 (the excavation of which
is ongoing at this writing), were filled with chariots, cavalry, and footsoldiers.
The practice of placing pottery figurines in front of the mausoleum to represent an awe-
some military formation continued into the later dynasties; representations of soldiers have
been discovered in the tombs of Yangling (in particular, the mausoleum of Emperor Jin Di),
as well as in tombs and tomb murals of the Northern Dynasties, the Sui dynasty, and the Tang
dynasty. The First Emperor's army, however, remains an extraordinary find, in particular for what

it tells us about the evolution of Chinese sculpture. By the third century BCE, Chinese sculpture
was capable of representing the human form with a high degree of verisimilitude; even on so
massive a scale, the artists of the First Emperors army were able to endow the figures with indi-
viduality by varying the bodies, costumes, hairstyles, and facial expressions. While the discovery
of the First Emperor's mausoleum is a landmark for Chinese history and archaeology, its
significance transcends the borders of China; indeed, it is one of the treasures of the world.
The continuities between the Qin and the Han dynasties, are borne out in tomb designs.
The Western Han imperial mausoleums in the northern plain of the Wei River at Xi'an include
features reminiscent of the design of the First Emperor's mausoleum, in particular, the shape of
the enormous mounds, the rectangular tomb enclosures, and the placement of auxiliary tombs
on the two sides of a road (simadao) that traces an east-west axis. The most important Western
Han royal tombs excavated in recent years are those of Liu Sheng and his consort in Mancheng,
Hebei province, and the tomb of the King of Nanyue in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.
Liu Sheng, King )ing of Zhongshan, was the son of Emperor Jin and the brother of Em-
peror Wu. He died in the fourth year of the Yuanding era of Emperor Wu (113 BCE); his consort
Dou Wan died slightly later. They were buried side-by-side in rock-cut cliff tombs on the east-
ern slope of a mountain. Both tombs share an architectural plan characteristic of Western Han

royal tombs: an entrance passageway, a tunnel, a front chamber flanked by two side-rooms, and
a rear chamber with a circumferential corridor. The tomb of Liu Sheng measures 51.7 meters in
length and 37.5 meters at its widest; that of Dou Wan is 49.7 meters long, and 65 meters wide
(measured from the outer wall of each side room). Liu Sheng was buried in a coffin nested
within a larger coffin (yiguoyiguan); Dou Wan was placed in a single coffin. In accordance with
the burial practice of Han aristocrats, both were encased in "jade suits with gold threads" (jinlu
yuyi); Liu Sheng's comprises 2,498 jade plaques; the weight of the gold used to link the plaques
is estimated at 1,100 grams. While similarly shaped jade plaques had been discovered in tomb

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