The Mausoleum of the Western Han's 4th emperor Liu Qi and his empress Madam Wang, is the largest modern underground museum in China. It is a 2 acre underground museum displaying some of the pits around the emperor's tomb. This museum is situated about 20 kms north from the centre of Xi'an and it took us about 45 minutes to get there by taxi. After visiting the underground burial pits, we also visited the archaeological museum which has a display of over 1800 different relics that have been uncovered.
This museum is not as reknown as the Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum, but is equally as impressive and spellbinding. What makes this underground museum so outstanding (besides the displays of course), is the way it has been designed. There are glass ramps that take visitors down to the excavation level and this really gives people an up-close and personal experience. In some sections we were standing on glass floors looking down on the burial pits, while at other sections we were at the same level. All the excavation pits are obviously enclosed and have been put under very specific temperature, lighting and humidity conditions to conserve them.
This joint tomb shared by emperor Liu Qi and empress Wang was built in 153 BC (over a period of 28 years) and covers an area of over 4900 acres. Two huge burial mounds of the emperor and empress remain to this day. The emperor's tomb is in the west with a 31m high burial mound, while the empress' tomb is in the east with a burial mound of 25m high. The archaeological exploration of this joint tomb started in the 1970's and some of the discoveries have been quite remarkable. Initial explorations discovered amongst other things, the emperor's tomb, the empress' tomb, burial pits to the north and south, ritual and ceremonial buildings, and satellite tombs. The emperor's tomb is at the centre of the mausoleum and is surrounded by 81 underground pits radiating from the centre of the tomb (in addition there are 28 pits around the empress' tomb) .
Archaeologist have found buried in the burial pits, rows of pottery warriors with their weapons, naked male and female pottery figurines, pottery animals like hordes of pigs, horses, cattle, sheep, goats, dogs and chickens (all for the emperor to feast on) and chariots. Unlike the Terracotta Warriors and Horses which are life-size, these pottery figurines are one tenth the size of the actual objects. The unique feature of many of these pottery figurines is their nakedness and their lack of arms. According to archaeologists, these figurines had wooden arms and were once clothed. However, over the thousands of years, the cloth and wooden arms have decayed, and have left these figurines naked and armless.
For most of us living in the modern world, taking the trouble to recreate reality in another form makes no sense at all, but all the Chinese emperors believed that people would go on to live in an afterlife world. With this in mind, they wanted to bring everything in their life time with them to the after life. Hence the grandeur and scale of some of these archaeological finds.
This museum is not as reknown as the Terracotta Warriors and Horses Museum, but is equally as impressive and spellbinding. What makes this underground museum so outstanding (besides the displays of course), is the way it has been designed. There are glass ramps that take visitors down to the excavation level and this really gives people an up-close and personal experience. In some sections we were standing on glass floors looking down on the burial pits, while at other sections we were at the same level. All the excavation pits are obviously enclosed and have been put under very specific temperature, lighting and humidity conditions to conserve them.
This joint tomb shared by emperor Liu Qi and empress Wang was built in 153 BC (over a period of 28 years) and covers an area of over 4900 acres. Two huge burial mounds of the emperor and empress remain to this day. The emperor's tomb is in the west with a 31m high burial mound, while the empress' tomb is in the east with a burial mound of 25m high. The archaeological exploration of this joint tomb started in the 1970's and some of the discoveries have been quite remarkable. Initial explorations discovered amongst other things, the emperor's tomb, the empress' tomb, burial pits to the north and south, ritual and ceremonial buildings, and satellite tombs. The emperor's tomb is at the centre of the mausoleum and is surrounded by 81 underground pits radiating from the centre of the tomb (in addition there are 28 pits around the empress' tomb) .
Archaeologist have found buried in the burial pits, rows of pottery warriors with their weapons, naked male and female pottery figurines, pottery animals like hordes of pigs, horses, cattle, sheep, goats, dogs and chickens (all for the emperor to feast on) and chariots. Unlike the Terracotta Warriors and Horses which are life-size, these pottery figurines are one tenth the size of the actual objects. The unique feature of many of these pottery figurines is their nakedness and their lack of arms. According to archaeologists, these figurines had wooden arms and were once clothed. However, over the thousands of years, the cloth and wooden arms have decayed, and have left these figurines naked and armless.
For most of us living in the modern world, taking the trouble to recreate reality in another form makes no sense at all, but all the Chinese emperors believed that people would go on to live in an afterlife world. With this in mind, they wanted to bring everything in their life time with them to the after life. Hence the grandeur and scale of some of these archaeological finds.
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