Terra Cotta Warriors - 8th Wonder of the World

After the Tour de Wall bicycle ride, we get into the van and Jacky informs us that it’s about 90 minutes to the Terra Cotta Warriors (TCW) museum so we sit back and take a break while we make the trek to the museum. After about 30 minutes, we stop at a place to “learn how the warriors were made”. When we walk in, we are greeted by a man who begins to talk to us and shows us the clay, the molds, the kilns, etc. As we continue to walk through this “prequel”, it begins to dawn on us that this has nothing to do with how the warriors were made but it has to do with how they make the souvenirs that they sell. Once we were done with how the TCW figures are made, we walked through a furniture making gallery, then on to other clay figurines, then to silk art, then more artwork and finally, they show us the gallery of items from each area that are for sale. They had actual size warriors there for sale (the price includes shipping….really, what the heck am I going to do with it? Look, I have a full size warrior in my house. It might be interesting for a little bit but it’ll soon be a big dust collector that you wonder “why did I buy this thing?”). Not only could you buy one actual size, they would make a mold of your face and put it on the warrior. They had an example of one where a Canadian had his face put on a warrior’s body. Now, I didn’t ask the nationality of the person that had this made, they told us it was a Canadian. So for my Canadian friends, I didn’t conclude this on my own because he had a hockey stick and a Maple Leafs jersey (or for the French Canadians, a Canadians jersey [with the obligatory beret], or for the tweeners, a Senators jersey). I couldn’t fathom the logic (or perhaps more accurately the arrogance) behind this move. Conversation piece…sure but c’mon. The Terra Cotta Warriors are part of the history of China, why would I interject myself into it by having them make a statue with my head? It’s like buying a replica of Mount Rushmore but removing Teddy’s head and inserting my own…It’s all about me. Anyhow, they had all sizes of the warriors for sale, some made from the clay, others from “jade” (there’s no way it was real jade) and all kinds of other things for sale here (books on the “history” of China….like that’s the true story, it’d be like expecting CNN to actually report on the news). There was no pressure put on us to buy so we didn’t (along with most of the other tour groups on this stop). It was kind of interesting but it was also like walking through a large, unnecessary gift shop before you got to the museum.

So, back into the van we went and we didn’t stop until we hit the museum. There was a small village surrounding the museum, souvenir shops, food vendors and off in the distance were the homes of some of the original farmers in this area. The odd thing here was that they checked your ticket three times before you made it inside. Jacob didn’t need a ticket due to his age so he went through with me. Each time, the guard looked at me, at him and I could see them thinking that he was older than we said but Jacky stepped in to indicate his age and we were waved on through. Jacky started us in Pit 1. As soon as we walked in, it was simply unbelievable. You were at the ground level and were able to look down into the pit to see rows and rows of these terra cotta soldiers at the depth that they were buried. They were in the pit lined up in formation like they were ready to advance on the enemy. Pit 1 is 230 meters long with 11 corridors (each about 3 meters wide). The corridors were paved with small bricks and then covered with a wooden ceiling supported by large beams and posts. The wooden ceilings were then covered with reed mats and layers of clay for waterproofing, and then mounded with more soil to make the pit about 2 to 3 meters higher than ground level. As mentioned previously, we saw the small traveling exhibit and since that time couldn’t wait until we got to see the real deal. It is hard to describe but it was nearly unbelievable when you consider that the army was made over 2,000 years ago. There are no two warriors that were to be made alike and so although the body may look similar, each has a distinctly different face so just the magnitude and scale of this project is huge. The collection of people needed to construct the army would have to be massive and this was just one pit.

At the moment, they have three pits that have been excavated or partially excavated and they know of 5 more that they will not excavate until they can solve the one major problem that they have. The warriors are actually colored with paint to make them appear exactly like they would in life but once they are exposed to the air, the paint fades and cannot be restored. So, they all look just like clay figures despite the fact that when they were unearthed, they were in color (where’s Ted Turner when you need him). From what we were told, it takes less than 3 days for the color on the warriors to completely fade away. They have tried to paint the figures to match the original condition but they have not found the right mix to match the original look and that will remain on the warriors (the original recipe for the paint and many other things found in the pits were lost to history since many involved with the building of the Emperor’s tomb and the pits for his army never left the area (fertilizer). For this reason, Pit #3 has been partially excavated but none of the warriors have been exposed to date. Once they believe they can preserve the warriors, they will continue to dig at these sites to continue to unearth the army of the first emperor of China, Emperor Qin (pronounced Chin). At the moment, they believe the three pits contain a total of 8,000 soldiers, 130 chariots with 520 horses and 150 calvary horses.

When you see them up close, you can see the soles of the shoes have an actual pattern (and you could just make out the small swoosh) and the individual hairs on the head are detailed along with other things like the fingernails. The detail work is simply amazing and was really the thing to see, it was tough from the viewing of the pits but later when we got an up close look, it was something (we also got to see this with the traveling exhibit but you could not take any photos). We asked Jacky how this could be done and he indicated that each warrior was inspected and if it wasn’t right, someone else take your place (above the ground). Talk about pressure.

Along many of the rows typically near the back, there were hundreds of broken pieces of soldiers. Years after the burial of Emperor Qin, the people broke into the pit and destroyed many of the warriors to display their feelings towards the Emperor’s “less than kind” regime (the Chinese have developed a computer program to scan the broken pieces and help them re-assemble the broken warriors). The majority of the workforce were basically slaves so the working conditions were poor and the people were pushed very hard to complete the task. In addition, when their work was complete, many of the laborers were killed to preserve the secrets of the pits and the tomb. Many of the things found in the pits, the bricks, the advanced metallurgy of the weapons, the paint pigments were lost to history when those that created them were killed to prevent the secrets from being revealed. It’s hard to fathom but many of the secrets of the pits have yet to be discovered even with the advancements in technology. Emperor Qin created the army to serve him in the afterlife so he could continue his rule as Emperor.
Our goal was to move around and get some good photos. We started with a great spot just above the original entrance to the pit and I wasn’t moving for anything or anybody until I had the photos I wanted. We had one chance to get this and I wanted to capture as much as I could with the camera. This was the prime spot since everyone wanted a photo with the pit in the background. We finally gave up the spot and began our move to the side of the pit. It was so interesting to see the warriors at the sides of the pit were actually turned and faced the sides of the pit as if they were preparing for an attack from the flank (that’s the side and not the cut of beef just in case you were confused). In the very back of the pit, there were several dozen warriors that were in the process of being re-assembled (like a large 3D puzzle). I can’t imagine the time and effort to perform this task but in this US this is what we would call “job security”.

The pits and army were part of the folklore of the country but faded into obscurity until the pit was discovered in 1974 by a group of farmers digging a well. The tomb of the emperor has not been opened and they will not attempt to open it until they are certain that they will not destroy any artifacts that might exist in this tomb. Right now, it’s a large dirt mound that looks more like a small hill in the distance but it is a burial mound that has been reduced in size again due to the passing of time. All around Xi’an you will find these burial mounds for various emperors/leaders of the country, Jacky indicated how many of the burial mounds there were but I can’t recall the number. This one is obviously the most famous simply due to the fact that this is the tomb of the emperor that created the country of China.

We went from Pit #1 to Pit #2 where there was a more limited collection of the warriors. This was more of the “office” of the pits where communications were done and orders were handed down to the army. Pit two, although much smaller in size and scope still was very interesting just due to the level of detail involved and again, it was a massive undertaking. Pit #3 was basically an unfinished dig site. They had dug down to the level of the top of the pit but had not uncovered any of the warriors in this area. This pit showed the enormity of the task involved in getting these warriors out of the ground. First you had to dig down to the “roof” of the pit. Then you need to remove the wooden roof and begin the arduous task of removing the dirt and debris to expose the warriors contained in this pit. The thing is that they have no idea what’s under the roof, perhaps all of the soldiers in this pit have been destroyed or damaged beyond repair. Conversely, perhaps this is the pit that will contain the answers to many questions around the technology for some of the weapons, the coloring pigments, etc. It is so interesting to think that although there have been a lot of warriors exposed, there are still many yet to be revealed. As you walked through and saw the sheer magnitude of the dig and all that they have uncovered, we hoped that in our lifetime that they will be able to open the Emperor’s tomb and reveal the remaining TCW without losing the color of the warriors. We’d love to go back and see more of what there is in Xi’an for the TCW but we don’t think that things will change in time for us to get the second chance to see the 8th wonder of the world.

So this concludes our Day 1 in Xi’an. Day 2 is all about Hua Mountain so stay tuned to see what we learn from that experience.