Today I had the pleasure of seeing the famous Terra Cotta army of Emperor Qin, known as China's first Emperor. Since I paid an obscene amount of money for my college education, I had the privilege of attending a luncheon where Dean Micheal Drompp of Rhodes College's Asian Studies department spoke briefly about the history of the man. He is known not only for standardising language, writing, roads, currency, and weights and measures, but for unending cruelty and strictness in enforcement of the law. Dr. Drompp shared a story that Qin once fell asleep and as it grew cold, the Keeper of the Imperial Hat covered him with the Imperial Cloak. When he awoke, he asked who had covered him and he was told the Keeper of the Imperial Hat; he punished the Keeper of the Hat for overstepping his bounds and the Keeper of the Imperial Cloak for not fulfilling his duties.
Terrified of death, Qin spent his life trying to avoid it, but finally decided to build a mausoleum that would echo his greatness in life. There are a suspected 7,000 soldiers and so far 1,000 of them have been unearthed since the discovery of the first one in 1973, and the High Museum is showing around 10-13 statues from the outer ranks of the mausoleum (I tried to find a schematic of the site, but am unable to-- I'll continue to look and will update with a link when I find one) along with a collection of artifacts from the era.
The collection itself is incredibly interesting, and the audio tour that goes along with it extremely informative. Curators from the British Museum and the Terra Cotta Warriors Museum (where they live in China when not on tour) describe the rise of Qin, the different forms of money seen in display cases (pre- and post-Qin) and the weapons-- impressively preserved bronze pieces from arrows to spear tips. Stone weights and new coins follow them as examples of what Qin did
for the empire. Jumping back, briefly, the exhibit introduces itself with the kneeling archer (seen to the left) which was really quite exquisite. The High's curators set up the exhibition so the warriors were not behind glass, but instead on platforms with a knee-high barrier surrounding it; this made viewing easier as there was no inch-thick glass to distort light and take away from the amazing detail on each and every one of these statues.
The detail on these soldiers is exactly what makes them so impressive. The High Museum's marketing did them a great disservice in making the exhibit appear to be a large collection of soldiers, putting out advertising that depicted a large portion of the 1,000 soldiers. People show up, see that there are only around 10 soldiers and feel like they've been gypped. The audio tour does quite a bit to emphasize the detail on each individual soldier, a different item number for each one, but anyone who doesn't realize the audio tour is free or doesn't care to take it (the majority of fellow visitors had the headsets, but there were quite a few who did not) isn't going to get that. I think that if there were a large number of soldiers, the thing that makes this exhibit so unique would have been completely lost on the public. Perhaps it is because of the marketing bungle, but everyone seemed to be really enthralled with what they saw so I think that the majority of people are overlooking it.
The final two rooms include a selection of different soldiers and one
of the horses with his bridle and saddle (seen to the right). Bronze replicas of original chariots and four are at the rear of the larger room behind the soldiers as the originals were too delicate to travel; the antechambers to that room include a mockup of the workshop with workers building both a warrior and a horse from bottom up, and musicians playing to dancing cranes on a river bank (though there is an argument that the statues may also have been fishing since there is no evidence left of what they were holding in their hands-- picture of one seen below).
In all, I highly recommend the exhibit. If you don't have the fortune of an Asian Studies professor, the audio tour will more than suffice and IS included in the price of admission. Leave behind your impressions from marketing, and instead focus in the incredible detail in each and every statue. I would not suggest less than an hour to go through the exhibit, and would take more time if you have it so that you can be sure to really look at each piece and enjoy the entire collection.
All photos are from the TimesOnline UK site artle "Terracotta army at the British Museum."
