Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Another early start, but what is an early start when we were going to get to see the World Heritage listed Terracotta Warriors!
We stop by the Art Ceramics and Lacquer Exhibition, an interesting look at how the Terracotta Warriors were actually made. The warriors made at the factory actually could be bought and shipped home, in all sizes. The factory also had a huge display of Lacquer Furniture, beautiful pieces, that again could be shipped home. Sharyn decided she'd get some things, as they were reasonably priced and she was given some money to buy a gift for birthday and Christmas. Cherie, John and Dad, got gift set boxed Terracotta Warriors.
The day was mostly spent at the Terracotta Warriors, as the park/museum was quite large, and had 3 pits to see, plus an Exhibition Hall. Strangely the warriors were actually only discovered in 1974, by farmers digging a well. The sight was awesome to see, ranks of life-size pottery figures, modelled from yellow clay to guard the tomb of Qin Shi Huangdi over 2,200 years ago. The three pits have over 7,000 soliders, archers and horses. We went to Pit 1 first, which contains the infantry (approx 6,000 warriors), this pit is the most excavated, and also has a rear area that has many smashed heads and pieces were yet to be assembled, however it does show them at work carefully putting things together like a puzzle.
The infantry were originally painted in vivid colours faded after exposure to air, and equipped with weapons which many have rotted or were damaged in fire. Each warrior is unique, they have their own individual details, especially in the hairstyles, clothing, belts and footwear.
We then went to Pit 2, still being excavated filled with calvary and soliders, the wooden roof top beams can be seen fallen across the warriors.
We did get to watch a film on how the warriors came to being and how they were found, and at the museum store alot of us bought a book on this history, and had it signed by one of the farmers that actually found the site.
Lunch was noodles, something a bit different, we watched the noodles actually getting made.
After lunch, we ventured into Pit 3, partially unexcavated seems to be the command centre, with 70 high ranking officers. The High Ranking Officer is a favourite, being the tallest overseeing the infantry figures, the other that differs to the infantry is the Kneeling Archer.
In the exhibition hall we saw the warriors close up in glass cabinets, each type, and we also viewed the two bronze chariots, found housed in wooden coffins near the burial mound of Qi Shi Huangdi's Tomb, which is located west of the pits, yet to be fully excavated, he spared no expense, enlisting 700,000 people over 36 years for the tomb's construction.
Being Erin's home town, she really had a lot to show us, so we went to the Muslin Quarter, an interesting walk to see the local shops and markets. Persimmons were the seasonal fruit as was the Pomegranate at the time we were there, so we got to try them. At the end of the street we could see the old city wall and the Bell and Drum towers, so our last stop was to visit the old city wall, which is the only wall left around a city in China.
Some of the tour group hired double bikes to ride along the top of the wall, we decided to walk the wall top, it was interesting to see below the city streets, old houses on one side (we saw people playing mahjong), and garden on the other side, we also saw the draw bridge.
- comments