Bowers Museum - Terra Cotta Warriors

[Rob_Hugo@PortNW]

I learned the reason for the Terra Cotta Warriors. They are the guardians of the tomb of the first emperor of China – Qin Shi Huangdi. I learned how Qin Shi Huangdi came to power. The country had been at war and disunion for over 200 years. Qin Shi Huangdi unified the China (which comes from Qin). He established his government on a system of “Legalism”, unified a common language – oral and written, and a system of weights and measurements and built roads. He came to power as king of his state, Qin, at the age of thirteen. It was at this time until his death at age forty-six that he began his work on his tomb, which included over 6,000 figures of Terra Cotta. This really spoke of the strong belief the Chinese had of Afterlife. Their perception was that it is like this life. That's why the emperor prepared his army, entertainment, food and all things necessary. The actual figures that we saw were beyond imagination or description. They had details in their hair, hat, clothes, shoes, fingernails, facial features and size. It was a breathtaking experience and made the land of Ancient China come alive. I have Skype and have contact with two (Chinese) students of mine. I was trying to explain to one. She didn't understand “Terra Cotta” at first. When she understood, we had a wonderful conversation about her country's amazing artifacts.

[Anonymous]

I saw this exhibit over the summer. It is an amazing display of Chinese sculpture and craftmanship. I highly recommend it! I would be wonderful to have sen all of them together in the tomb, but this is the next best thing.

[Anonymous]

Yes. This exhibit was simply amazing!!! My oldest daughter read somenthing about the "Terracota Soldier" and the only point of reference she had to understand it was a movie : The Last Emperor (I'm not sure). So, when she found out about this exhibit it was almost mandatory for the whole family to go. We learned a lot and I could tell that my daughter had a better time than anybody else.

[Anonymous]

I too went to see the Terra Cotta warriors. It was a major revelation about
the Qi or (Qin) dynasty. On the Discovery Channel, they had a four hour presentation of
the affect of the emporer's rule on China at that time.
It was most disheartening to hear that much of Chinese literature, history,
and cultural writings were destroyed by the Emporer at that time.
As a result, there will be many parts of Chinese history that will have to be
divined with the surviving documents from that period.

[Anonymous]

I saw this exhibit in the spring of 2008 and it was fantastic. At that time, my knowledge of China was limited to events following the Ming-Qing transition, so much of the information was new to me. The variety of artifacts and the fact that the warriors themselves were left until the end of the exhibit (to build anticipation, I assume) worked well to paint a complete picture of the time period.

[Anonymous]

I've always been interested in understanding Chinese eschatology. It's cool that we can get to enjoy these treasures here in the States. Thanks for sharing.

[Anonymous]

By the way, there was a special last week on the history channel that profiled China's "first emperor" who had these great statues built. These soldiers carried real weapons that were works of art in itself...

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