The Chinese Emperors’ Eternal Armies

Recently, several figures similar to Jing Di’s soldiers have appeared on the New York art market, a sign of continued grave robbing.

Of the relatively intact pits, each has a different theme. Pit #17 contains 70 terracotta soldiers marching behind carriages drawn by wooden horses. The soldiers, toppled by a cave-in years ago, carry iron swords slung at their hips, halberds, and wooden shields. The wooden horses have decayed, but bronze bits and carriage axles remain. Oddly, the pit was filled ten feet high with wheat, corn, and millet, and may have served as a granary.

Pit #20 contains numerous red lacquer boxes bound with metal belts. Time and intruders have destroyed many of them and they have not been opened by excavators, but it is believed they held weapons, serving as a armory.

Pit #21 contains sculptured animals such as oxen, dogs, sheep, and pigs. Also, a clay soldier lies beside two iron cooking pots and two large ceramic soup bowls and smaller bowls. A chow line perhaps? No archers, cavalry or armored infantry have yet been found. However, the tools, coins, cups, and animals excavated imply a rear-guard supply troop. Female figures, possibly servants or courtesans, also were included. Front-line soldiers may be discovered when the other pits are excavated.

The Eternal Army

Qin’s soldiers are well proportioned and stand slightly taller than average height for the period. His gifted artisans were able to give the eternal army a feeling of being just about to move. This aura of "motion in stillness" was achieved by postures of the figures, alertness of the expressions, and arrangement of the army as ready to march into battle. Contributing to this feeling is that one must climb into the excavation and actually walk among the soldiers to view them closely.

The figures were made by using a combination of molds and hand sculpting. The heads, for instance, were each cast from one of perhaps a dozen different molds, then hand sculpting of the eyes and noses, the addition of a variety of mustaches, eyebrows, ears, hair, and headgear provided individual distinctions.

In this way one head mold could produce a group of faces that had little or no similarity.

In the same way, a variety of limbs and armor could be combined to produce an infinity of individual soldiers. Constructed from a delicately textured clay, and painted after firing, Qin’s army must have provided a very imposing and realistic presentation. The paint has flaked off over the centuries, but remaining traces show that there were different color schemes, perhaps distinguishing army units.