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Although, as&nbsp;one of China’s ancient capitals, Xi’an was the&nbsp;scene of much skullduggery, intrigue and&nbsp;rumbustious behaviour in the deep dark&nbsp;past, for much of the 20th century, its&nbsp;citizens lived quiet, somewhat uneventful&nbsp;lives. That, however, was all to change on&nbsp;29 March 1974, when a small group of&nbsp;farmers set off to dig a well some 50km&nbsp;northeast of the city centre.
As they set about the task of&nbsp;pinpointing some elusive underground&nbsp;waterway, they noticed that their labours&nbsp;had uncovered some unusual-looking&nbsp;red soil, something that none of them&nbsp;was familiar with. Undeterred, they&nbsp;persevered, soon uncovering a life-sized&nbsp;pottery head and then several bronze arrowheads. Rightly sensing that the site they were astride&nbsp;concealed far more than a subterranean stream, they reported&nbsp;their initial findings to the local authorities. The city was never&nbsp;to be the same again.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-43542" src="//www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH.jpg" alt="Terracotta&nbsp;Army" width="700" height="466" srcset="https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH.jpg 700w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH-200x133.jpg 200w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH-421x280.jpg 421w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH-120x80.jpg 120w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH-500x333.jpg 500w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH-400x266.jpg 400w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/xi-an-750899_1920_PATH-600x399.jpg 600w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" />
What these sturdy rural engineers had stumbled upon&nbsp;would soon be acclaimed as the greatest archaeological&nbsp;discovery of the 20th century – the now-legendary Terracotta&nbsp;Army. Stowed beneath the silent, preserving soil for more&nbsp;than 2,000 years, this vast ceramic squadron was the work&nbsp;of more than 700,000 ancient artisans, all carrying out the&nbsp;bidding of the elders of the Qin Dynasty (221-206 BC). In total&nbsp;– as the wondering world was about to discover – there were&nbsp;some 7,000 figurines, many of which stood still battle-ready&nbsp;some 20 centuries on.
As the excavation activity broadened, neighbouring plots&nbsp;proved to be home to some 600 horses and more than 100&nbsp;chariots. All of these were in perfect scale with each life-sized&nbsp;soldier, who all stood at more than 1.8m in height and weighed&nbsp;some 272kg each. This was regardless as to whether they were&nbsp;infantrymen, cavalrymen, archers or officers.
Although the centuries had inevitably muted their colour&nbsp;schemes, it was still possible to determine just how brightly&nbsp;decorated each figurine had once been. Careful examination&nbsp;revealed the army’s hair had once been&nbsp;uniformly black, while their skin tones&nbsp;had been various shades of pink. It also&nbsp;indicated that the mighty army had once&nbsp;been clad in variously-hued purple and&nbsp;red robes.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter wp-image-43543 size-full" src="//www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2.jpg" alt="Terracotta&nbsp;Army" width="700" height="466" srcset="https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2.jpg 700w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2-200x133.jpg 200w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2-421x280.jpg 421w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2-120x80.jpg 120w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2-500x333.jpg 500w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2-400x266.jpg 400w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2015-09-22-124332_-_Terrakotta-Armee_Halle_2-600x399.jpg 600w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" />
None of these revelations, however,&nbsp;answered the two questions that everyone&nbsp;was asking – Why was such an army&nbsp;ever created and what was it intended&nbsp;to defend its makers from? Although the&nbsp;driving force behind the pieces was soon&nbsp;identified – China’s first emperor, Qin Shi&nbsp;Huang, a man notoriously obsessed with&nbsp;his own mortality – his exact motivation&nbsp;remained lost in the mists of time.
Inevitably, just as the ancient army&nbsp;awoke from its slumber, so, too, did&nbsp;Xi’an itself. Suddenly, it was no long era historical backwater, renowned only&nbsp;as a place where things used to happen.&nbsp;Instead, it was at the very epi centre&nbsp;of the kind of global archaeological&nbsp;excitement not seen since the discovery of the&nbsp;tomb of the boy-king Tutankhamen in Egypt’s&nbsp;Valley of the Kings back in 1922.
Essentially, the uncovering of the Terracotta&nbsp;Army, together with China’s emergence at the&nbsp;very forefront of global tourism, has transformed&nbsp;Xi’an. While Beijing had long ago usurped its onetime&nbsp;role as China’s national capital, its preeminence&nbsp;as an international visitor destination is now inviolable.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-43544" src="//www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920.jpg" alt="Terracotta&nbsp;Army" width="700" height="466" srcset="https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920.jpg 700w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920-200x133.jpg 200w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920-421x280.jpg 421w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920-120x80.jpg 120w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920-500x333.jpg 500w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920-400x266.jpg 400w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/terracotta-warriors-2376695_1920-600x399.jpg 600w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" />
Today, Xi’an and its longburied&nbsp;ceramic residents – now&nbsp;often collectively referred to as&nbsp;the Eighth Wonder of the World – attract countless domestic and international tourists&nbsp;every year. In 2016 alone, more that 150 million&nbsp;visitors came to pay their respects, netting the city’s&nbsp;hospitality sector some 120 billion yuan (US$18 billion)&nbsp;– 18 percent of the city’s total annual income.
One clear beneficiary has been the city’s housing&nbsp;market, which has soared, with government officials and&nbsp;developers now planning to create an additional hundred&nbsp;thousand homes, to address its rising population – a&nbsp;consequence of both the tourism boom and the success&nbsp;of China’s national urbanisation policies.
Similarly, knowing that the city’s historic legacy is&nbsp;not enough on its own to draw in and retain tourists,&nbsp;while persuading them to inject as much of their&nbsp;disposable income into the local economy as possible,&nbsp;Xi’an has been quick to transform its overall hospitality&nbsp;offering. This has seen the arrival of a string of multi starred&nbsp;hotels, Western-style shopping malls – often&nbsp;flaunting many of the same brands that woo shoppers&nbsp;in far-distant Shanghai and Beijing.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-43545" src="//www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014.jpg" alt="Terracotta&nbsp;Army" width="700" height="466" srcset="https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014.jpg 700w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014-200x133.jpg 200w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014-421x280.jpg 421w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014-120x80.jpg 120w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014-500x333.jpg 500w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014-400x266.jpg 400w, https://www.gafencushop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Xian_-_City_wall_-_014-600x399.jpg 600w" sizes="(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px" />
This transformation in its reputation has not just been restricted&nbsp;to academic circles. As a testament to this, a huge number of&nbsp;conferences and cultural symposiums have been held within the city’s&nbsp;precincts in recent years. In 2017, for instance, it was the host city&nbsp;for the Sino-French Culture Forum, an event renowned for gathering&nbsp;many of the best-known and brightest academic minds across a vast&nbsp;array of disciplines, including music, architecture and design.&nbsp;
It’s remarkable to think that that the core of this whole-scale&nbsp;urban transformation lurked in the city’s subterranean depths&nbsp;untouched for more than two millennia. It is more remarkable still that&nbsp;this unwitting gift from the city’s forefathers should have had such a&nbsp;widespread and far-reaching impact on the metropolis to this day.
As it is, it is all but impossible not to wonder just how many similar&nbsp;marvels lie undiscovered in China, Asia, Europe and the&nbsp;wider world – each one a ticking treasure&nbsp;trove that could reshape lives and&nbsp;reboot urban (or even&nbsp;national) economies,&nbsp;while introducing&nbsp;us to secrets so&nbsp;ancient that their very&nbsp;existence remains wholly&nbsp;unsuspected.

Text: <a href="mailto:bailey@itotalmedia.com">Bailey Atkinson</a>&nbsp;

Soldiers of Fortune: 45 years ago the Terracotta Army was discovered

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Soldiers of Fortune: 45 years ago the Terracotta Army was discovered