50 Fun Facts About Terracotta Army

The Terracotta Army was buried to protect which ruler in the afterlife?

He was the first emperor of a unified China.

In which year did local farmers discover the Terracotta Army while digging a well?

The find is the largest pottery figurine group ever discovered.

Outside which Chinese city was the Terracotta Army found?

The site is in Lintong County, Shaanxi province.

Roughly how many soldiers do the three main pits hold, according to 2007 estimates?

Plus 130 chariots with 520 horses and 150 cavalry horses, most still in the ground.

What determines the height of the individual figures?

The tallest figures are the generals.

Who led the group of farmers who found the first fragments while digging a well?

He was digging with his five brothers and a neighbour about 1.5 km east of the tomb mound.

Which historian described the tomb's construction a century after it was finished?

His Records of the Grand Historian never mentions the clay army at all.

How many conscripted workers did the ancient historian say the mausoleum project involved?

Work began in 246 BCE, when the future emperor was just 13.

What did the ancient account say flowed through the emperor's tomb in simulated rivers?

High mercury levels in the mound's soil have since lent his account credibility.

Which rebel is blamed for looting and burning the mausoleum complex after the first emperor died?

Fire damage and missing weapons in Pits 1 and 2 seem to support the story.

Roughly how large is the whole necropolis, as measured by ground-penetrating radar and core sampling?

It was built as a microcosm of the emperor's imperial palace compound.

Has the emperor's actual tomb chamber been opened?

Concerns about preserving its contents have kept archaeologists out.

How quickly can the lacquer on a newly excavated figure curl once exposed to the dry local air?

The paint can then flake off within four minutes in the dry local air.

On which side of the tomb do the warriors stand guard, and why?

The four main pits lie about 1,500 metres east of the burial mound.

How deep are the four main pits?

Up to five metres of reddish sandy soil had accumulated over the site in two millennia.

How many parallel corridors run through Pit 1, the largest pit?

The 230-metre-long pit holds the main army of more than 3,000 figures.

What does Pit 3 represent?

Pit 2 holds cavalry, infantry and war chariots as a military guard.

What is unusual about Pit 4?

Its builders may have abandoned it.

What is thought to have crushed many of the figures found in fragments?

Fire damage and burnt rafters were found in Pits 1 and 2.

How tall are the terracotta figures?

Officers are typically the taller ones.

How many base facial forms have scholars identified among the warriors?

Clay was added after moulding to give each face individual features.

Which type of headgear marks out the cavalrymen?

Chariot drivers wear helmets and more armour.

Where did the sculptors sign their names on the figures?

Workshops had to inscribe their names on products to ensure quality control.

What colour were the warriors' faces originally painted?

Eyebrows and facial hair were black; the whole figure was lacquered.

Which synthetic pigment, a barium copper silicate, was used on the warriors?

Stanford scientists linked its production to Taoist alchemists trying to synthesise jade.

The barium copper silicate pigment on the warriors made China the first civilisation to develop what?

The pigment was later found to occur naturally as the rare mineral effenbergerite.

How were the figures assembled?

Then they were placed in the pits in precise military formation.

What everyday product were the warriors' legs made in the same way as?

This makes the process a form of assembly-line production.

What did a 2021 morphological study suggest about the figures' faces?

Some scholars think the realism comes from modelling on actual soldiers.

What was found in Pit K9901, uncovered in 1999?

The muscular, loincloth-clad figures show an advanced grasp of anatomy.

Which art historian first speculated in 1986 that the army's realism showed a Hellenistic influence?

Later archaeologists have called such claims unsupported and Eurocentric.

A grave pit excavated in 2003 held how many skeletons of the necropolis workers?

DNA showed a diverse workforce with many from southern China.

Roughly how many bronze weapons have been recovered from the pits?

Most are arrowheads, usually found in bundles of 100.

Analysis of the Terracotta Army's arrowheads suggested production like which modern company's factories?

Each bundle of 100 formed a distinct chemical cluster, pointing to cellular manufacturing.

What did 2019 research conclude about the thin chromium layer on some weapons?

The alkaline soil and fine particles more likely did the preserving.

Inscriptions on some swords date their manufacture to which years?

That means the weapons had been in use before burial.

Grinding marks seen under an electron microscope show the earliest industrial use of which tool?

It was used for polishing bronze weapons.

What is the Taerpo horserider, from a tomb near Xianyang?

The small pre-Qin figure wears Scythian-style clothing and looks like a foreigner.

Where was the first exhibition of the figures outside China held, in 1982?

Later shows have toured Europe, the Americas and Australia.

The British Museum's 2007-08 Terracotta Army show drew its biggest crowds since which show?

400,000 advance tickets sold out and the museum stayed open until midnight.

Besides the Terracotta Army, what other set of artefacts is said to draw a crowd by name alone?

On the British Museum's Chinese New Year day the crush forced the gates shut.

In which year was the mausoleum, including the Terracotta Army, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site?

The tomb itself has still not been excavated.

How tall is the truncated-pyramid tomb mound over the emperor's burial chamber?

Trees were planted on it so that it resembled a natural hill.

What were found in a pit linked to the west tomb passage?

Bronze cranes and ducks were also found set in an underground park.

Which two later Han-era terracotta armies show the tradition continued in miniature?

The Qin's life-size monumental style vanished until Buddhist sculpture arrived centuries later.

Besides soldiers, which figures have been found in other pits of the necropolis?

Stone armour suits and burial sites of rare animals have also been found.

What did 18th and 19th century grave-diggers near Mount Li do when they struck terracotta fragments?

For centuries occasional reports of tiles, bricks and fragments had surfaced.

Which geographer, six centuries after the emperor died, explained why Mount Li was chosen for his tomb?

He wrote that its north side was rich in gold and its south in jade.

What was built over Pit 1, the largest pit, when the site became a museum?

Pit 1 was covered by a large hangar-like hall when the on-site museum opened in 1979; Chinese archaeologists including Zhao Kangmin had investigated after the farmers' find.

Which lost monumental works show the emperor commissioned giant human statues in his lifetime?

They were cast from confiscated weapons after the unification of 221 BCE.