The next day, our first full day in Xi'an, we headed out with a tour group from our hostel to the terracotta warriors. For those of you who don't know of the terracotta warriors, a little history lesson for ya:
The warriors were constructed by Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor to unite China. They say there are around 8000 warriors (they're still excavating). They were built because the emperor believed that he would still rule China in his afterlife and needed an army to help him (our tour guide kept telling us that he was crazy). One of the best known facts about the army is that no two warriors are the same. Each person was originally holding their own weapons, but they were made of wood so they disintegrated long ago (same with several chariots made of wood). Everything was painted life like colors, but after 2000 years of being underground, the paint on the clay vanished almost instantly when they were dug up and exposed to air. Each warrior is life size and was constructed after an actual person, so each one's facial features - and even hair styles - are unique. And when the army was finished being constructed, the emperor had all of the workers killed so that no one would know the secret of the army and come and destroy it. Probably one of the reasons it stayed so well preserved for so long.
The army wasn't discovered until 2000 years after it was constructed. In 1974, a peasant was digging a well and dug up a warrior's head. Our tour guide told us that the government paid him 10 yuan (about $1.25) for his find, since they had no idea what it would lead to. But he has since been well taken care of, being provided a great house, not having to work, and meeting leaders from around the world (Including our very own Bill Clinton). The man is now about 85 years old and hangs out in one of the buildings on the warrior compound almost every day, and we actually got to see him.
It was about an hour drive out to the site from our hostel. The grounds that the warriors are located on are pretty expansive, and we did a lot of walking. The first thing we made our way to was a building that houses a couple bronze chariots as well as many examples of the weapons that the warriors held. The bronze chariots were really nice and detailed. They are built a quarter of the actual size, because the emperor believed that when he got to heaven they would expand to full size to meet his needs.
From there we went to a little cinema which has a short film detailing some of the history of the warriors. It was all in English and didn't even have Chinese subtitles. Guess they know who their audience is. (This is where we got to see the man who discovered the warriors. He was sitting behind a table with a big "No Photos" sign on it.)
From there we moved on to Pit one, the biggest of the 3 pits where the warriors are located. The room is about as long as a football field and there are about 6000 warriors and horses, all standing in battle formation. Pit 2 is the smallest area, with only 72 warriors and is believed to be the army headquarters because of so many high ranking generals that were found in this area. Pit 3 is decently large, but most of the warriors haven't been unearthed yet. But there are apparently about 1300 warriors in this area. Also in Pit 3, they have a couple warriors enclosed in glass cases, so you can get up close to them and really see all the detail (even the tread on the bottoms of their shoes is unique!). They have even been able to preserve a little bit of paint on a couple of the warriors.
The army wasn't discovered until 2000 years after it was constructed. In 1974, a peasant was digging a well and dug up a warrior's head. Our tour guide told us that the government paid him 10 yuan (about $1.25) for his find, since they had no idea what it would lead to. But he has since been well taken care of, being provided a great house, not having to work, and meeting leaders from around the world (Including our very own Bill Clinton). The man is now about 85 years old and hangs out in one of the buildings on the warrior compound almost every day, and we actually got to see him.
It was about an hour drive out to the site from our hostel. The grounds that the warriors are located on are pretty expansive, and we did a lot of walking. The first thing we made our way to was a building that houses a couple bronze chariots as well as many examples of the weapons that the warriors held. The bronze chariots were really nice and detailed. They are built a quarter of the actual size, because the emperor believed that when he got to heaven they would expand to full size to meet his needs.
From there we went to a little cinema which has a short film detailing some of the history of the warriors. It was all in English and didn't even have Chinese subtitles. Guess they know who their audience is. (This is where we got to see the man who discovered the warriors. He was sitting behind a table with a big "No Photos" sign on it.)
From there we moved on to Pit one, the biggest of the 3 pits where the warriors are located. The room is about as long as a football field and there are about 6000 warriors and horses, all standing in battle formation. Pit 2 is the smallest area, with only 72 warriors and is believed to be the army headquarters because of so many high ranking generals that were found in this area. Pit 3 is decently large, but most of the warriors haven't been unearthed yet. But there are apparently about 1300 warriors in this area. Also in Pit 3, they have a couple warriors enclosed in glass cases, so you can get up close to them and really see all the detail (even the tread on the bottoms of their shoes is unique!). They have even been able to preserve a little bit of paint on a couple of the warriors.
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