The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army | 
 enlarge | Creator: Jane Portal
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $40.00
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Rating:  1 reviews
Sales Rank: 206650
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 3.4
Dimensions (in): 11.5 x 8.9 x 1.1
ISBN: 0674026977
Dewey Decimal Number: 931.04
EAN: 9780674026971
ASIN: 0674026977
Publication Date: November 1, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: good condition
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Product Description
Standing guard around the tomb of Qin Shihuangdi, the ranks of a terracotta army bear silent witness to the vast power of the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty, who unified China in 221 BCE. Six thousand warriors and horses make up the army, while chariots, a military guard, and a command post complete the host. A new look at one of the most spectacular finds in the annals of archaeology, this book also considers the historical and archaeological context of the Terracotta Army, as well as the extensive research and excavation carried out since its discovery in 1974. In richly illustrated chapters, experts in the field describe the Qin's rise and military conquest, the empire's ideology and practices, and the emperor's achievements and legacy. The authors examine the site itself, including new discoveries such as terracotta bureaucrats, acrobats, and strongmen, life-size bronze birds, hundreds of suits of stone armor, and terracotta warriors with colored faces preserved with new technology. From explorations of the massive mausoleum and the rituals that surrounded it, to explanations of the actual manufacture of the Terracotta Army, the book offers a detailed and authoritative tour of one of ancient history's most eloquent memorials, with all it says of China's long and coherent cultural past--and future potential. (20080901)
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| Customer Reviews:
Wonderful photos of the Emperor's Army July 5, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army is the catalog of the British Museum's exhibition September 2007 through April 2008. (Much of the material is archived on its website.) The exhibition featured the largest group of important objects relating to the First Emperor ever loaned abroad by China.
Most of the 120 objects displayed in the exhibit and book came from the tomb of Qin Shihuangdi, the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty. He reigned from 221 BCE when he unified China to 210 BCE. One of the key points of the exhibit -- apart from the marvelous art which is displayed in superb reproductions -- is to correct "[t]he written record [which] is distorted by bias, and the 'portraits' of him [that] date from the Ming dynasty onwards (AD 1368-1644) and are purely imaginary." The first half of the exhibit and catalog focus on his accomplishments and the second half focuses on the contents of his tomb.
The photographs and text are much too rich to summarize here; one of the best illustrations is of two recently discovered terracotta musicians, one sitting, one kneeling, with three bronze birds. The musicians are about to play and the tame, trained birds -- a swan, a goose and a crane -- are about to dance.
This short extract gives a fair indication of the quality of the text:
"Today his large burial mound occupies the centre of the compound. This artificial hill has the shape of a truncated pyramid, with a base of approximately 350 square metres, planted with bushes and trees. The terracotta army is buried in four pits to the east of the tomb mound, outside the walls of the tomb complex. It is as if it were placed there to guard the tomb from attack from the east, where all the conquered states lay. The four pits seem to represent a complete garrison: the total number of figures is estimated at over 7,000. All the warriors originally carried lifesize real weapons, many of which disappeared when the pits were looted and burned in the rebellions after the first emperor's death.
"It is perhaps the enormous scale of the terracotta army as well as the quality of the depiction and manufacture of its members that moves visitors so greatly. These mature, life-size sculptures seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, as there was no tradition of such large or such realistic sculptures in the centuries preceding the Qin. Although the warriors have been described by some as individual portraits in clay of actual soldiers, it has now been shown that their manufacture was a great and early feat of mass production: a small and quite limited repertoire of body parts was produced using moulds, coiling and slab building. (3) They were joined together in a multitude of combinations, with details worked by hand afterwards before the whole figure was painted. Endless variety, for example of costumes, hairstyles, hand positions or facial features, was therefore possible (Figs. 5-10), but in no way are the figures individual portraits."
The catalog contains eight pages of bibliography with four pages devoted to a glossary and to a chronology. (The over-all chronology covers 3000 years so the short portion for the Emperor's life is crammed and difficult to read, and sometimes not expanded in the text.) The maps are superficial and not particularly helpful to a general reader. Nonetheless, this is a very good survey of the First Emperor, and as Jane Portal writes:
"It is predicted that excavations at the site of the tomb will continue for generations, as new discoveries are made year after year and new techniques of conservation and scientific research are introduced and perfected. It will doubtless take longer to excavate the first emperor's tomb complex than the approximate 36 years it took to build."
Consequently, the general reader will have to continue to buy new books to keep up with the discoveries. This wonderful catalog is a great way to survey the current state of knowledge.
I've given this catalog only four stars, not to reflect any real weakness in the book, but merely to recognize the greatness of The Eternal Army: The Terracotta Army of the First Chinese Emperor (Timeless Treasures). The reviews here on Amazon are accurate and glowing; Roberto Ciarla's text is fuller and much more detailed, and there are more photographs, some in extraordinary detail.
That written, the best approach is to buy both books. I learned a great deal from both of them.
Robert C. Ross 2008
Robert C. Ross 2008
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