Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-7zcd7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-13T04:35:35.235Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The First Emperor and sculpture in China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 October 2013

Lukas Nickel
Lukas Nickel*
Affiliation:
SOAS, University of London
*
ln2@soas.ac.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Sculpture as an artistic medium was widely employed in the arts of Greece and the Hellenistic East, but played only a minor role in ancient East Asia. This changed dramatically with the First Emperor of China who marked his ascent to the throne in 221 bc with the erection of giant bronze sculptures outside his palace and the installation of thousands of terracotta figures in his tomb. The current text sets out to investigate the sudden and short-lived surge of sculpture making in third-century bc China and places it in the context of developments across Asia of the time. The text joins art historical, archaeological and textual evidence to investigate whether the First Emperor's extraordinary interest in sculpture may have been the result of contacts with the contemporary Hellenistic world.

Keywords

SculptureHellenismCultural exchangeQin-period ChinaTerracotta warriorsQin Shi HuangdiGraeco-BactriaAi Khanoum

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Bulletin of SOAS , Volume 76 , Issue 3 , October 2013 , pp. 413 - 447
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Barnard, Richard. 2004. “Alexander in China?”, in Xiaoneng, Yang (ed.), New Perspectives on China's Past. Chinese Archaeology in the Twentieth Century. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 329–43.Google Scholar
Bernard, Paul. 1994. “The Greek Kingdoms of Central Asia”, in Harmatta, János (ed.), History of Civilizations of Central Asia, Vol. 2: The Development of Sedentary and Nomadic Civilizations. 700 B.C. to A.D. 250. Paris: Unesco publication.Google Scholar
Bernard, Paul. 2007. “The Greek colony at Ai Khanoum and Hellenism in Central Asia”, in Cambon 2007, pp. 44–55.Google Scholar
Blänsdorf, Catharina, Emmerling, E. and Petzet, M. (eds). 2001. The Terracotta Army of the First Chinese Emperor Qin Shihuang. Munich: Lipp Verlag.Google Scholar
Boardman, John. 1993. The Diffusion of Classical Art in Antiquity. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Bosworth, Albert Brian. 1988. Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Boyle, Katie, Renfew, Colin and Levine, Marsha. 2002. Ancient Interactions – East and West in Eurasia. Cambridge: McDonald Institute.Google Scholar
Brinker, Helmut. 1995. “Vom Ursprung des Menschenbildes”, in Goepper 1995, 13–35.Google Scholar
Broschat, Katja et al. 2007. “Die Bronzevögel des Ersten Kaisers – Restaurierung und Technologie”, in Unter der gelben Erde – die deutsch-chinesische Zusammenarbeit im Kulturgüterschutz. Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland GmbH. Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 81–94.Google Scholar
Cambon, Pierre (ed.). 2007. Hidden Afghanistan. Amsterdam: De Nieuwe Kerk.Google Scholar
Chen Li 沈琍. 2010. “Huo Qubing mu ji qi shijiao yanjiu de huigu ji sikao” 霍去病墓及其石雕研究的回顧及思考 (Review and reconsideration of research on the tomb of Huo Qubing and its stone sculpture), Kaogu yu Wenwu 2010/6, 60–6.Google Scholar
Christopoulos, Lucas. 2012. “Hellenes and Romans in Ancient China (240 bc–1398 ad)”, Sino-Platonic Papers, no. 230.Google Scholar
Cuo mu. 1995. Cuo mu. Zhanguo Zhongshanguo guowang zhi mu Cuo 墓-戰國中山國國王之墓 (The tomb of Cuo – The tomb of the king of Zhongshan state of the Zhanguo period). Beijing: Wenwu Press.Google Scholar
Delaine, Janet. 2002. “The temple of Hadrian at Cyzicus and Roman attitudes to exceptional construction”, Papers of the British School at Rome, vol. 70, 205–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dintsis, Petros. 1986. Hellenistische Helme. (Archaeologica 43.) Rome: Giorgio Bretschneider.Google Scholar
Von Erdberg, Eleanor. 1990. “Die Soldaten Shih-huang-ti's – Porträts?”, in Kraatz, Martin, Meyer zur Capellen, Jürg and Seckel, Dietrich (eds), Das Bildnis in der Kunst des Orients. (Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 50/1.) Stuttgart: Steiner, 221–34.Google Scholar
Von Falkenhausen, Lothar. 2003. “The external connections of Sanxingdui”, Journal of East Asian Archaeology 5/1–4, 191–245.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Von Falkenhausen, Lothar. 2004. “Mortuary behaviour in pre-Imperial Qin: a religious interpretation”, in Lagerwey, John (ed.), Religion and Chinese Society, vol. I. Ancient and Medieval China. Hong Kong and Paris: The Chinese University Press and École française d'Extrême-Orient, 109–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Von Falkenhausen, Lothar. 2006. Chinese Society in the Age of Confucius (1000–250 bc). The Archaeological Evidence. Los Angeles: Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Francfort, Henri-Paul. 1988. “Central Asia and Eastern Iran”, in Boardman, John et al. (eds), The Cambridge Ancient History, vol. 4. Persia, Greece, and the Western Mediterranean ca. 525 to 479 bc. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 165–93.Google Scholar
Goepper, Roger (ed.). 1995. Das Alte China. Essen: Kulturstiftung Ruhr.Google Scholar
Gombrich, Ernst. 1972. The Story of Art. London: Phaidon.Google Scholar
Dashun, Guo. 2004. “The Hongshan culture complex at Niuheliang and the origins of ritual in China”, in Xiaoneng, Yang, New Perspectives on China's Past – Chinese Archaeology in the Twentieth Century. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 144–59.Google Scholar
Hannestad, Lise. 2013. “A comparative study of the cultural dynamics in two cities of the eastern Seleucid Kingdom: Uruk and Ai Khanoum”, in Lindström et al. 2013, 99–113.Google Scholar
Hanshu. Ban Gu 班固. Hanshu 漢書. (Documents of the Han Dynasty.) Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1962.Google Scholar
Yoshito, Harada 原田淑人, (1885–1974) 1936. “Qin zhi jinren” 秦之金人 (The Metal Men of Qin), trans. Guwu yanjiu (古物研究, Research on Antiquities). Shanghai: Shangwu press.Google Scholar
He Xilin 賀西林. 2009. “‘Huo Qubing mu’ de zai kaosi” ‘霍去病墓’的再思考 (Reconsidering the ‘Tomb of Huo Qubing’), Meishu yanjiu/Art Research 2009/3, 32–44.Google Scholar
Von den Hoff, Ralf. 2013. “Alexanderbildnisse und imitatio Alexandri in Baktrien”, in Lindström et al. 2013, 83–97.Google Scholar
Hölscher, Tonio. 1971. Ideal und Wirklichkeit in den Bildnissen Alexanders des Großen. Heidelberg: C. Winter.Google Scholar
Holt, Frank L. 1988. Alexander the Great and Bactria. The Formation of a Greek Frontier in Central Asia. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Holt, Frank L. 2005. Into the Land of Bones – Alexander the Great in Afghanistan (Hellenistic Culture and Society 47.) Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Howard, Angela Falco, Song, Li, Hung, Wu and Hong, Yang (eds). 2006. Chinese Sculpture. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Huainanzi. He Ning 何寧. Huainanzi jishi 淮南子集釋 (The Huainanzi collected and interpreted). Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1998.Google Scholar
Jettmar, Karl. 1989. “Der Oxus-Schatz und das Heiligtum von Tachti Sangin”, Oxus 1989, 171–5.Google Scholar
Boqin, Jiang 姜伯勤. 2004. Zhongguo Aojiao yishushi yanjiu 中國襖教藝術史研究 (A History of Zoroastrian Art). Beijing: Xinhua Press.Google Scholar
Kaogu yu wenwu 1996/5, pp. 1–8. “Xianyang Shiyougangguan Gangshengchang Qin mu qingli jianbao” 咸陽石油鋼管鋼繩廠秦墓清理簡報 (Preliminary report on the excavation of the Qin period tombs at the steel factory of the Oil and Steel factory in Xianyang).Google Scholar
Kesner, Ladislav. 1995. “Likeness of no one: (re)presenting the First Emperor's army”, The Art Bulletin, 77/1 (March 1995), 115–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Khayutina, Maria (ed.). 2013. Qin – The Eternal Emperor and his Terracotta Warriors. Zurich: Verlag Neue Zürcher Zeitung.Google Scholar
Ledderose, Lothar. 2000. Ten Thousand Things – Module and Mass Production in Chinese Art. Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ledderose, Lothar and Schlombs, Adele (eds). 1990. Jenseits der Grossen Mauer – Der Erste Kaiser von China und seine Terrakotta-Armee. Dortmund and Munich: Museum am Ostwall.Google Scholar
Legge, James. 1895. The Chinese Classics, vol. 2: The Work of Mencius. Oxford: Trübner & Co.Google Scholar
Yinde, Li. 2012. “Excavations and studies of the Western Han tombs of the Chu kings”, in Lin 2012, 43–48.Google Scholar
Lin, James (ed.). 2012. The Search for Immortality – Tomb Treasures of Han China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Meicun, Lin 林梅村. 2006. Sichou zhi lu kaogu shiwu jiang 絲綢之路考古十五講 (Fifteen lectures on the archaeology of the Silk Road). Beijing: Beijing University Press.Google Scholar
Lindström, Gunvor, Hansen, Svend, Wieczorek, Alfried et al. (eds). 2013. Zwischen Ost und West – Neue Forschungen zum antiken Zentralasien. Darmstadt: Philipp von Zabern.Google Scholar
Loeb. 1917. Jones, Horace Leonard (trans.), The Geography of Strabo. (Loeb Classical Library.) 8 volumes. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 1917–32.Google Scholar
Loewe, Michael. 1985. “The royal tombs of Zhongshan (c. 310 b.c.)”, Arts Asiatiques 40, 130–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Loewe, Michael. 2010. “Imperial tombs”, in Nylan, Michael and Loewe, Michael (eds), China's Early Empires, a Re-Appraisal. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 213–31.Google Scholar
Liancheng, Lu 盧連成 and Zhisheng, Hu 胡智生. 1988. Baoji Yu guo mu di 寶雞？國墓地 (The cemetery of the Yu state in Baoji). Beijing: Wenwu Press.Google Scholar
Mairs, Rachel. 2011. The Archaeology of the Hellenistic Far East, BAR International Series 2196.Google Scholar
Major, John S. et al. (ed. and trans.). 2010. The Huainanzi – a Guide to the Theory and Practice of Government in Early Han China. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Martinón-Torres, Marcos et al. 2012. “Forty thousand arms for a single emperor – from chemical data to labor organization in the production of bronze arrows for the Terracotta Army”, Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, October 2012.Google Scholar
Shunying, Mu 穆舜英 and Mingzhi, Wang 王明哲. 1985. Xinjiang gudai minzu wenwu 新疆古代民族文物 (Artefacts of the ancient peoples of Xinjiang). Beijing: Wenwu Press.Google Scholar
Nickel, Lukas (ed.). 2002. Return of the Buddha. Zurich: Museum Rietberg; London: Royal Academy.Google Scholar
Nickel, Lukas. 2006. “Tonkrieger auf der Seidenstrasse? Die Plastiken des Ersten Kaisers von China und die hellenistische Skulptur Zentralasiens”, Zurich Studies in the History of Art/Georges Bloch Annual, vol. 13–14, 124–49.Google Scholar
Nickel, Lukas. 2007. “The Terracotta Army”, in Portal 2007, 158–79.Google Scholar
Nickel, Lukas. 2011. “Yazhou shiye zhong de bingmayong” 亞洲視野中的兵馬俑 (The Terracotta Warriors in an Asian Context), in Yan, Zheng and Hung, Wu (eds), Studies on Ancient Tomb Art, vol. 1 古代墓葬美術研究（一）. Beijing: Wenwu Press, 23–40.Google Scholar
Nickel, Lukas. 2012. “The Nanyue silver box”, Arts of Asia, 42/3, 98–107.Google Scholar
Oxus 1989. Oxus – 2000 Jahre Kunst am Oxus-Fluss in Mittelasien. Zurich: Museum Rietberg.Google Scholar
Paludan, Ann. 2006. Chinese Sculpture – a Great Tradition. Chicago: Serindia Publications.Google Scholar
Parzinger, Hermann. 2008. “The ‘Silk Roads’ concept reconsidered – about transfers, transportation and transcontinental interactions in prehistory”, The Silk Road Project Newsletter 5/2, 7–15.Google Scholar
Portal, Jane (ed.). 2007. The First Emperor. China's Terracotta Army. London: The British Museum.Google Scholar
Pugatchenkova, Galina Anatoljevna. 1971. Галина Анатольевна Пугаченкова, Скульптура Халчаяна, Москва, Издательство Искусство.Google Scholar
Rawson, Jessica (ed.). 1996. Mysteries of Ancient China – New Discoveries from the Early Dynasties. London: British Museum Press.Google Scholar
Rawson, Jessica. 1999. “The eternal palaces of the Western Han – a new view of the universe”, Artibus Asiae 5/1–2, 5–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawson, Jessica. 2002. “The power of images – the model universe of the First Emperor and its legacy”, Historical Research 75, no 188 (May 2002), 123–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawson, Jessica. 2010. “Carnelian beads, animal figures and exotic vessels: traces of contact between the Chinese states and Inner Asia, c. 1000–650 bc” in Wagner, Mayke and Wei, Wang (eds), Archäologie in China, vol. 1, Bridging Eurasia. Mainz: Philip von Zabern, 1–42.Google Scholar
Report. 2000. Qin Shihuang diling yuan kaogu baogao 秦始皇帝陵園考古報告 (Excavation of the Precinct of Qin Shihuang's Mausoleum in 1999). Beijing: Wenwu Press.Google Scholar
Report. 2007. Qin Shihuangdi lingyuan kaogu baogao 2001–2003 秦始皇帝陵園考古報告 (Report on the excavations during 2001–2003 at the grave site of Emperor Qin Shihuang). Beijing: Wenwu Press.Google Scholar
Sherratt, Andres. 2006. “The trans-Eurasian exchange. The prehistory of Chinese relations with the West”, in Mair, Victor (ed.), Contact and Exchange in the Ancient World. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 30–61.Google Scholar
Yan, Shi 史岩. 1940. “Qin zhi zhong ju jinren kao” 秦之鍾鐻金人攷 (Considerations on the term zhong ju jinren of Qin), Jinling xuebao 金陵學報 10/1–2, 43–56.Google Scholar
Shiji. Sima Qian 司馬遷. Shiji 史記 (Records of the Historian). Beijing: Zhonghua Press, 1959.Google Scholar
Kurakichi, Shiratori 白鳥庫吉. (1865–1942) 1929. “Kyōdo no Kyūtoō no Ryōiki to So no Saiten no Kinjin ni tsuite” 匈奴の休屠王の領域と其の祭天の金人について.(Concerning the area of the Xiongnu-Prince Xiutu and the bronze figures for its heaven ritual), first published 1929, reprint in Saigai Minzokushi Kenkyū (塞外民族史研究 Research on the History of Peoples on the Periphery), vol. 2 (Shiratori Kurakichi Zenshū vol. 5). Tōkyō: Iwanami Shoten, 1970, 303–62.Google Scholar
So, Jenny F. (ed.). 2000. Music in the Age of Confucius. Seattle and London: Washingon University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stewart, Andrew. 1993. Faces of Power. Alexander's Image and Hellenistic Politics. Berkeley, Los Angeles and Oxford: University of California Press, 25–7.Google Scholar
Thote, Alain. 2004. “Burial practices as seen in rulers' tombs of the Eastern Zhou period. Patterns and regional traditions”, in Lagerwey, John (ed.), Religion and Chinese Society, vol. 1: Ancient and Medieval China. Hong Kong and Paris: The Chinese University Press, 65–107.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kai, Wang. 1990. “Han terracotta army in Xuzhou”, Orientations, October 1990, 62–6.Google Scholar
Wenwu 1988/11, pp. 14–23, 54. “Shaanxi Longxian Bianjiazhuang wuhao Chunqiu mu fajue jianbao” 陝西隴縣邊家庄五號春秋墓發掘簡報 (Preliminary report of the excavation of the Chunqiu period tomb no 5 in Bianjiazhuang, Longxian, Shaanxi).Google Scholar
Wenwu 2008/9, pp. 4–28. “2006 nian Gansu Zhangjiachuan huizu zizhixian Majiayuan Zhanguo mudi fajue jianbao” 2006 年甘肅張家川回族自治區馬家塬戰國墓地發掘簡報 (2006 Excavation on the Majiayuan cemetery of the Warring States period in Zhangjiachuan autonomous county of Hui Nationality).Google Scholar
Wenwu 2010/6, pp. 4–20. “Shaanxi Hancheng Liangdaicun mudi beiqu 2007 nian fajue jianbao” 陝西韓城梁帶村墓地北區 2007 年發掘簡報 (2007 Excavation on the Northern Section of the Liangdaicun Graveyard in Hancheng City, Shaanxi).Google Scholar
Hung, Wu. 2005. “On tomb figurines – the beginning of a visual tradition”, in Hung, Wu and Tsiang, Katherine R. (eds), Body and Face in Chinese Visual Culture. (Harvard East Asian Monographs 239.) Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 13–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hung, Wu. 2006. “From the Neolithic to the Han“, in Howard 2006, 17–104.Google Scholar
Xi'an 2006. Xi'an – Kaiserliche Macht im Jenseits – Grabfunde und Tempelschätze aus Chinas alter Hauptstadt. (Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland). Bonn. Philipp von Zabern.Google Scholar
Xi'an nanjiao Qin mu. 2004. Xi'an nanjiao Qin mu 西安南郊秦墓 (Qin tombs in the southern suburb of Xi'an). Xi'an: Shaanxi Renmin Press.Google Scholar
Xu, Jay. 2001. “Bronze at Sanxingdui”, in Bagley, Robert (ed.), Ancient Sichuan – Treasures from a Lost Civilization. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 59–152.Google Scholar