Spring and Autumn to the Warring States Jade Man (front) Collection of the Freer Museum of Art, USA
Spring and Autumn to the Warring States Jade Man (back) Collection of the Freer Museum of Art, USA
In the late Shang Dynasty, a humanoid jade carving sat on the foot
The tomb of Yin Xu Woman was unearthed
Late Shang Dynasty, double-sided yin and yang jade people
Middle and late Warring States, Jade People
Collection of the Harvard Art Museum
At the end of the Warring States period, the double jade dancer
Collection of the National Museum of Asian Art
At the end of the Warring States period, the Jade Dancer
Guangzhou Fenghuanggang was excavated
At the end of the Warring States period, in the early Western Han Dynasty, jade dancers
Collection of Jiangxi Provincial Museum
In the early Western Han Dynasty, jade dancers
The tomb of the King of Nanyue in Guangzhou was excavated
Han Dynasty White Jade People
Collection of the Palace Museum
Western Han Dynasty, round carved jade man
The Duling site was excavated
Late Western Han Dynasty, jade dancer
The Tomb of the Three Bridges han in Xi'an was excavated
The Dabaotai Han Tomb in Beijing was excavated
Yongcheng Mangshan Han Tomb was excavated
Eastern Han Dynasty, Jade Dancer
The tomb of Liu Chang, King Mu of Zhongshan in Dingzhou, was excavated
Tang Dynasty Flying
Shanghai Museum
Song Dynasty, jade carving boys and girls
Collection of the National Museum
In the Ming Dynasty, the female pattern jade ornament
Collection of the Capital Museum
In the Qing Dynasty, alkyx fairies held peaches
Lingbi high-rise commune was unearthed
Tomb No. 157 of Zhangjiapo was excavated
Wood carved human face in the Creek Cemetery
In ancient times, masks were closely related to factors such as tribal wars, animal totems, ancestor worship, and so on. In the vast areas of Xinjiang, various ancient masks have also been unearthed to depict the faces of local residents.
In 2002, the Xinjiang Institute of Archaeology found two wood-carved figures in the Xiaohe cemetery in the Loulan area. One of the pieces is relatively well preserved, 8.7 cm high, 5.1 cm wide and 6.1 cm thick, and the facial features are carved in a very exaggerated way, and then the long and tall nose is towered over the large mouth that exposes the teeth, and the bridge of the nose is decorated with wool. Of course, other wood carved figurines with typical Indo-European characteristics have also been unearthed in the Xiaohe cemetery.
Clay figurines from the Sea of Shanshan
The human face in Cyclades culture
A year later, the Xinjiang Institute of Archaeology found a slender nose bridge of a clay figurine in the Yanghai tomb in Shanshan County. Eyes and mouth seem to be closed, as if closing their eyes to recuperate. The latter, in particular, is very similar in appearance and artistic technique to the marble carvings of the Cycladic civilization era in ancient Greece.
Many steppe peoples have a tradition of building stone peoples, and this Cypriot stone man built in the 4th and 1st centuries BC is a typical proof.
In 1989, the Xinjiang Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology found a well-preserved male corpse wearing gorgeous costumes in an ancient tomb in Yingpan, Xinjiang. This Western nobleman known as the "Yingpan Beauty Man" is 180 cm tall, his hair and body hair are light brown, and when his body was unearthed, he wore a red robe with a Greco-Roman symmetrical angel and warrior duel pattern, in which the angel and warrior pattern clearly has a Greek tradition, but the symmetrical pattern under the tree is a Persian custom; his lower body wears woolen trousers embroidered with flowers and grass patterns, and his feet wear white felt boots with gold pieces, about 30 years old, the era is the Han and Jin Dynasties. This male nobleman may have been a nobleman of the neighboring Moshan Kingdom, who obviously benefited from the Silk Road trade during his lifetime, because along with him were also the coffins painted with three-legged golden crows, lilies and toads in the moon, four breasts and four bronze mirrors, the fragments of paper of the Luwen, the dragon pattern beast face brocade, and the coffin lid panel painted with four-legged sacred beasts.
Strikingly, when the man was unearthed from the tomb, his face was covered with a well-preserved hemp mask. The mask is 25 cm high, slightly larger than the face of the deceased, with a long strip of gold leaf on the forehead, the mask is very delicate, the face is painted white, the eyes are highlighted with black dye, the lips, the bridge of the nose is high, and then the red dye is applied to the lips, the eyes and mouth are closed, and the eyebrows are very slender. This mask is made in a very unique way, first using wood and dirt to make a human face inner membrane, then pasting the sackcloth on it, drawing the concave lines of the eyes and lips with hard objects, waiting for the sackcloth to dry out, the inner film is removed, and then the white pigment is applied to the face, and the black outline eyebrow line, eye slits and beard, reflecting the typical Europa ethnic characteristics of this person.
In addition to sackcloth masks, gold is also an important material for the ancestors of the Western Regions to make masks. For example, in 1997, in the Boma Mound in Zhaosu County, a gold mask inlaid with red gemstones was found, the mask was divided into left and right halves from the middle line, beaten and formed, polished and welded, and then riveted with small rivets, the mask as a whole was square, wide-faced, thick eyebrows, round eyes, lips slightly opened, revealing gold teeth, the figure eight hu was riveted with gold forward multiple gems, the eyebrows were willow-leaf-shaped, relatively slender, with gold and rubies inlaid into the style of rows of shells, and finally his beard was also a circle of rubies. The eyes are set with two large rubies as eyes. The overall appearance is exquisitely crafted and majestic, and experts believe that this mask is a remnant of ancient Cypriot culture. Zhaosu was a nomadic area of the ancient Cypriot and Cypriot-influenced Usun kingdoms, and this object was made before the 5th century AD.
This set of gold-encrusted ruby artifacts, such as golden sword scabbards, is similar to the style of the friezes unearthed at the Golden Hill cemetery in the Shibalgan region of northern Afghanistan. The ruby-encrusted gold sword sheaths and gold rings unearthed from the Boma Tombs and the artworks of the Golden Hill Cemetery in northern Afghanistan are all beautiful using bead-blowing spot welding and inlaying techniques.
A cultural relic of the Golden Hill
In the cemetery, scholars also found gold pots inlaid with precious stones, gold cups, sword sheaths, and silver jars, reflecting the aesthetic influence of the Cypriots and their love of gold ornaments.
Agamemnon's golden mask
Since this mask is almost exactly the same size as the face of a real person, it should be a gold mask for the tomb of a Cypriot nobleman, which is similar to the famous Agamemnon gold face.
In addition to precious metals, ancient ancestors in Xinjiang used stone to make masks and small figures. In 1979, a stone carved mask was unearthed on the banks of the Gongnais River in Xinyuan County, the mask was 23.5cm long, 17cm wide, 6cm thick, sandstone texture, polished very smooth, the face shape was wide and narrow, the round eyes were inverted, the eyeballs were prominent, the lips were slightly open, the mask shape was general and exaggerated, the three-dimensional sense was strong, with the characteristics of typical Ethnic Minority Faces in Xinjiang, and it was the image of typical Hu people.
Although some believe that it is related to the westward migration of the Khitan people, this mask is different from the typical Khitan precious metal mask, with no metal decoration and no accessories. It seems relatively simple, but it is somewhat similar to a cemetery stone man found near the village of Tazmin in the Minusinsk Basin. The stone figure is carved on granite and depicts a human face wearing a false mask. The figure has a wide top and a narrow lower part, with rounded eyes, and dots indicate eyeballs. The nose is carved into the edges of the stone, and the mouth is not very large. The difference is that the stone man's head is carved with vertical animal ears. So this stone man may be inextricably linked to the shamanic priests of Scythian culture.
The clay masks unearthed in Khotan, which bear similarities with ancient Greek drama, are one of the evidences that Khotan belonged to Thein-European culture
In the museum in the Hotan area, there is also a wooden mask with a better texture, which is from the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. Excavated in 1995 in the Gurubak Cemetery in Hotan City, the human head is rectangular, there are glyph-shaped ornaments on the top of the head, and several parts such as eyes, mouths, and noses are densely carved on the shorter face, although the mask is mutilated, leaving only the left forehead, cheeks, eyes and earrings, etc., but it can still be inferred that this is a Western Hu person, which may be a wooden mask used in religious activities.
In the cultural concept common in Eurasia, the mask embodies a nation's perception of itself. If the face of the deceased can be depicted in a highly realistic way, then the soul can find the destination of the body, and the soul will not become a wandering soul. By the way, it also records the physical characteristics and cultural outlook of the ancient Western peoples.