CHINA ARQUEOLOGIA golden-age-chinese-archayeolog

CHU TOMBS AT
XIASI, XICHUAN,
HENAN PROVINCE
Now normally submerged under the Danjiang Reservoir, the nine large tombs at Xiasi in
Xichuan county (Henan province), together with two tombs at the adjacent locality of
Heshangling, represent six generations of a high-ranking aristocratic lineage in the Chu kingdom.
They date from the second quarter of the sixth to the third quarter of the fifth century
BCE. Each lineage head was buried in a large tomb with an associated horse-and-chariot pit; in
some cases, their principal consorts were buried in separate large tombs nearby. Besides the
main occupant, each large tomb contained one or several additional skeletons, possibly human
victims chosen from the main occupant's own relatives. Tomb 2 at Xiasi, much larger and more
lavishly appointed than the others, was surrounded by fifteen small tombs containing possibly
lower-ranking human victims.
The large tombs, some of which had been looted before excavation, contained abundant
assemblages of ritual bronzes and funerary jades. The constellation of bronze vessels reflected
the ritual rank of the deceased person. Tombs of females lack the weapons and horse-andchariot
items seen in those of their husbands, and they contain fewer vessels. None of the
tombs yielded any trace of "useful" items such as ceramics.
Despite some looting, Tomb 2 at Xiasi contained thirty-six bronze vessels and a set of
twenty-six bells, which is shown in this exhibition. Its exceptionally lavish furnishings, to some
extent echoed by those in the three consorts' tombs clustering around it (Tombs i, 3, and 4),
testify to privileges far exceeding those enjoyed by either previous or succeeding generations of
the same lineage. This cluster of tombs yielded a number of bronze vessel types not encountered
in the others, such as flat-bottomed tripods (sheng) and other vessels of archaic form, harking
back to the mid-ninth century BCE. Possibly, these vessels testify to their owners' participation in
special kinds of rituals restricted to the royal family and its immediate entourage. In their execution,
as well, many of the bronzes from Tomb 2 and its cluster are far more luxurious than those
seen elsewhere at the cemetery. Highlights include some of the earliest vessels with metal inlay
found anywhere in China and a unique altar stand with intricate decoration executed in the
lost-wax casting technique, which was very rarely used in Eastern Zhou bronzework.
In their bronze inscriptions, the lineage heads buried at Xiasi-Heshangling refer to themselves
as Chu Shuzhisun ("Descendants in a Junior Line of Chu"), indicating that they were
descended from an earlier king of Chu but only distantly related to the king of their own time.
The inscriptions give the name of the occupant of Tomb 2 at Xiasi as Peng. This individual has
been identified with Yuan (or Wei) Zi Feng, chief minister of Chu from 552 until his death in
548 BCE. 1 Feng was a descendant of Sunshu Ao (/I. 598-597 BCE), who had been chief minister
under King Zhuang of Chu (r. 613-591 BCE), and whose descendants hereditarily governed the
territory surrounding present-day Xichuan. Some scholars assume the earliest capital of the
Chu kingdom to have been located in this area, 2 but in the sixth and fifth centuries BCE, the
Chu capital had long been moved southward to the environs of present-day Jiangling (Hubei
province), and Xichuan had become a border domain. The inscriptions on bronzes found in
2/O | CHU AND OTHER CULTURES