CHINA ARQUEOLOGIA golden-age-chinese-archayeolog

150C
have been used in conjunction with some sort of
tent or overhanging curtain; such arrangements
may also have been employed in an earlier tomb
at Taiyuan, 3 and a pair of canopies or tents were
found in the tomb of Liu Sheng. If such was indeed
the practice in China, it was perhaps stimulated
by contacts to the north; ceremonies or festivities
associated with the screens and tents may have
been attempts to reach the spirits, perhaps by
inhaling incense or making aromatic offerings.
The presence of a door, however, casts an uncertainty
on whether this screen was part of such
an arrangement.
A much smaller lacquered screen, decorated
with a bi disk and silk cords, and, on the reverse,
the image of a dragon, was found in the tomb of
the wife of the Marquis of Dai at Mawangdui. 4
The excavators of the tomb of the King of Nanyue
have suggested that this screen was decorated
with cloud scrolls, a pattern derived from the early
Han dynasty lacquer painting designs known from
sites in Yangzhou and other areas in the south. 5 JR
1 Excavated in 1983 (D 19-11, D 106, D 162); reported:
Guangzhou, 1991,1:433-451.
2 Discussed in Rawson 19983, 89.
3 Tomb 251, discussed in Rawson forthcoming.
4 Hunan 1973,1:94.
5 Pruch 1997,134 -189.
FIG. i. Conjectural reconstruction
of the screen
with its fittings. After
Guangzhou 1991, 449,
fig. 259.
437 | TOMB OF THE KING OF NANYUE