CHINA ARQUEOLOGIA golden-age-chinese-archayeolog

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indicating that such deliberate movement was a
convention in Tang imperial tombs.
Another striking aspect is the large size of all
thirteen of the female figures who form the composition.
They are full-faced, heavy-set, substantial
women, reminiscent of the image of the Tang courtesan
Yang Guifei, the favorite of Emperor Xuanzong;
her ample proportions changed the fashion of
Tang women everywhere. 3 If it was generally assumed
that the preference for ample women somehow
died out toward the end of the Tang dynasty,
these ample women — and others like them from
the same period — make clear that for those who,
like Wang Chuzhi, continued the Tang imperial
traditions, the Yang Guifei ideal endured. 4 Only
in the late tenth and eleventh centuries do we see
the loss of this ideal in the new Song models of
feminine beauty. 5 RB
1 Excavated in 1995; reported: Hebei 1996, 4-13; Hebei 1998.
2 The relevant section is reproduced in Yang 19973, 74.
3 Kuwayama 1987, 85.
4 See, for example, a Liao tomb found at Baoshan, reproduced
in Zhao 1996,160, and in Neimenggu 1998, especially
the color reproduction from Tomb 2 printed
on the inside back cover. See also the Later Zhou tomb
dated c. 958 mentioned in cat. 175 n. 4, where the
Tang ideal still prevails.
5 In the context of tomb decoration, the slender Song ideal
of feminine beauty is illustrated by the female orchestra
painted on the wall of a Northern Song tomb excavated
in Jiangjiagou village, Shanxi province: Shaanxi 1996, 6,
fig. 4, and color frontispiece. Most secular figure paintings
associated with the Five Dynasties also favor a slender
female physique. See Yang 19973,112 -113.
51O | EARLY IMPERIAL CHINA