STUDY OF ART AND ARCHAEOLOGY IN NORTH CHINA

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

During the years 1995-1996, the Yuangzhou Archaeological Excavations in China, funded by the Monbusho (Japan Ministry of Education) Grant-in Aid for International Scientific Research, was a Joint Project by Japan and China.During 1995, we discovered the Tomb of Shi Daoluo who lived during Tang dynasty, and was buried in 658 A.D.Numerous small fragments of Murals were of gold, silver and polychrome. Also two sets of armor of the same materials were found.The tomb had two guards, one depicted with the head of a man and the body of a beast. The other was beast head and body. Both of these guards were painted of gold, silver and polychrome.A Byzantine gold coin, a white porcelain vase, and six lobed glass bowl were also discovered, all in bamboo/wood lacquer were boxes, similar to Japanese Shoso-in Treasures.The epitaph has four guards engraved on each of four sides. This is similar to Japanese Takamatsu-zuka Kofun wall paintings.During 1996, the tomb of the Northern Zhou dynasty prime minister Tian Hong was discovered, who died and buried in 575 A.D.Originally the tomb contained large quantity of mural statuettes, of which 18 colored in red, white and black, all in good condition were found. The rest were lost due to the roof and wall caving in.Four Byzantine gold coins, jade ornaments, numerous gold leafed glass beads and gold painted mica foils were also recovered.These discoveries are helpful to our understanding of the relationships between the Byzantine, west-central Asian, Chinese, Japanese cultures during 500-600s A.D.