The Terracotta Army
The Ancients
History Hit
4.7 • 4.5K Ratings
🗓️ 24 February 2022
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Discovered by local farmers in 1974, the Terracotta Army is one of the most astounding archaeological finds on record. A piece of funerary art, dedicated to the First Emperor of China Qin Shi Huang, it contains over 8,000 figures of soldiers, chariots, and horses. This week Tristan is joined by Dr Xiuzhen Li, Honorary Senior Research Fellow at UCL, to discuss its origins, its possible Hellenistic influences, and what else we can learn from this incredible ancient wonder.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | It's the ancient history hit. I'm Tristan Hughes your host and in today's |
| 0:18.4 | podcast where we're going to ancient China. Finally, because we're talking about |
| 0:22.8 | one of the most extraordinary iconic ancient archaeological sites in the |
| 0:28.5 | home world. Yes, we are talking all about the terracotta army, the terracotta |
| 0:34.4 | warriors built more than 2,000 years ago as part of a huge mausoleum complex, |
| 0:40.8 | more than 50 square kilometers in size constructed for the first emperor of |
| 0:46.7 | China. So what do we know about the terracotta warriors? How were they |
| 0:51.0 | constructed? Why? What was their purpose in the mausoleum and could their |
| 0:56.0 | potentially be an influence from the ancient Mediterranean, from the ancient |
| 1:00.2 | Hellenistic world? Well to answer all of these questions and so much more, I was |
| 1:06.0 | delighted to get on the podcast a few weeks back to chat in person with Dr. |
| 1:11.0 | Shujin. Shujin is an honorary senior research fellow at UCL and she's also |
| 1:17.0 | done a lot of work with the museum for the terracotta army out in China. She is |
| 1:22.3 | one of the leading experts all about the terracotta warriors with a particular |
| 1:26.6 | focus on their bronze weapons, on the logistics behind how this huge |
| 1:31.4 | monumental army was constructed. Now this is going to be a two-part |
| 1:36.6 | podcast. In this first part we're going to be focusing in giving an overview |
| 1:40.6 | shall we say of the terracotta army, whilst the second part, which we'll release in |
| 1:44.5 | a few weeks time, we're really going to delve into the details of the weapons |
| 1:47.9 | themselves and what these bronze weapons placed among these warriors, what |
| 1:53.0 | that can tell us about the time, the effort, the logistics behind creating this |
| 1:58.7 | huge army more than 2000 years ago. But without further ado to talk all about |
... |
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