A complete set of grave goods from a tomb opened by the Lao–tung railway near Lao Yang in the Honan Fu have been acquired by the British Museum through a railway engineer on the spot. They may be taken as a typical and, I believe, quite reliable, example of the grave furniture of a T'ang personage of importance. They include six covered jars of graceful oval form, made of hard white ware and coated with thin glaze of pale yellowish or faint green tint, which ends in the characteristic T'ang fashion in a wavy line several inches above the base. They measure about thirteen inches in height. These are presumed to have held the six kinds of grain. Next comes a graceful vase, probably for wine, with ovoid body, tall, slender neck, with two horizontal bands, a cup–shaped mouth, and two high, elegantly carved handles with serpent heads which bite on to the rim (Plate 14, Fig. 2). The only other vessels were a circular tray, on which stood a small, squat vase, with trilobe sides, small mouth, and three rudimentary feet, surrounded by seven shallow cups. Like the wine vase and covered jars, these have flat bases, in most cases carefully smoothed and lightly bevelled at the edge.[44] The retinue consisted of a charming figure of a lady on a horse, eight other ladies (probably of the harem) with high, peaked head–dress, low–necked dresses with high waists, and a shawl over the shoulders and falling down from the arms like two long sleeves; natural feet are indicated in every case. With these were two figures of priestly appearance, with long cloaks and hoods, three other men in distinctive costumes, eleven retainers in civil costume with peaked head–gear, long coats with lappets open at the neck, waist belts, and high boots, their right hands held across the breast and their left at the side. One of these figures is remarkable for his foreign features, with exaggerated and pointed nose, suggesting a Western Asiatic origin. There are, besides, four men, apparently in armour, and two tall figures who seem to wear cap helmets with camail falling down the neck and breast armour, recalling in many ways our own mediæval men–at–arms. The supernatural element is represented by two strange, squatting quadrupeds with legs like a bull, human heads with large ears and a single horn which are called by the Chinese t'u kuai or "earth–spirits." Finally, in addition to man and super–man, the animal world was represented by two saddled horses, two dromedaries, two pigs, two sheep, a beautifully modelled dog, and a goose. What more could a man desire in the underworld? All these figures are of the usual white plaster–like body, with the pale, straw–coloured or greenish glazes which long burial has dissolved into iridescence where it has not actually caused it to flake away. Some of them stand on flat, plain bases; others on their own feet and robes. The latter kind are all hollow beneath, and the quadrupeds have a large cavity under the belly, a feature common to the T'ang and Han animals, and one which I have noticed on bronzes of the same periods. Needless to add, these figures were made in moulds, the seams of which are still visible.[45]
Plate 5.—T'ang Sepulchral Figures. In the Benson Collection.
Fig. 1.—A Lokapala or Guardian of one of the Quarters, unglazed.
Fig. 2.—A Horse, with coloured glazes. Height 27 inches.
Fig. 3.—An Actor, unglazed.
Plate 6.—T'ang Sepulchral Figures, unglazed.
Figs. 1, 2 and 4.—Female Musicians.