Ancient double-deck coffin contains woman, belongings from 6th century

The remains in the rarely found double-deck lacquer coffin unearthed in Zhengxiangbai Banner, a county-level administrative district of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region's Xilin Gol League, have been proved to be those of a woman, as the first phase of study wound up last weekend.

The coffin, which is believed to be from the Northern Wei Dynasty (AD 386-534), ruled by an ancient nomadic ethnic group of Xianbei, was found in October by a local herdsman who also is a volunteer cultural relic protector. The discovery was not made public until early this month.

On March 8, after months of preliminary study, the coffin was opened by an archaeological team co-led by the autonomous region's Department of Culture and the Chinese Academy of Cultural Heritage affiliated with the State Administration of Cultural Heritage.

Although participating archaeologists unanimously say it is premature to value its significance, they all cautiously revealed their excitement.

"I've never seen a coffin of such structure from this similar period of time before," said Zhan Changfa, director of the cultural relic restoration center of the academy and head of the six-person team from the institute that is participating in the project.

"When we used an X-ray machine to examine the coffin before opening it and found this unique structure, we even once thought something was wrong with our machine because it was beyond our imagination," he joked.

"We've seen some double-deck coffin chambers sharing similar characteristics, but they are mostly from centuries earlier."

The remains have been proved to belong to a woman. Her body lies on the upper deck, while grave goods, including terrines, iron lamps and bronze pieces, were buried in the lower deck.

"We suspect this special structure represents the woman's aristocratic status or characteristics of a certain branch within Xianbei people, but it's still too early to draw a conclusion before we make a more detailed analysis of the samples," Zhan said.

Zhan's team drove a mobile laboratory to the scene for basic testing, but he said some samples must be sent to Beijing for further study to possibly unveil the woman's identity. He expected preliminary results to be available within a month or two.

"There are many high-level Northern Wei tombs scattered around northern China, but according to my restoration experience, not so many are so well-preserved," Zhan said. "The body was found with delicate metal head wear, silk pieces, as well as fur and leather articles, which are quite marvelous."

According to Tala, one of the project leaders and the curator of the Inner Mongolia Museum in the autonomous region's capital of Hohhot, silk and fur pieces are among the most precious discoveries this time.

"These pieces should be a lifetime of belongings of the woman, so they contain much information of daily life at that time," Tala said. "We've found images of deer, birds, as well as some Buddhist signs on the silk. No one yet dares to say how much academic importance they may have until we've done in-depth research, which will last for a long time."

Zhan said it is difficult to find such a complete set of organic materials, like leather and silk, in an ancient tomb.

"That may not necessarily mean how rarely these items were buried in tombs, or how special this woman is, but the coffin is at least a lucky one to avoid tomb raiding. Once a tomb is broken into and robbed, organic matter will easily be ruined. "

Being buried as deep as 9.6 meters underground may partially explain why the coffin is intact. Two other tombs of Xianbei people were found in the same area in 2010 and 2011, but both had already been raided, and tomb-raid vestiges were also detected near this third one in October. Local cultural heritage authorities immediately took steps to prevent raiding of the third site.

"We suspect these three compose a family's group tomb," said Zhuang Yongxing, head of the cultural heritage bureau of Xilin Gol League. "Due to unfortunate losses on previous occasions, we are extraordinarily careful this time to arrange for special personnel to closely safeguard the coffin.

"Considering -20 C temperature and other harsh natural conditions in the winter's open wild that are not suitable for archaeological excavation, we transported the coffin to Xilin Gol League Museum in Xilinhot (the league's capital city), which offers better preservation," Zhuang said.

"I am glad our museum will probably have another precious exhibit in the near future," Zhuang added.

Yuan Hui contributed to this story.

wangkaihao@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily USA 03/19/2014 page4)