Two Terracotta figures, more than two millennia old, were damaged when a tourist went on a rampage in Xi’an, China.
The incident occurred on Friday at the Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang in Xi’an, an ancient city home to many Chinese dynasties of the past. One of the key features at the mausoleum is the hundreds of Terracotta figures lined up in a sort of valley.
Reports suggest that on Friday morning, a 30-year-old Chinese tourist suddenly jumped over the guardrail and into one of the pits that houses those figures. He then started pushing and pulling away the figures, causing many of them to fall. Video footage showed him getting apprehended by the security and being taken away. Museum officials later said that at least two terracotta figures were damaged during this incident. They also said the man is suspected to be mentally ill, though a formal investigation against him would still be carried out. Despite the incident, the museum reopened on Saturday.
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The Terracotta figures were created to protect Emperor Qin Shi Huang, the first Chinese emperor, after his death. More than 700,000 workers labored for 30 to 40 years to create these figures around 209 BCE. The striking feature about these figures is not only that they are life-sized, but also that the average sizes of the figures vary according to the military rank. In 1974, an excavation revealed around 8,000 of these statues at the current location. In 1987, the mausoleum was granted UNESCO World Heritage status.
