兵马俑英文版讲解词

The museum of Terracotta Warriors and Horses

Good morning, Ladies and gentlemen, so nice to see you . I’m your interpreter in the museum of Terracotta Warriors and Horses.This museum is located at the foot of mountain Li Shan, about 35 kilometers east of X i’an. First I will give you a brief introduction about the master of this underground army---the First Qin Emperor. His name was Yingzheng. He came to the throne at the age of 13 in 246BC and seized the power at the age of 22 in 237BC. By 221BC, when he was only 38 years old, he had annexed all the six independent states and established the first feudal empire in the long history of China.

After the unification of the whole country, he styled himself the First Emperor and standardized the coinage , weights and measurements , the legal codes , the written scripts and so on. He also ordered the linkage of the original Great Wall. All these exerted an everlasting influence on the long feudal history of China.

But, just like each coin has two sides, the First Qin Emperor thought his contributions were beyond compare, so he became more and more arrogant and ambitious . As soon as he came to the throne, he ordered that a magnificent mausoleum should be built for him. And after the unification of the whole country, he even gathered 720,000 conscripts from all parts of the country to work on his mausoleum. In fact, it took 37years to complete this project. And the site of these terracotta warriors and horses is just a small part of his mausoleum.

Pit No.1 was discovered in March 1974 when some local farmers were digging a water well to save them from the drought. There are about 6,000 figures in this large pit if fully excavated according to the density. But today, only one third has been excavated.

Pit 1, the largest pit, is in rectangular shape. It measures 230 meters long from east to west,62 meters wide from north to south and 5 meters deep ,covering an area of 14,260 ㎡.It is an earth and wood structure in the shape of a tunnel. Five sloping roadways were constructed on 4 sides of pit to permit access. But do you know how did Qin people make such a large underground construction? Let me tell you the story. First, a large pit was made. The floor was paved with bricks. Earth walls were built and pillars were erected. There are 10 partition walls dividing the whole pit into 11 corridors. On top of the pillars were crossbeams and the crossbeams were covered with mats and then earth. After finishing the underground building, the 6,000 pottery figures were sent to the corridors through the slopping roadways. Then the entrances were sealed. Unfortunately, someone set a big fire on the underground building, the thousands figures were destroyed into fragments at the end of the Qin Dynasty.

The layout of this pit is a large military battle formation. There are chariots and infantrymen in this pit. In the front of the formation are the vanguards.3 ranks of soldiers are standing here in order. They are the first to sacrifice for the emperor. Behind the vanguards is the main body of the formation. There are 38 columns with lines of chariots and infantrymen. The left and right sides of the formation are flanked with a row of guards respectively. At the rear of the formation is another row of guards. The guards are meant to defend against the enemy’s attack from the flanks and the rear. This battle formation is impressively well organized. The warriors and horses are standing as firm as a rock. None of the warriors have shields, but they carry various types of weapons. It is a pity that we can’t see the real weapons held by the soldiers. That’s because they were stolen by someone. After