Hi, friends. If this were to be July and you're Stuff you Should Know listener, you might be queuing up the following episode, but it's not. It's modern times. But I enjoyed this one, so it's my select pic. It's all about the Terracotta Army, and it's called How the Terracotta Army Works. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles w Chuck Bryant and Jerry. We're just hanging figure. We pressed record and see what happens. Yeah. Sorry, Terracotta Army of three not very imposing over Terracotta. Did you go to the High Museum and see this when it was around? No? I didn't, you know, Yumi did, and I wish I would have gone, but I did not. Yeah, but she was quite blown away. It was awesome and I didn't even um. I hadn't heard of it until then. And then when I went and saw it, it was like, this is pretty amazing, what a great story, And then I wanted to podcast about it and then just sort of forgot and now here it is a year later or however long. Yes, it was a while ago. Yeah, it was UM but it's still a pretty fascinating story. Yeah, in that exhibit. If you live UM in on planet Earth, go to the website and see where it's going to be, because it travels around there like the Body's exhibit. Yeah, I mean there's, uh, there's this exhibit and then I think there's permanent UM exhibits elsewhere. There's a permanent exhibit at the site itself, and it's pretty maybe one in London, I'm not positive. Well, London has everything, but they do, they do. The only thing they don't have is twelve ounces of bears. That's yeah, because there's sixteen owns that's right, Yeah, you don't need it. I took a trip there. I was like, what's with all these tallboys? And they're like, what's that? Oh? I get it now. Yeah. And it's not like you when you go to the pub, you don't go in for a twelve ounce or you go for a point. Yeah, and it's an imperial point, right? Is that more than sixteen ounces? Is that one point? Is that sixteen point nine? Is that one point nine ounces? I'll bet it is. Jerry hold up fingers. Jerry said twenty ounces is an imperial point, So I was wrong. Sixteen is a standard point. Are you sure it's not twenty five, Jerry. That's called a double doucee. That's called the core's double doucee. Double deuce is technically why because the twelve is a single? Right? No, but a double I thought double juice just meant we're gonna put two beers into one can. That's the double double beer. What what are we talking about today? I don't know. I'm thirsty all of a sudden, though. You want a beer. It's Friday. I love a beer. Let me just reach into my bag. Here, you're your cooler bag, carry around like a purse. I wish man, that'd be fun, cooler Fannie pack drinking on the job like it's a nineteen fifties Ye alright, let's get serious, buddy, okay, Chuck. On the morning of March seven, farmers set out to dig a well, so begins the article on how Stuff Works dot Com. Yes, but it also begins this story A pretty amazing story. Actually, yeah, it's it's awesome. This was in the Chinese village of Good Look ug oh, that was pretty good. That's what I'm gonna say, um, And they were digging for water and got down about thirteen feet and hit something hard and dug up a terra cotta face and head, and we're like, exactly, they're probably whoa yeah or whatever the Chinese expression for what would be what was kind of universal? Okay, I'm curious we do have We found out we're not banned in China, by the way, Yeah, so hello to all of our listeners out there in China. Um, and will you let us know what woe was in Chinese? Yeah? I think we should do a show sometime on universal uh sounds Yeah, like UM have heard different um or read different things about how people laugh in different countries and people remark of of of affirmation or decline something like, I think it'd be really interesting. Yeah. They're called idioms, right, is that what it is? Like? Here we might go huh, but somewhere else they might go what else? I don't know. We got we have focus here, terracotta army. Yes. Um. So they alerted the government like any good UM citizens should, and said, hey, I think we have something here you should come look at. Yeah. Because when they dug down a little more and they found shards of the same type of pottery, and a lot of it in kind of vague human form. And that's when they're like, there's something weird going on here, So let's contact the authorities. And the authorities said archaeologists away and sent them out to the site. Because it was nineteen seventy four, they said, hey, let's contact the Chinese government right away. That's right. I don't know if that would happen today. Uh the Chinese people, you think, I don't know. It depends on who they are. I would guess they probably were more likely to in seventy four than today. All right, So what they knew the the government and experts and archaeologists said, well, hold on a minute, you guys are digging near the burial ground of Chin sure Hondi and Um he was the first emperor of China and he had a huge mausoleum, and I bet you anything that's what you guys have found. And uh, it turns out they were right. The archaeologist so Um. The legend had it that Um Chin sure Huangdi, China's first emperor, Um had himself built a pretty awesome mausoleum. As a matter of fact, you couldn't even call it a mausoleum. It was called a funerary complex. It was so massive. But as they started to dig and get further and further along in this excavation, which they have still not even and come close to completing, from something, yeah, it's the size of Manhattan, the size of Manhattan, his his mausoleum um, they started to realize, like it's even bigger than we ever thought. Like it wasn't lost. They knew that he was buried somewhere around this area. It was just you don't go digging up emperor's tombs. But these these farmers had found something pretty interesting and it was enough to get the archaeologists over that, and they started to dig. And they still have yet to excavate Cheen's tomb, his actual tomb where he's buried, and we'll talk about that later. But when they started dig, they started to reveal like more and more of these terra cotta figures, and they would stumble upon one room. At first they stumbled upon a room and they found chuck, like six thousand of these things of infantry in all standing at the ready, all larger than life. They were about six to six and a half feet tall. That's including the base. Yeah, all made of terra cotta. Um, crossbows, finger on the trigger, um, dudes on horses. Well, those are in separate rooms. So first room was like six thousand infant freemen. It was lined up like a information information would be lined up. Then there was another room that had like specialists like cavalry, got archers with crossbows, blow darters yeah. Um. And then there was a third room that had I think eighties six like commanders. It was like the command room. So basically what they revealed was this terra cotta army information in this guy's grave, yes, with the idea that, um, he wanted protection in the afterlife because he was one of the great jerks of world history. He really Yeah, he was terrible. He was a tyrant, for sure. He was a He perhaps was responsible for the deaths of more than one million of his citizens. He also, though, got things done. Yeah, let's talk about the guy. Okay. So he was the first emperor. Before him, China had seven kingdoms, and um in four eighty one, all these kingdoms said, you know what, I want to be the main kingdom. So it started what was called the Warring States, the era of battling for land and superiority. And I saw this really neat documentary on that geo I think called China's Ghost Army. I think it's what's called. I posted a link on our on our podcast page for this episode. Totally worth watching. It's like an hour. But they say that UM before this, prior to this Warring States era, when an emperor died in chen the chen Um Kingdom, Uh, they would kill the whole court, hundreds of people would be buried alive with the emperor. And then this Warring States, these battles and wars were so significant as far as casualties went. There like, we can't do that anymore, we need them to go fight in the wars. So they stopped that tradition. But it was because of this Um the Warring States era interesting and that can you imagine like two people just being mass buried alive together because the emperor died, I can't imagine. So let's get back to this jerk cheen He Uh He overtook and basically was the first emperor. Uh forced people to be in the army, built up a huge army UM. He relocated in his first year about a hundred and twenty thousand families. And that's like Stalin did that same thing. It's like, you can't have ethnic unity and then that kind of collective thought and then potentially an upper rising if you break up that kind of ethnic bonds by basically bussing people in and out of different areas. Yeah, it makes sense, but this guy was doing it like um, a couple like about two thousand years before stalling crazy. He burned all the books, he burned all the writings. Uh. Scholars that didn't jibe with his line of thought were buried alive or beheaded. Yeah. He was a piece of garbage and he was terrible. Um. He assembled a workforce of a million men to build about five thousand miles of roads, um. And the Great Wall of China. Yeah, the first Great Wall of China. So while he said he was a jerk, he made a point. He got things done. I mean he he got a monetary system that was unified. Yeah. He also unified weights and measurements. Um. He unified China from seven kingdoms into one country. And it's still that way today two thousand years later. And if you've noticed the similarity between Chin and China, that's because the country is named after him, so he got things done. Vital figure in China's history, but he did a brutal, brutal, controlling, murderous dictator. Right. He wasn't asking, And he also had a really conflated view of his the empire that he'd put together. And you can see this apparently in the money that he minted. Like he there were different regions that he conquered had different kinds of money, so he did create like a single monetary system. I think you said, um, and that that money was square shaped with a hole in the center, so kind of like a square donut. The band Liang coin and that coin at the time in ancient China, um the square represented the earth and the circle represented the sky or the heavens. And so what he was saying is that this earth, my empire, is even greater than the heavens that surround the earth. That's how how good I'm feeling about my off right now? He felt pretty good, but he was parah annoyed, and I think that usually comes when you're on top and you get there by any means necessary, you're gonna be watching your back your whole life. Um. Specifically, he came from the west and conquered eastward. So when he was buried, he had the terra Cotta army facing east to protect him because of all the badness he had done. And this is after he had killed hundreds of scientists that he commissioned to try and prolong his life. Yeah, so we talked about him actually in the Bizarre Medical Treatments episode. I think without realizing it, that um, he at the back in the day at the time they believe mercury had some sort of like life enhancing or immortality bestowing properties, and he would take mercury pill. I think that that's ironically what killed him. Um. But he in addition to mercury, he sent out people to like find Fountain of Youth or whatever was the Chinese legend version of that. Um. He was obsessed with remaining alive and simultaneously, like you said, totally paranoid with dying. So he must have been a very tormented person. Yeah, he killed. Hum. Doctors and scientists were killed who could not come up with a way to make him immortal and again buried alive or beheaded. O. Great. Not a good guy. UM, all right, you want to take a break here and talk more about the terracotta army. Yes, sorry, so chuck, Um, when we uh, we were talking about this guy, think you're paying it a pretty good picture of him. I guess he comes to either he comes to grip with the idea that he's going to die, because at the time, like he's trying to chase immortality, he's concocting um like a huge burial massoleum for himself. I guess, hedging his bets in case he does die. But by this time, like Confucius and other scholars in China had basically like philosophically debunked the idea of life after death. So this man was utterly crazy by his contemporary standards. Um, And that kind of shows if you step back and really think about the attitude and the mentality behind what he was doing. But he at some point either came to grips with the factors he was gonna die, or he was just hedging his bets and thought he was going to remain immortal. But just in case, let me have this incredible grand funerary complex created, and let's build a terra Cotta army to protect me in the afterlife. Yeah, it's really neat to look at the terr Kotta army. Now is art, but it's eight thousand soldiers. Like this guy was clearly cuckoo. He was off his rocker. Yeah, he was a bad man. He was a bad man. Alright. So shall we start with the army. Yes, let's because it's not all that was that he had commission. But the armies are very it's pretty significant. It is significant. Um, Like you said, they are in formation. So the front dudes are Um, they're kneeling down their bowmen and they were famous the armies they had then, and this is one of the reasons he took over. They figured out the crossbow, and they figured out how to shoot while riding a horse, and that was basically all she wrote. Yeah, everybody else is like your mother. Yeah, like down here with a sword on the ground and you're shooting at me from twenty ft away with some weird metallic bolt. I guess not metallic, but wouldn't. Yeah, they weren't forging steel back then. I wonder when they did start. I don't know. It sounds like a podcast it does how steel works. Yeah, it would be a good one. I could see that. Um. So you have these bowmen, they have on their armor. Um, their fingers on the trigger there incredibly detailed down to the soles of their feet. Yeah, they have their shoes they're wearing have like tread marks on the bottom. So they took great pride, these artists, clearly because they probably didn't want to get killed, because each of them had to sign in case there was a flaw, it could be traced back to who built this one. Yeah, that they were killed if they didn't like it. They most decidedly were. There were eighty three. They found the stamps, which were ultimately the signatures of eighty three different foreman, and each foreman had a team of apprentices working under him, and the reason that they did assign those stamps was so that he could have them killed if he didn't like how slow work was progressing, if he didn't like what it looked like. Um. And at first, chuck, they were like, well, this is clearly they just set up an assembly line. Molds were known to the Chinese back then, and um, that's the only way you could possibly create seven thousand figures from a terra cotta army. And they found that yes, actually the heads were um created through molds. I think that arms were and stuff like that, but the bulk of them were created by this thing called coiling. Okay, so what is that like three D printing? Very much so. Actually they take clay and hammer until it's soft impliable, and then you wrap it in like a rope around it, and then you mold it. And the thing it really took these there's people who are recreating it to try to figure out how they did it, and they've examined like broken pieces so they can see the inside and they can see the coiling evidence very clearly, and they're like, it doesn't make any sense, Like you can't quickly make um all these figures in an efficient way by coiling? Why would they not just use molds? And finally somebody realized, like this emperor was a bloodthirsty tie right, he didn't care about efficiency. He cared about differences distinctions. So while so while the heads, just the actual shape of the heads were made in molds, the bodies were made by hand, each one through this coiling method. So where you could make like a molded body and maybe a week, it would take a month to do one body by coiling. And that's what they were doing because he wanted them different. That's crazy. Yeah, he just didn't want to carbon carbon copies soldiers exactly. So each one of these the body was made by hand through this incredibly intensive coiling method. So they're starting from the ground up obviously with the base and then coiling their way up. The legs then were molded and affixed, uh, as well as the arms and torsos. No, not the torsos, not the torso No, that's not right. Um okay, gotcha. But then the heads, they said they found eight different head molds. Yes, and that's just the big mold, not the right. The faces were done by hand individually as well, right, each face. Yeah. The hair and expressions, yeah yeah, and the hair uh. You know, warriors who had had the most kills had longer hair and a bigger up right bigger bee high and um, so they would you know, they took great care into making you know, the the most revered soldiers have their hair matched as it should, basically as realistic as they could. Yeah. Like around, if you're just an infantryman, you'd be wearing like one of one of those beanies, a beanie hat probably, um, with maybe like your bund just kind of sticking up off to the side. Underneath, if you're a general, you might be wearing a huge hat with a pheasant feather and a bow tying the whole thing underneath you. Pretty fancy, Yeah, very fancy. So these things were incredibly detailed. They weren't like a knockoff Star Wars figure that you would find in bulk Area or something like that, you know, or China. Yeah, sure, that was way more appropriate than Bulgaria. They probably make the real thing too. Um. Yeah, these were very detailed. Not you know, you wouldn't want to say lifelike. They're still artistic slightly, but they were pretty detailed still. Yeah, and they the ones you see now when they see him in the museum or you look it up on Google. Um, they are not colored, but that is because of humidity and time. But um, originally they fired him in the killing and they painted and lacquered them as well. That's right. I'd love to see those. Look at watch that National Geographic thing. They've redone one in the original colors that they think, and they're almost garish. They're so different like colorful wise and um, lots of surprising lavenders and blues and purples and things, reds, colors used to be way more garish. Um, but so okay. They were doing some assembly line stuff. Most of the bulk of it, though, was coiled by hand. The faces, the hair all done by hand, and then each one was painted by hand and then given a coat of lacquer. That's insane. It's insane that the Sky would have had an assembly line of seven thousand of these things built and unpainted. But he didn't. He went even more detailed. And apparently also I learned from that documentary at the time lacquer was an extremely expensive um product and he was using it on his terra cottas soldiers. It still ain't cheap, uh, And that they there wasn't just the soldiers, there were also um some Uh. There was a strong man in another room and some what do you call him that circus performers, Yeah, acrobats. And I looked up the strong man and he was noted for the detail of his biceps and he had a gut, he did, he had a gut and some my guns, yeah, cutting guns. He's missing his head right, Yeah, I didn't see a head. Yeah, but yeah, he's got he's a big boy. He's like um, he was built like Andre the Giant, Yeah kind of all right, you want to take another little rest here, We'll take a quick napa and then I'll let you awake very gently. All right, We'll we'll finish up. What up, buddy, huh, it's time to finish the terracott army. Oh man, oh, I got like crusted in my eyes. Look at you. Okay, I'm back, Chuck, Okay. So Geen wasn't the only ruler to do this, right, No, he wasn't. Who else did it? Well? Do you remember in our Pyramids episode, although it hasn't come out yet, no one will know what I'm talking about, but you will eventually. Um, we talked about how the the Pyramid of Cufu was the pinnacle of pyramid building in dynastic Egypt, and then the pyramids got smaller because the rulers um cred I guess went down as people started to worship the Sun instead. Great point that I had never considered. Very similar thing happened in China as people as the well. The Ching dynasty only lasted for another four years after Cheen sure huangdi um died, and then the Han dynasty started, and the Hans apparently had much um easier hand with their subjects, and so as a result, even though they had terracotta armies buried with them, they were like a third to a sixth of the size of Cheen's terracotta army. And they take that as a sign and that this um might empower over people. Um had diminished tremendously. Yeah, I think it was symbolic of a kinder Um regime UM and one that was not also booby trapped with like very much like Raiders of the Lost Arc. Apparently Cheens to him or the whole complex was booby trapped with like blow darts and stuff ready to go ye, and also we did we um. One of the reasons why this thing was booby trapped was to prevent looters. Because remember there's a historian that was that came along not too long after. He's a part of the early Han dynasty. From what I understand, his name is Sema kion Um, and Seema Kian is the one who first described cheens mausoleum. And one of the things he described is that Um on the ceiling was a constellation made of pearls and gems. Mountains had been chiseled out of gold and that um that Cheen's tomb itself was surrounded by a river of mercury. Because remember again, since they said that um it bestowed immortality, and from what I understand, a lot of what Sima Kian was talking about a writing has been proven correct. So um. And they've also found that in the soil around Chion's tomb where they think he's buried, there's higher than unusually high mercury levels, like super high. Yeah, so they think like, yeah, these crazy people buried him around a river of mercury, and who knows if there's a constellation of pearls and gemsa's maybe Seema Kian is right, Yeah, And that also makes it super dangerous to excavate still um, which is one of the reasons why they haven't done more there. Um there are six hundred pits that they have unearthed thus far, which is, like I said, I think, only about one percent. And um, they're sort of a raid to look elsewhere because of the booby traps in the mercury. I don't blame them. Uh So a few stats. Thirty six years to complete this army or the tomb, I guess um seven hundred thousand laborers they estimate eight hundred and twenty thousand square feet a hundred feet deep. With I saw eight thousand warriors, this is seven. I've seen different numbers too. Let's just say between six and eight UM forty thou weapons. And apparently these weapons are in really good shape. Well yeah, I mean they were like bronze swords and stuff like that. Yeah, they weren't made of like um, paper mache, so I guess they did have metal. Yeah, bronze at least that answers that in each one of these terra cotta soldiers weighs about three d and thirty pounds, which is crazy because they're not even solid. Oh yeah, it wouldn't be right. So what is the coil on the inside? Then they smooth out the outside, right, Okay, that makes sense. So we did mention that um Emperor Han ling D, who came fifty three years after Cheen, had his smaller terracotta soldiers. There's also the Wei Shan site Um which they found in two thousand two, another terracotta army. But they're all just a foot tall. They they they might as well not even be there. Symbolic and cute. Yeah that also symbolic again of a kinder. What was the one quote from do nothing in order to govern? Yeah, not quite the same as Chen That was the Emperor han ling D's quote. He was the motto Cheen was a little more do whatever you need to do to squash any disruption. Well yeah, and Han ling D came along and said, you know what, we're going to not text you guys that much. We're gonna do away with forced labor. Yeah, so uh, let's party. He was like the Rodney danger Field of the han dynasty. H I think he got respect though, Sure, that's true. So that's he was the Rodney Dangerfield post death, because Rodney has tons of respect. What was Rodney danger Fields epitaph? Do you remember? It's like one of the best ever. Someone I was on the Mark Maron's interview show w t F was interviewed and they were talking about the old days hanging out with Rodney and just what a beast that guy was. What do you mean just party beast? Oh yeah, like legendary. Um, you hang out with Rodney and you're in for a long night. I can imagine. Yeah, but a really good guy. I found it. Chuck. What his epitaph on Rodney danger Fields Grave Styf. There goes the neighborhood. So classic awesome, But I had like that you get a free bowl of soup. Oh that was pretty good man. You were like the rich little of this podcast. Uh, you got anything else? Nope. If you want to know more about the terra cotta army, go see it. And while you're doing that, you can type those words into the search bar at how stuff works dot com. Terra cotta is one word, by the way, one word Smithsonian Magazine. Oh did they goof it? Uh? And since I shame Smithsonian Magazine that means it's time for listener mail. I'm gonna call this uh animal imprint feedback. Hey guys, I'm currently listening to how animal imprinting works and could not even finish it because I had to write you my godmother's dorsey. Uh. And Susan live on own and run an urban farm in Austin, Texas on the east side. They have several animals such as chickens, bunnies, geese, miniature donkeys, boy and ducks. Um. Recently, a mother duck had no interest in her babies uh, and they got adopted by a chicken. That chicken got sick of them trying to play in all of the rain, and we have all the rain we've been getting, and left them on the around. A male goose named Gustavo took the baby ducks in and treats them as his own. On top of that, the next batch of baby ducks born he went and took as his own. Now Gustavo has about ten baby ducks that follow him around the nest. With them, he has his own private army. That's right, um, and they're not terra cotta. They're made of baby duck feathers, the softest army. I failed to mention that Gustavo is the face of the farm, greets people, follows around my godmothers and gives tours whoever stops by, So she says, she finishes with. I started listening to y'all about five months ago and cannot stop start many of my sentences now with this podcast, I was listening to say many random facts that I learned from. You also teach high school world history. And on the days I need to uh the students not to talk um a k A. The days that I don't have a lesson plan, UH talk too alright, play one of your episodes that applies to what we're learning and have them do bookwork. I find many of them not working and listening to your show instead. Nice. So that is from Christina, Maudie and Christina, thank you for your work as a teacher. And hello to all your students. And hello, Hello are your godmothers and Gustavo. Yes, hello miss Maudie's class. Thanks for listening Miss Maudie. That's so nice. Yeah, I'm sure that's what they call her. Yeah, that'd be great. I call it Christina. That's way too modern of a school for me. Yeah, and big ups to Gustavo. That's pretty cool. I want to take a Gustavo to her someday. And she sent a picture of gustav on the ducks too. Uh well, we should post that somewhere all right, unless it's copyrighted. Let us know. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at s y s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook, dot com, slash stuff. You should know. You can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff Works dot com and has always joined us at our home on the web. If you should know, dot Com Radio Stuff You Should Know is a production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. H

Hi, friends. If this were to be July and you're Stuff you Should Know listener, you might be queuing up the following episode, but it's not. It's modern times. But I enjoyed this one, so it's my select pic. It's all about the Terracotta Army, and it's called How the Terracotta Army Works. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles w Chuck Bryant and Jerry. We're just hanging figure. We pressed record and see what happens. Yeah. Sorry, Terracotta Army of three not very imposing over Terracotta. Did you go to the High Museum and see this when it was around? No? I didn't, you know, Yumi did, and I wish I would have gone, but I did not. Yeah, but she was quite blown away. It was awesome and I didn't even um. I hadn't heard of it until then. And then when I went and saw it, it was like, this is pretty amazing, what a great story, And then I wanted to podcast about it and then just sort of forgot and now here it is a year later or however long. Yes, it was a while ago. Yeah, it was UM but it's still a pretty fascinating story. Yeah, in that exhibit. If you live UM in on planet Earth, go to the website and see where it's going to be, because it travels around there like the Body's exhibit. Yeah, I mean there's, uh, there's this exhibit and then I think there's permanent UM exhibits elsewhere. There's a permanent exhibit at the site itself, and it's pretty maybe one in London, I'm not positive. Well, London has everything, but they do, they do. The only thing they don't have is twelve ounces of bears. That's yeah, because there's sixteen owns that's right, Yeah, you don't need it. I took a trip there. I was like, what's with all these tallboys? And they're like, what's that? Oh? I get it now. Yeah. And it's not like you when you go to the pub, you don't go in for a twelve ounce or you go for a point. Yeah, and it's an imperial point, right? Is that more than sixteen ounces? Is that one point? Is that sixteen point nine? Is that one point nine ounces? I'll bet it is. Jerry hold up fingers. Jerry said twenty ounces is an imperial point, So I was wrong. Sixteen is a standard point. Are you sure it's not twenty five, Jerry. That's called a double doucee. That's called the core's double doucee. Double deuce is technically why because the twelve is a single? Right? No, but a double I thought double juice just meant we're gonna put two beers into one can. That's the double double beer. What what are we talking about today? I don't know. I'm thirsty all of a sudden, though. You want a beer. It's Friday. I love a beer. Let me just reach into my bag. Here, you're your cooler bag, carry around like a purse. I wish man, that'd be fun, cooler Fannie pack drinking on the job like it's a nineteen fifties Ye alright, let's get serious, buddy, okay, Chuck. On the morning of March seven, farmers set out to dig a well, so begins the article on how Stuff Works dot Com. Yes, but it also begins this story A pretty amazing story. Actually, yeah, it's it's awesome. This was in the Chinese village of Good Look ug oh, that was pretty good. That's what I'm gonna say, um, And they were digging for water and got down about thirteen feet and hit something hard and dug up a terra cotta face and head, and we're like, exactly, they're probably whoa yeah or whatever the Chinese expression for what would be what was kind of universal? Okay, I'm curious we do have We found out we're not banned in China, by the way, Yeah, so hello to all of our listeners out there in China. Um, and will you let us know what woe was in Chinese? Yeah? I think we should do a show sometime on universal uh sounds Yeah, like UM have heard different um or read different things about how people laugh in different countries and people remark of of of affirmation or decline something like, I think it'd be really interesting. Yeah. They're called idioms, right, is that what it is? Like? Here we might go huh, but somewhere else they might go what else? I don't know. We got we have focus here, terracotta army. Yes. Um. So they alerted the government like any good UM citizens should, and said, hey, I think we have something here you should come look at. Yeah. Because when they dug down a little more and they found shards of the same type of pottery, and a lot of it in kind of vague human form. And that's when they're like, there's something weird going on here, So let's contact the authorities. And the authorities said archaeologists away and sent them out to the site. Because it was nineteen seventy four, they said, hey, let's contact the Chinese government right away. That's right. I don't know if that would happen today. Uh the Chinese people, you think, I don't know. It depends on who they are. I would guess they probably were more likely to in seventy four than today. All right, So what they knew the the government and experts and archaeologists said, well, hold on a minute, you guys are digging near the burial ground of Chin sure Hondi and Um he was the first emperor of China and he had a huge mausoleum, and I bet you anything that's what you guys have found. And uh, it turns out they were right. The archaeologist so Um. The legend had it that Um Chin sure Huangdi, China's first emperor, Um had himself built a pretty awesome mausoleum. As a matter of fact, you couldn't even call it a mausoleum. It was called a funerary complex. It was so massive. But as they started to dig and get further and further along in this excavation, which they have still not even and come close to completing, from something, yeah, it's the size of Manhattan, the size of Manhattan, his his mausoleum um, they started to realize, like it's even bigger than we ever thought. Like it wasn't lost. They knew that he was buried somewhere around this area. It was just you don't go digging up emperor's tombs. But these these farmers had found something pretty interesting and it was enough to get the archaeologists over that, and they started to dig. And they still have yet to excavate Cheen's tomb, his actual tomb where he's buried, and we'll talk about that later. But when they started dig, they started to reveal like more and more of these terra cotta figures, and they would stumble upon one room. At first they stumbled upon a room and they found chuck, like six thousand of these things of infantry in all standing at the ready, all larger than life. They were about six to six and a half feet tall. That's including the base. Yeah, all made of terra cotta. Um, crossbows, finger on the trigger, um, dudes on horses. Well, those are in separate rooms. So first room was like six thousand infant freemen. It was lined up like a information information would be lined up. Then there was another room that had like specialists like cavalry, got archers with crossbows, blow darters yeah. Um. And then there was a third room that had I think eighties six like commanders. It was like the command room. So basically what they revealed was this terra cotta army information in this guy's grave, yes, with the idea that, um, he wanted protection in the afterlife because he was one of the great jerks of world history. He really Yeah, he was terrible. He was a tyrant, for sure. He was a He perhaps was responsible for the deaths of more than one million of his citizens. He also, though, got things done. Yeah, let's talk about the guy. Okay. So he was the first emperor. Before him, China had seven kingdoms, and um in four eighty one, all these kingdoms said, you know what, I want to be the main kingdom. So it started what was called the Warring States, the era of battling for land and superiority. And I saw this really neat documentary on that geo I think called China's Ghost Army. I think it's what's called. I posted a link on our on our podcast page for this episode. Totally worth watching. It's like an hour. But they say that UM before this, prior to this Warring States era, when an emperor died in chen the chen Um Kingdom, Uh, they would kill the whole court, hundreds of people would be buried alive with the emperor. And then this Warring States, these battles and wars were so significant as far as casualties went. There like, we can't do that anymore, we need them to go fight in the wars. So they stopped that tradition. But it was because of this Um the Warring States era interesting and that can you imagine like two people just being mass buried alive together because the emperor died, I can't imagine. So let's get back to this jerk cheen He Uh He overtook and basically was the first emperor. Uh forced people to be in the army, built up a huge army UM. He relocated in his first year about a hundred and twenty thousand families. And that's like Stalin did that same thing. It's like, you can't have ethnic unity and then that kind of collective thought and then potentially an upper rising if you break up that kind of ethnic bonds by basically bussing people in and out of different areas. Yeah, it makes sense, but this guy was doing it like um, a couple like about two thousand years before stalling crazy. He burned all the books, he burned all the writings. Uh. Scholars that didn't jibe with his line of thought were buried alive or beheaded. Yeah. He was a piece of garbage and he was terrible. Um. He assembled a workforce of a million men to build about five thousand miles of roads, um. And the Great Wall of China. Yeah, the first Great Wall of China. So while he said he was a jerk, he made a point. He got things done. I mean he he got a monetary system that was unified. Yeah. He also unified weights and measurements. Um. He unified China from seven kingdoms into one country. And it's still that way today two thousand years later. And if you've noticed the similarity between Chin and China, that's because the country is named after him, so he got things done. Vital figure in China's history, but he did a brutal, brutal, controlling, murderous dictator. Right. He wasn't asking, And he also had a really conflated view of his the empire that he'd put together. And you can see this apparently in the money that he minted. Like he there were different regions that he conquered had different kinds of money, so he did create like a single monetary system. I think you said, um, and that that money was square shaped with a hole in the center, so kind of like a square donut. The band Liang coin and that coin at the time in ancient China, um the square represented the earth and the circle represented the sky or the heavens. And so what he was saying is that this earth, my empire, is even greater than the heavens that surround the earth. That's how how good I'm feeling about my off right now? He felt pretty good, but he was parah annoyed, and I think that usually comes when you're on top and you get there by any means necessary, you're gonna be watching your back your whole life. Um. Specifically, he came from the west and conquered eastward. So when he was buried, he had the terra Cotta army facing east to protect him because of all the badness he had done. And this is after he had killed hundreds of scientists that he commissioned to try and prolong his life. Yeah, so we talked about him actually in the Bizarre Medical Treatments episode. I think without realizing it, that um, he at the back in the day at the time they believe mercury had some sort of like life enhancing or immortality bestowing properties, and he would take mercury pill. I think that that's ironically what killed him. Um. But he in addition to mercury, he sent out people to like find Fountain of Youth or whatever was the Chinese legend version of that. Um. He was obsessed with remaining alive and simultaneously, like you said, totally paranoid with dying. So he must have been a very tormented person. Yeah, he killed. Hum. Doctors and scientists were killed who could not come up with a way to make him immortal and again buried alive or beheaded. O. Great. Not a good guy. UM, all right, you want to take a break here and talk more about the terracotta army. Yes, sorry, so chuck, Um, when we uh, we were talking about this guy, think you're paying it a pretty good picture of him. I guess he comes to either he comes to grip with the idea that he's going to die, because at the time, like he's trying to chase immortality, he's concocting um like a huge burial massoleum for himself. I guess, hedging his bets in case he does die. But by this time, like Confucius and other scholars in China had basically like philosophically debunked the idea of life after death. So this man was utterly crazy by his contemporary standards. Um, And that kind of shows if you step back and really think about the attitude and the mentality behind what he was doing. But he at some point either came to grips with the factors he was gonna die, or he was just hedging his bets and thought he was going to remain immortal. But just in case, let me have this incredible grand funerary complex created, and let's build a terra Cotta army to protect me in the afterlife. Yeah, it's really neat to look at the terr Kotta army. Now is art, but it's eight thousand soldiers. Like this guy was clearly cuckoo. He was off his rocker. Yeah, he was a bad man. He was a bad man. Alright. So shall we start with the army. Yes, let's because it's not all that was that he had commission. But the armies are very it's pretty significant. It is significant. Um, Like you said, they are in formation. So the front dudes are Um, they're kneeling down their bowmen and they were famous the armies they had then, and this is one of the reasons he took over. They figured out the crossbow, and they figured out how to shoot while riding a horse, and that was basically all she wrote. Yeah, everybody else is like your mother. Yeah, like down here with a sword on the ground and you're shooting at me from twenty ft away with some weird metallic bolt. I guess not metallic, but wouldn't. Yeah, they weren't forging steel back then. I wonder when they did start. I don't know. It sounds like a podcast it does how steel works. Yeah, it would be a good one. I could see that. Um. So you have these bowmen, they have on their armor. Um, their fingers on the trigger there incredibly detailed down to the soles of their feet. Yeah, they have their shoes they're wearing have like tread marks on the bottom. So they took great pride, these artists, clearly because they probably didn't want to get killed, because each of them had to sign in case there was a flaw, it could be traced back to who built this one. Yeah, that they were killed if they didn't like it. They most decidedly were. There were eighty three. They found the stamps, which were ultimately the signatures of eighty three different foreman, and each foreman had a team of apprentices working under him, and the reason that they did assign those stamps was so that he could have them killed if he didn't like how slow work was progressing, if he didn't like what it looked like. Um. And at first, chuck, they were like, well, this is clearly they just set up an assembly line. Molds were known to the Chinese back then, and um, that's the only way you could possibly create seven thousand figures from a terra cotta army. And they found that yes, actually the heads were um created through molds. I think that arms were and stuff like that, but the bulk of them were created by this thing called coiling. Okay, so what is that like three D printing? Very much so. Actually they take clay and hammer until it's soft impliable, and then you wrap it in like a rope around it, and then you mold it. And the thing it really took these there's people who are recreating it to try to figure out how they did it, and they've examined like broken pieces so they can see the inside and they can see the coiling evidence very clearly, and they're like, it doesn't make any sense, Like you can't quickly make um all these figures in an efficient way by coiling? Why would they not just use molds? And finally somebody realized, like this emperor was a bloodthirsty tie right, he didn't care about efficiency. He cared about differences distinctions. So while so while the heads, just the actual shape of the heads were made in molds, the bodies were made by hand, each one through this coiling method. So where you could make like a molded body and maybe a week, it would take a month to do one body by coiling. And that's what they were doing because he wanted them different. That's crazy. Yeah, he just didn't want to carbon carbon copies soldiers exactly. So each one of these the body was made by hand through this incredibly intensive coiling method. So they're starting from the ground up obviously with the base and then coiling their way up. The legs then were molded and affixed, uh, as well as the arms and torsos. No, not the torsos, not the torso No, that's not right. Um okay, gotcha. But then the heads, they said they found eight different head molds. Yes, and that's just the big mold, not the right. The faces were done by hand individually as well, right, each face. Yeah. The hair and expressions, yeah yeah, and the hair uh. You know, warriors who had had the most kills had longer hair and a bigger up right bigger bee high and um, so they would you know, they took great care into making you know, the the most revered soldiers have their hair matched as it should, basically as realistic as they could. Yeah. Like around, if you're just an infantryman, you'd be wearing like one of one of those beanies, a beanie hat probably, um, with maybe like your bund just kind of sticking up off to the side. Underneath, if you're a general, you might be wearing a huge hat with a pheasant feather and a bow tying the whole thing underneath you. Pretty fancy, Yeah, very fancy. So these things were incredibly detailed. They weren't like a knockoff Star Wars figure that you would find in bulk Area or something like that, you know, or China. Yeah, sure, that was way more appropriate than Bulgaria. They probably make the real thing too. Um. Yeah, these were very detailed. Not you know, you wouldn't want to say lifelike. They're still artistic slightly, but they were pretty detailed still. Yeah, and they the ones you see now when they see him in the museum or you look it up on Google. Um, they are not colored, but that is because of humidity and time. But um, originally they fired him in the killing and they painted and lacquered them as well. That's right. I'd love to see those. Look at watch that National Geographic thing. They've redone one in the original colors that they think, and they're almost garish. They're so different like colorful wise and um, lots of surprising lavenders and blues and purples and things, reds, colors used to be way more garish. Um, but so okay. They were doing some assembly line stuff. Most of the bulk of it, though, was coiled by hand. The faces, the hair all done by hand, and then each one was painted by hand and then given a coat of lacquer. That's insane. It's insane that the Sky would have had an assembly line of seven thousand of these things built and unpainted. But he didn't. He went even more detailed. And apparently also I learned from that documentary at the time lacquer was an extremely expensive um product and he was using it on his terra cottas soldiers. It still ain't cheap, uh, And that they there wasn't just the soldiers, there were also um some Uh. There was a strong man in another room and some what do you call him that circus performers, Yeah, acrobats. And I looked up the strong man and he was noted for the detail of his biceps and he had a gut, he did, he had a gut and some my guns, yeah, cutting guns. He's missing his head right, Yeah, I didn't see a head. Yeah, but yeah, he's got he's a big boy. He's like um, he was built like Andre the Giant, Yeah kind of all right, you want to take another little rest here, We'll take a quick napa and then I'll let you awake very gently. All right, We'll we'll finish up. What up, buddy, huh, it's time to finish the terracott army. Oh man, oh, I got like crusted in my eyes. Look at you. Okay, I'm back, Chuck, Okay. So Geen wasn't the only ruler to do this, right, No, he wasn't. Who else did it? Well? Do you remember in our Pyramids episode, although it hasn't come out yet, no one will know what I'm talking about, but you will eventually. Um, we talked about how the the Pyramid of Cufu was the pinnacle of pyramid building in dynastic Egypt, and then the pyramids got smaller because the rulers um cred I guess went down as people started to worship the Sun instead. Great point that I had never considered. Very similar thing happened in China as people as the well. The Ching dynasty only lasted for another four years after Cheen sure huangdi um died, and then the Han dynasty started, and the Hans apparently had much um easier hand with their subjects, and so as a result, even though they had terracotta armies buried with them, they were like a third to a sixth of the size of Cheen's terracotta army. And they take that as a sign and that this um might empower over people. Um had diminished tremendously. Yeah, I think it was symbolic of a kinder Um regime UM and one that was not also booby trapped with like very much like Raiders of the Lost Arc. Apparently Cheens to him or the whole complex was booby trapped with like blow darts and stuff ready to go ye, and also we did we um. One of the reasons why this thing was booby trapped was to prevent looters. Because remember there's a historian that was that came along not too long after. He's a part of the early Han dynasty. From what I understand, his name is Sema kion Um, and Seema Kian is the one who first described cheens mausoleum. And one of the things he described is that Um on the ceiling was a constellation made of pearls and gems. Mountains had been chiseled out of gold and that um that Cheen's tomb itself was surrounded by a river of mercury. Because remember again, since they said that um it bestowed immortality, and from what I understand, a lot of what Sima Kian was talking about a writing has been proven correct. So um. And they've also found that in the soil around Chion's tomb where they think he's buried, there's higher than unusually high mercury levels, like super high. Yeah, so they think like, yeah, these crazy people buried him around a river of mercury, and who knows if there's a constellation of pearls and gemsa's maybe Seema Kian is right, Yeah, And that also makes it super dangerous to excavate still um, which is one of the reasons why they haven't done more there. Um there are six hundred pits that they have unearthed thus far, which is, like I said, I think, only about one percent. And um, they're sort of a raid to look elsewhere because of the booby traps in the mercury. I don't blame them. Uh So a few stats. Thirty six years to complete this army or the tomb, I guess um seven hundred thousand laborers they estimate eight hundred and twenty thousand square feet a hundred feet deep. With I saw eight thousand warriors, this is seven. I've seen different numbers too. Let's just say between six and eight UM forty thou weapons. And apparently these weapons are in really good shape. Well yeah, I mean they were like bronze swords and stuff like that. Yeah, they weren't made of like um, paper mache, so I guess they did have metal. Yeah, bronze at least that answers that in each one of these terra cotta soldiers weighs about three d and thirty pounds, which is crazy because they're not even solid. Oh yeah, it wouldn't be right. So what is the coil on the inside? Then they smooth out the outside, right, Okay, that makes sense. So we did mention that um Emperor Han ling D, who came fifty three years after Cheen, had his smaller terracotta soldiers. There's also the Wei Shan site Um which they found in two thousand two, another terracotta army. But they're all just a foot tall. They they they might as well not even be there. Symbolic and cute. Yeah that also symbolic again of a kinder. What was the one quote from do nothing in order to govern? Yeah, not quite the same as Chen That was the Emperor han ling D's quote. He was the motto Cheen was a little more do whatever you need to do to squash any disruption. Well yeah, and Han ling D came along and said, you know what, we're going to not text you guys that much. We're gonna do away with forced labor. Yeah, so uh, let's party. He was like the Rodney danger Field of the han dynasty. H I think he got respect though, Sure, that's true. So that's he was the Rodney Dangerfield post death, because Rodney has tons of respect. What was Rodney danger Fields epitaph? Do you remember? It's like one of the best ever. Someone I was on the Mark Maron's interview show w t F was interviewed and they were talking about the old days hanging out with Rodney and just what a beast that guy was. What do you mean just party beast? Oh yeah, like legendary. Um, you hang out with Rodney and you're in for a long night. I can imagine. Yeah, but a really good guy. I found it. Chuck. What his epitaph on Rodney danger Fields Grave Styf. There goes the neighborhood. So classic awesome, But I had like that you get a free bowl of soup. Oh that was pretty good man. You were like the rich little of this podcast. Uh, you got anything else? Nope. If you want to know more about the terra cotta army, go see it. And while you're doing that, you can type those words into the search bar at how stuff works dot com. Terra cotta is one word, by the way, one word Smithsonian Magazine. Oh did they goof it? Uh? And since I shame Smithsonian Magazine that means it's time for listener mail. I'm gonna call this uh animal imprint feedback. Hey guys, I'm currently listening to how animal imprinting works and could not even finish it because I had to write you my godmother's dorsey. Uh. And Susan live on own and run an urban farm in Austin, Texas on the east side. They have several animals such as chickens, bunnies, geese, miniature donkeys, boy and ducks. Um. Recently, a mother duck had no interest in her babies uh, and they got adopted by a chicken. That chicken got sick of them trying to play in all of the rain, and we have all the rain we've been getting, and left them on the around. A male goose named Gustavo took the baby ducks in and treats them as his own. On top of that, the next batch of baby ducks born he went and took as his own. Now Gustavo has about ten baby ducks that follow him around the nest. With them, he has his own private army. That's right, um, and they're not terra cotta. They're made of baby duck feathers, the softest army. I failed to mention that Gustavo is the face of the farm, greets people, follows around my godmothers and gives tours whoever stops by, So she says, she finishes with. I started listening to y'all about five months ago and cannot stop start many of my sentences now with this podcast, I was listening to say many random facts that I learned from. You also teach high school world history. And on the days I need to uh the students not to talk um a k A. The days that I don't have a lesson plan, UH talk too alright, play one of your episodes that applies to what we're learning and have them do bookwork. I find many of them not working and listening to your show instead. Nice. So that is from Christina, Maudie and Christina, thank you for your work as a teacher. And hello to all your students. And hello, Hello are your godmothers and Gustavo. Yes, hello miss Maudie's class. Thanks for listening Miss Maudie. That's so nice. Yeah, I'm sure that's what they call her. Yeah, that'd be great. I call it Christina. That's way too modern of a school for me. Yeah, and big ups to Gustavo. That's pretty cool. I want to take a Gustavo to her someday. And she sent a picture of gustav on the ducks too. Uh well, we should post that somewhere all right, unless it's copyrighted. Let us know. If you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us at s y s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook, dot com, slash stuff. You should know. You can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at how stuff Works dot com and has always joined us at our home on the web. If you should know, dot Com Radio Stuff You Should Know is a production of I heart Radio. 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