By At a glance: Terracotta Army
- Location
- Lintong District, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China
- Built
- c. 246–208 BCE; found 1974
- Type
- Funerary sculpture pits · Royal
- Style
- Qin dynasty
- Commissioned by
- Qin Shi Huang, first emperor of unified China
- Architects & builders
- Not recorded; workshop foremen's names are stamped on many figures
- Materials
- Fired clay, originally lacquered and painted; bronze weapons
- Size
- An estimated 8,000 soldiers, 130 chariots and 670 horses across three pits
Terracotta Army: what it is
The army stands in battle formation about 1.5 km east of the emperor's burial mound, facing east, toward the states Qin had conquered. Pit 1 holds the main infantry, Pit 2 cavalry, archers and chariots, and Pit 3 appears to be a command post.
The pits are only part of a vast necropolis that also contains acrobats, officials, bronze waterbirds and a model of the imperial stables. The emperor's own tomb mound remains unexcavated.
Terracotta Army, then and now
Real images only: an earlier view and a recent photograph, each credited and linked to its original file. Switch between them or compare side by side.
Then · 1979Now · TodayMove across the image to compareTerracotta Army: how it was designed
- 01
An assembly line in clay
Legs, torsos, arms and heads were made separately, often from moulds, then joined and hand-finished. This modular system let workshops produce thousands of figures in a few decades.
- 02
Individual faces
Hair, moustaches, expressions and armour were modelled by hand, so no two soldiers look exactly alike. Height and dress vary with rank, from crouching archers to taller generals.
- 03
A roofed underground barracks
The pits were corridors lined with rammed-earth walls and brick floors, roofed with timber beams covered with mats and earth. The army stood in the dark.
- 04
Real weapons
Soldiers held real bronze swords, spears, crossbows and arrows, many still sharp, some bearing dates and workshop marks.
Construction timeline
Work on the mausoleum begins when the future emperor becomes king of Qin at about 13.
He unifies China and takes the title Qin Shi Huang, First Emperor.
The emperor dies; work ends around 208 BCE as the dynasty collapses.
The pits are broken into and burned, traditionally blamed on the rebel general Xiang Yu.
Farmers digging a well in Lintong find fragments of figures.
The museum over Pit 1 opens; in 1987 the mausoleum is inscribed by UNESCO.
How the design changed
Colour that vanished in minutes
The figures were coated in lacquer and painted in reds, greens, blues and purples. On exposure to dry air the lacquer curls and flakes, so most colour was lost soon after excavation.
Excavating more slowly
Because of paint loss, archaeologists now excavate in small areas and use conservation treatments developed with German partners before exposing painted surfaces.
Who built it
The historian Sima Qian, writing about a century later, said some 700,000 workers laboured on the mausoleum. Many figures carry the stamped names of foremen from government and local workshops, the closest thing to signatures, which has let researchers trace the workshops' output.
Where it is
Lintong District, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China · 34.3850° N, 109.2731° E · Open in OpenStreetMap. Nearest in this guide: Forbidden City (880 km), Great Wall (930 km), Potala Palace (1,788 km).
880 km930 km1,788 kmTerracotta ArmyDrag to pan, use + and − or double-click to zoom, and tap any pin for a preview.
Built around the same time
| Monument | Country | Built | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Great Stupa at Sanchi | India | 3rd century BCE – 1st century CE | 4 years earlier |
| Petra — Al-Khazneh (the Treasury) | Jordan | Al-Khazneh: about the 1st century CE | 196 years later |
| Parthenon | Greece | 447–432 BCE | 201 years earlier |
Terracotta Army: questions people ask
How many soldiers are in the Terracotta Army?
About 8,000 soldiers are estimated across the three pits, along with about 130 chariots and 670 horses. Only part has been excavated.
Why was the Terracotta Army made?
It was built to guard and serve Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China, in the afterlife, as part of his vast tomb complex.
Were the terracotta warriors painted?
Yes. They were lacquered and painted in bright colours. Most of the paint flaked off when the figures were exposed to air during excavation.
Has Qin Shi Huang's tomb been opened?
No. The emperor's burial mound has not been excavated, partly to protect it and partly because the technology to do so safely is not yet available.
Sources & image credits
- UNESCO World Heritage Centre — Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor
- Wikipedia — Terracotta Army
- Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum
- Current photograph: 51714-Terracota-Army.jpg by xiquinhosilva, CC BY 2.0 — original on Wikimedia Commons · licence.
- Historic image: Qin Soldier Xian.jpg by George Saxton, NESDIS, NOAA, Public domain — original on Wikimedia Commons.
- Coordinates from Wikidata. Images resized and converted to WebP; otherwise unaltered. Checked October 25, 2026.
More to wander into
- World monument · 7th century BCE – 1644 CE (most visible parts Ming, 1368–1644)Great Wall of ChinaTwo thousand years of walls, from rammed earth to Ming brick.
- World monument · 1555–1561Saint Basil's CathedralNine chapels in one, painted into a riot of colour a century after it was built.
- World monument · Late 12th – early 13th century (traditional dating)Rock-Hewn Churches of LalibelaChurches carved down into the ground, still in daily use after 800 years.
- World monument · c. late 8th – early 9th centuryBorobudurA Buddhist mandala in stone, climbed as a 5-km path to enlightenment.
- World monument · c. 21st century BCEZiggurat of UrA 4,100-year-old Sumerian stepped platform for the moon god, rebuilt in parts in the 1980s.
- World monument · 1959–1973Sydney Opera HouseSails that became buildable once every shell was cut from the same sphere.
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