Society

5 Tang Dynasty murals complete long journey home

By Ma Lie (China Daily)
Updated: 2011-05-12 08:16

XI'AN - Five Tang Dynasty (AD 618 - 907) murals that were illegally sold overseas six years ago have finally been returned to their former home in Xi'an, the capital of Northwest China's Shaanxi province.

The precious murals that are 1.2 meters long and between 80 and 90 cm wide, were officially transferred to Shaanxi history museum from Xi'an police on Wednesday.

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"The five murals are well preserved with complete composition and vivid colors," Cheng Jianzheng, curator of the museum, said at the ceremony held in the museum on Wednesday afternoon to welcome their return.

It was the second success made by Xi'an police in getting back precious cultural relics, following the return of a Tang Dynasty stone coffin that was also illegally sold overseas.

According to Han Qing-long, head of the heritage inspection team under the Xi'an public security bureau, a criminal gang that raided a Tang Dynasty imperial tomb in a southern suburb of Xi'an was broken up in February 2006.

"We caught Yang Bin, the leader of the robbery gang, in July 2006 and got information that the coffin and murals had been sold overseas. After that, we started the long search for the rare treasures," Han said.

After four years of hard work and negotiations, Han and his colleagues successfully persuaded a relics collector in the United States to return the 27-ton stone coffin without any conditions. The coffin was transferred by the police to Shaanxi history museum on June 17, 2010.

"We got information about the murals from the collector and then made hard efforts to have them returned on March 17 this year," Han said.

The coffin and murals were both stolen from the tomb of Wu Huifei (699 - 737), concubine of Tang Xuanzong (685 - 762), the seventh emperor of the Tang Dynasty.

Experts found that the five murals were all high-grade cultural relics, of which three had been ranked as State top class relics with proficient painting skills. The initial research on the murals showed that the figures in the murals are palace maids.

Xu Tao, a researcher with Shaanxi provincial cultural relics identification center, said similar murals have been seen in around 100 ancient tombs during archaeological excavations but few have been as well preserved as the murals that were returned. Xu said such murals can only stand the test of time if they have the right environment, because air, humidity and light damages the colors.

"Such well-preserved murals are rare art treasures and they can provide valuable information about the person buried in the tomb and the period in which she lived," Xu said.

Du Hangwei, director of the Xi'an public security bureau, said that the success in bringing back the ancient coffin and murals sets a good example for police departments in cracking down on relics robbery.