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Unique fish scale armor found in Marquis of Haihun’s tomb
More than 6,000 scales of armor have been discovered in the tomb Liu He, the Marquis of Haihun, in Nanchang, capital of eastern China’s Jiangxi province. The fish scale armor was made of a lacquered iron, copper and leather. Previous examples of Han Dynasty armor found in tombs were all made from a single material. This is the first armor from the period to be discovered that was made of a composite of multiple materials.
Liu He was the grandson of Emperor Wu of Han and son of the king of Changyi, so not in the direct line of imperial succession. He ascended to his father’s throne after his death in 88 B.C., becoming King of Changyi when he was around four years old. According to later historical sources (supporters of his political opponents), he was a wastrel from teenagerhood, running with a bad crowd and never listening to good advice. The powerful general and regent Huo Guang saw him as a useful idiot when He’s uncle Emperor Zhao died without a son and installed Liu He on the imperial throne. His reign lasted exactly 27 days, from July 18th to August 14th, 74 B.C. He was deposed, the articles of impeachment charging him with 1127 counts of improper conduct and stripped of his titles. The next emperor eventually relented, and in 63 B.C. made him Marquis of Haihun which had the marked advantage of sending him far from the capital. He died in 59 B.C.
His tomb was discovered in 2011, a rapid rescue excavation in response to a report of looters having hit a rich vein of archaeological material. It is the largest and best preserved Western Han tomb ever found, and in the years of excavations since its discovery, more than 20,000 artifacts have been recovered, including two million bronze coins, the largest amount of gold ever found in a Han tomb, bronze goose-shaped lamps, bronze lamps, two lacquer screens, one of with the earliest known portrait of Confucius, 12 shields, 5,200 wooden tablets and bamboo slips containing writings ranging from poetry, the Analects of Confucius, historical chronicles to divination and a game manual.
The tomb is so dense with grave goods that it is still undergoing excavation and the objects that have been recovered are still in the process of investigation and conservation. The scale armor was found two years ago in the armory room in the west part of the outer chamber of the tomb. It was in a large pile with numerous swords. Rising groundwater from Poyang Lake posed a threat to the metals and organic materials in the armor, so the entire pile was removed in a soil block for excavation in laboratory conditions at the Nanchang Museum of the Han Dynasty Haihunhou State Ruins.
In the two years of laboratory excavation, the archaeological team has sorted and counted almost 7,000 individual scales of armor. Traces of lacquer found indicate the armor and swords were stored together in large lacquer boxes which decayed over time leaving behind their contents.
Bai Rongjin, a research fellow with the Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that “the smallest armor piece was only 1 centimeter wide and 0.2 centimeters thick.” […]
Usually, armor pieces measure between 4-10 centimeters. Even the exquisite iron armors pieces unearthed from the Western Han (206 BC-25 AD) tombs of Prince Liu Sheng, measured 2-3 centimeters in width. The presence of smaller armor pieces indicates that more armor pieces were needed to make the armor, and that the forging process was a more refined one, explained Bai.
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