The Terracotta Army

The Terracotta Army is an incredible collection of 8,099 life size terracotta figures of warriors and horses. Buried with the first Qin Emperor in around 210BC and built to assist the Emperor in ruling in the afterlife, the figures were discovered in 1974 by local farmers. Each soldier has been individually painted and they have different hairstyles and armour depending on their rank.

The guides tell you that construction of the mausoleum and army would have taken 700,000 workers 38 years to complete.

There is now a museum on the site covering 16,300 square meters where you can see the army, some of those currently excavated are restored to their former glory and arranged in battle formations, but there are thousands yet to be dug out. An amazing site, and the sole object of most visitors' trips to Xian.