The Emperors of China did not want their bodies to be alone in the afterlife, which resulted in the creation on Chinese Tomb Art. Chinese Tomb Art served a purpose to give the Emperors a home in the afterlife along with all the aspects from their lives that mattered to them such as servants, objects, wives, pets, guardians and food. All of these objects would be included with the burial of the Emperor. The Qin Shihuangdi tomb belonged to the first Emperor of China, Qin Shihuangdi who’s reign lasted from 221 BCE to 206 BCE. This short lived Empire introduced a lot to China such as standardization of currency, weights and measures and a single legal code. When he passed away, he was buried along with over 7,000 figures in his tomb. While pieces of his tomb are still being discovered today, the Terracotta Warriors were a huge part of his tomb occupying at least two of the three vaults of his tomb. Two prominent examples of the Terracotta Warriors were the armored kneeling archer and the armored general. These two pieces of art were similar and different in a few ways.
The armored kneeling archer and the armored general had a few similarities such as they were both armored and created the same way with similar features. Both of these figures wore armor that covered the shoulder and bodies of these warriors. This signifies that these warriors were valued in the eyes of the Qin Shihuangdi. Not all of the Terracotta warriors had armor on them, including certain archers, which explains there is a clear distinction between the sculptures that were armored and the sculptures that weren’t armored. Another similarity between the two figures were the way they were made. These figures were created starting from the feet and working up the body. The body parts were produced in bulk and then attached depending on the figure that was being built. Then they would be heated to make the figures. Both of these figures were painted but the paint has gone away after being buried for centuries. One feature that these figures have is that their faces are all different fro m each other. Each and every face of the Terracotta Warriors are unique despite the body structures being fairly similar depending the position of the warrior. These Terracotta warriors also did have weapons in their hands such as the infantryman that were equipped with their lances and crossbows. Despite some of similarities there are some differences between these figures.
These two figures have a few differences such as the number of figures, their positions, and their features. The number of figures found for each of these types of warriors are very different. There are thousands of the kneeling archers while only nine generals have been discovered so far. While the tomb hasn’t been completely excavated, this is still a huge difference. This shows how high of a rank the General was. The kneeling archer is kneeling while the general is standing. The archer is kneeling because they were kneeling during combat and that is why armor for the top half of their body was enough to protect since their bottoms halves were covered. The General’s position was standing to show the power he and his hands were put together to show that he did not participate in combat as a general. While the basic structure for the figures are similar, there are little features of the figures that lets any viewer know the position of the warrior. The hair of the archers was braided and arranged into a topknot. The hair of the general was put back and they wore a headdress to let people know who they were. The Generals had ribbons that showed their ranks while the Archer did not have any ribbons or indication of rank. The Generals had more distinctive features considering they had the highest rank. These were some of the differences between the two figures.