Lanterns

There have been several photos of the Terracota Warriors Lanterns on blip so I did wonder whether to add mine. These two metre high lanterns were created for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and are now on display at Edinburgh University’s Old College for a few days. People seem to have been able to wander among the lanterns but this afternoon the barriers were up and as it was daytime they were not yet lit.

The lanterns were inspired by the 8000 terracotta soldiers which were discovered in battle formation in underground pits in China. The first Chinese Emperor wanted to be protected in his mausoleum in his afterlife by models of soldiers, horses and many others and since then, they lay undiscovered for 2200 years until some peasants digging a well noticed fragments in the soil in 1974.

Unlike the original terracota soldiers who were entombed, these warriors have been able to see the light of day (and night) and feel the wind which blew them gently so that they appeared to be breathing.