Chinese Glasses Made 2,000 Years Ago

These framed blue glasses were unearthed in 1983 from the tomb of a West Han prince in Guangzhou Province.

All together, 11 pairs of glass ID panels in the size of a smart phone were discovered during a construction project.

The tomb, built on a hill, is found to contain 7 chambers arranged in T shape, linked each other through doors, which is typical West Han tomb style.

On the walls of the entrance chamber, colourful murals were painted. There are bronze and stone musical instruments, as well as wine vessels, stored in the east chambers. While in the west chambers, a variety of artifacts made of silk, bronze, jade and Lacquerware were displayed.

The most priceless articles found in the tomb, apart from 11 pairs of glass ID panels, are a jade clothes and a gold seal, which reveals the identity of the tomb owner.

COMMENTS FROM GOOGLE PLUS

Mile HsiangYang Lee:

Gold seal? 😮 Gold Plated or Gilded Gold, right? 😐 Not actually 100 % GOLD CONTENT?

All Things Chinese: 

It’s made of solid gold but mixed with a small percentage of other metal alloy I believe. Otherwise the seal would be too soft like a pile of shit and won’t be suitable for using as a seal.

There is no object with 100% gold content existed so far, not on the Earth. The purest gold

This is the coffin in the bury chamber and the tomb owner was found wrapped in a jade suit.

The conventional belief is that glasses were introduced to China by Zhe He’s Treasure Fleets from the Middle East during Ming Dynasty only half a millennium ago.

COMMENTS FROM GOOGLE PLUS

Eric Horrobin:

So he lay there dead for all to see. What a spectacle. 🤔

All Things Chinese:

I believe his body has long rotten with only a few bones left inside the suit.

From Feng Shui point of view, a corpse that fails to degenerate is a very ominous sign. And further exposing a dead body in the air for everyone to view will have negative effects on both the deceased and the people alive.