A house-shaped burial of a spouse of the Yuan Dynasty found in Wushan

Archaeologists excavated a house-shaped burial of the Yuan Dynasty (1206 AD to 1368 AD) in the Miaoyu Township, Wushan County, Sichuan Province in August 2005. The burial, which is an imitation of the ground architecture, has two narrow chambers with elegant murals in which the dead husband and wife were put respectively. Murals in the right chamber depict the scenes of everyday living such as playing chess, playing musical instruments, teaching and enjoying paintings. Two attendants in Mongolian dress, each more than 50 cm high, were painted beside the door of the chamber. Except for two similar painted attendants beside the door, murals in the left chamber are quite different from that in the right chamber. Peonies, pines, birds and butterflies were painted on the walls in high density. The roof was decorated with cloud patterns. Though the burial had been looted and no offerings were left, the fine murals are of great value to the study of Yuan paintings. In fact, as Professor Su Bai from the Beijing University mentioned, this is the first time that archaeologists found Yuan burial murals in the area south of the Yangzi River.