In the Spring of 1974, several farmers from the Yang Village near Xi'an were digging a well when they stumbled across the most priceless archaeological discovery of modern times!
Excavations have un-earthed thousands of terracotta warriors, each with a unique facial expression and positioned according to their ranks.
They are a replica of the Qin army from more than 2,200 years ago and it was believed that each terracotta warriors were replicas of real Chinese soldiers.
The army of statues, numbering in the thousands, is testament of the forces the first Emperor of China had at his command.
Qin Shi Huang (259 - 210BC) was the first Emperor of the Qin Dynasty and he was the founder of China's first empire after unifying the Seven Warring States. If this name sounded all too familiar, that was because he is the one who ordered the building and restoration of the Great Wall of China!
Upon ascending the throne at the age of 13, Qin Shi Huang ordered the construction of his tomb which took 38 years to build and utilizing the labor of over 700,000 conscripts many of whom were killed to protect the privacy of the Emperor once it was done.
