Jade Burial Suits of Liu Sheng and Dou Wan: Han Royal Tombs

The jade burial suits of Liu Sheng and Dou Wan are the most famous finds from the Mancheng Han tombs in Hebei Province, China. Liu Sheng, a prince of the Western Han dynasty who died in 113 BC, and his wife Dou Wan were buried in rock-cut tombs inside a hill, each wrapped in a suit made of thousands of jade plaques sewn with gold wire. Discovered in 1968, they were the first complete jade suits ever found, and they transformed understanding of Han royal burial.

Who was Liu Sheng?

Liu Sheng was a son of Emperor Jing of Han (reigned 157–141 BC) and so a half-brother of Emperor Wu of Han. In 154 BC, after the Rebellion of the Seven States, he was made king of Zhongshan, a small kingdom in what is now central Hebei. He ruled it for about 42 years and is known by his posthumous title, Prince Jing of Zhongshan.

The historian Sima Qian describes him as fond of wine and women, and the Shiji credits him with more than 120 sons. Centuries later, Liu Bei, founder of the Shu Han state in the Three Kingdoms period, claimed descent from him, which made his name familiar to generations of Chinese readers.

Liu Sheng lived at a time when the Han court was steadily reducing the power of the regional kings. After the rebellion of 154 BC, kings lost the right to appoint their own senior officials, and in 127 BC Emperor Wu’s “edict of extending grace” required kings to divide their lands among their sons, so that kingdoms shrank with each generation. The Book of Han records that in 138 BC Liu Sheng wept at a court banquet and complained that imperial officials were harassing the princes, after which the emperor treated them with greater courtesy. A life of luxury, rather than political ambition, was the safest path for a royal relative, and the splendour of his tomb reflects that.

Little is known of Dou Wan beyond her tomb. Her family name links her to the powerful Dou clan of Empress Dowager Dou, Liu Sheng’s grandmother, and she probably died a few years after her husband.

Discovery in 1968

In May 1968 soldiers of the People’s Liberation Army working on Lingshan hill, south-west of the town of Mancheng, broke into a hidden chamber. The site proved to be Liu Sheng’s tomb, and a second tomb, Dou Wan’s, was located nearby. Archaeologists from the Institute of Archaeology and Hebei province excavated both during the summer of that year, during the Cultural Revolution.

The scholar and official Guo Moruo visited the excavation and helped identify the occupants from inscriptions. The full excavation report was published in 1980.

The tombs

Both tombs were hollowed directly into the limestone of the hill, a type of burial used for Western Han kings. Liu Sheng’s tomb is about 52 metres long and Dou Wan’s about 50 metres. Each has a sealed entrance passage, side chambers and a central hall, with the burial chamber at the back.

The entrances had been closed with walls and, in Liu Sheng’s case, with molten iron poured between brick walls, which helped keep robbers out. The side chambers held chariots and horses, storerooms with large wine jars and food vessels, and kitchens. The central halls had wooden structures with tiled roofs, built inside the rock to imitate a palace.

Together the tombs contained several thousand objects of bronze, gold, silver, jade, iron, pottery and lacquer, making them one of the richest Han burials ever found intact.

The jade suits

Jade suits, called jinlü yuyi (“jade clothes sewn with gold thread”), were made for the highest Han elite. Each suit was shaped to the body, with separate parts for the head, upper body, arms, hands, legs and feet. Small rectangular or shaped jade plaques were drilled at the corners and joined with fine wire.

Liu Sheng’s suit is about 1.88 metres long and is made of 2,498 jade pieces joined with roughly 1,100 grams of gold wire. Dou Wan’s suit is about 1.72 metres long, with 2,160 pieces and around 700 grams of gold wire. Inside the suits were jade plugs for the body’s openings and jade objects placed in the hands.

Making a suit required enormous skilled labour. Specialists have estimated that a single suit could have taken a workshop many years, though such estimates vary widely. Later texts of the Eastern Han describe a hierarchy in which gold wire was reserved for emperors and silver or copper wire used for lesser nobles, but such rules were not yet fixed in Liu Sheng’s time.

Why jade?

In early China, jade was associated with purity, virtue and immortality. Han elites believed it could prevent the body from decaying and protect the spirit. Ironically, when the Mancheng tombs were opened, almost nothing of the bodies remained; the suits had collapsed under their own weight and only traces of remains were found.

The custom of jade suits ended in AD 222, when Cao Pi, the first emperor of the Wei dynasty, banned them, in part because they attracted tomb robbers.

The Changxin Palace Lamp and other treasures

Dou Wan’s tomb held the famous Changxin Palace Lamp, a gilded bronze figure of a kneeling servant girl about 48 centimetres tall holding a lamp. A sliding shutter adjusts the direction and brightness of the light, and smoke rises through the servant’s raised sleeve into her hollow body, reducing soot in the room. Inscriptions show that it had belonged to the Changxin Palace, the residence of the empress dowager, before it came to Dou Wan.

Liu Sheng’s tomb produced a celebrated boshan incense burner inlaid with gold, shaped as a mountain with tiny hunters and animals among its peaks. Other finds include bronze vessels, iron weapons, gold and silver acupuncture needles, and seals.

Consequences and legacy

Before 1968 jade suits were known mainly from texts, and some scholars doubted they had existed in the form described. The Mancheng suits proved their reality and became a model for identifying fragments from other tombs. Around twenty more suits or partial suits have since been found, including that of the King of Nanyue in Guangzhou, which uses silk thread.

The suits and the Changxin lamp are now in the Hebei Museum in Shijiazhuang. They have travelled to major exhibitions abroad and are among the most recognisable images of Han China, alongside finds from the Mawangdui Han tombs.

Myths and facts

• Myth: The suits preserved the bodies. Fact: The bodies had decayed almost entirely.
• Myth: Jade suits were common among Han nobles. Fact: They were reserved for a tiny elite of emperors, kings and their consorts.
• Myth: Every suit used gold wire. Fact: Silver, copper and silk were also used, depending on rank and period.

Timeline

• 154 BC: Liu Sheng becomes king of Zhongshan.
• 113 BC: Liu Sheng dies and is buried at Lingshan, Mancheng.
• Late 2nd century BC: Dou Wan dies and is buried in the neighbouring tomb.
• AD 222: Cao Pi bans jade burial suits.
• 1968, May: Soldiers discover Liu Sheng’s tomb.
• 1968, summer: Both tombs are excavated.
• 1980: The excavation report is published.

Why it matters

The Mancheng tombs give a rare, almost undisturbed view of how a Western Han king and queen prepared for the afterlife. Their jade suits show the wealth and craftsmanship of the early empire and the powerful beliefs about death that drove it.