Memories of a Terracotta Warrior
ISF Academy, Lo, Charlotte - 10
am a Terracotta Warrior, standing with my master, day and night. I shall fulfill my duty to protect him, withstanding
all problems. My fellow warriors are also there to guard him, Qin Shi Huang, the strongest and most powerful emperor
of all time.
Qin Shi Huang was the emperor that created a whole new China, reducing seven warring kingdoms into a united
country. He was good in many ways, but he was not the nicest ruler. In fact, he was a tyrant, probably the most gruesome
and barbaric one. In order to protect his kingdom, he sent thousands of people to build and connect the first Great Wall
of China, surrounding the borders of his empire. He ordered generals to whip them if they did not work hard enough or if
they stopped to catch their breath. If you spoke against him or said something that insulted him, “Off goes your head!”
One day, he decided that smart people who read books will be harder to control, so he ordered all books to be burnt and
hundreds of book readers and scholars were buried alive.
His dream was to live for eternity, so he sent ships to venture out across many cities, in search of a so-called Magic
Elixir, that can make him immortal. After many years of searching, no elixir was found. Qin Shi Huang thought, “ If I can’t
live forever, then, I have to have a fabulous afterlife, just like the life I have now.” So, from the age of 13, he started
ordering potters to form human-like servants, guards, life-like horses and carriages to be placed in his opulent tomb, which
took over 30 years to build, together with countless treasures and priceless jewels. My emperor was really worried that
tomb robbers would steal all these treasures, so he decided that he needed an army to protect him in his afterlife.
You may ask, what are Terracotta Warriors? Well, it literally means, “baked earth”. We were made under secrecy, by
around 700,000 laborers, and placed in underground trenches that were less than a mile away from our majesty’s tomb.
Thousands and thousands of clay sculptures like me stand guard, in strategic positions to protect and guard him in the
afterlife, and to stop tomb robbers from stealing his treasures. There are many different sculptures, like generals, archers,
officers, soldiers, chariots, and even acrobats! None of the warriors’ faces were the same.
All of the sculptures were placed in four pits, numbered 1, 2, 3 and 4. The first pit is the largest, containing around 6,000
soldiers. In pit two, where I lived together with almost 900 fellow warriors, there are also archers, chariots, cavalry and
horses. As a Terracotta Warrior, I wore armor which was made out of “fish scale” like pieces of metal, put together to
become a knee length robe. The lower ranked servants didn’t have any armor and only had cloth shin guards for protection.
We were in the pit for what seemed like an eternity, but it was actually 2,200 years. I’m lucky that I have a chariot
to relax on, with horses pulling on the reins, unlike other soldiers, who have to stay in the same position for centuries. My
chariot is made out of bronze, with four majestic and strong horses pulling it forward. It has two bronze wheels and an
umbrella on top. The horses looked so real that they might become alive any second.
We were never supposed to be discovered by anyone, and my emperor even took special measures to ensure that, including
shutting the people who took his dead body to the tomb in the tomb forever, until they starved to death. But
unfortunately, one day in 1974, because there was a drought, the six Yang brothers decided to dig a well around the place
we were buried and dug right to where a brother of mine was standing, and in a blink of an eye, all of us were all
uncovered. The archaeologists goggled at the sight in front of them, unable to contain their excitement. They started
restoring us one by one, which was really hard work, by placing heads back, fixing chips… and they are still busy doing so
today, as there are over 7,500 of us! After all their hard work, we looked almost like how we looked like when we were
first made, except for the colours painted on us, as the paint didn’t stay a long time on us. Then, they opened an exhibit for
tourists to come and see us in Xian, where we were found.
We, the Terracotta Warriors, represent the Emperor’s power and fierceness, standing straight and still, with no
expression on our faces. We are proud that we have protected our majesty well since Qin Shi Huang, as of today,
remains undisturbed in his tomb. That is probably why a lot of people marvel at us, and why we are classified as the
eighth wonder of the world. We are another one of China’s marvels, right next to the Great Wall of China, also created
by the mighty Qin Shi Huang.
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