Ancient Sichuan: Treasures from a Lost Civilization (review)

This sumptuous book is a feast for the eye as well as the intellect. Although it is a very good catalog of the exhibit of the same name mounted by the Seattle Art Museum in collaboration with the Bureau of Cultural Relics, Sichuan Province, China, it is far more than just a catalog. The book is a treasure in itself, with crisp photographs, clear drawings and maps, and a scholarly text that is both thorough and gracefully written. The authors are top scholars in their fields, and they bring informed perspectives on the archaeology and history of Sichuan as well as many details that are available otherwise only in Chinese. This will therefore be an important addition to the libraries of China scholars, including those who work on other parts of China and in other time periods.

More than half the volume is devoted to the astonishing discoveries at Sanxingdui. Although these artifacts are familiar to China archaeologists and historians through a variety of publications, they are probably less well known to the general public. The most spectacular of these finds are bronze heads and masks and one complete human statue, which dominate the book as they must have dominated the exhibition. These bronzes are breathtaking in their grandeur, in their eerie, otherworldly quality, and in their difference from anything hitherto known in China—or elsewhere, for that matter. The fact that little else is known of the Sanxingdui culture only adds to the impression that the bronzes derive from an alien world.

As spectacular as the bronzes are, however, it is the scholarly qualities of the book that make it outstanding. Two introductory chapters introduce the reader to the topic of Sichuan archaeology and the context of the discoveries in that province, followed by five chapters that explore the archaeology of Sichuan in detail. For the most part, each chapter's author has also written the catalog entries, tying the objects into the overall discussion well. An afterword wraps up with a perspective that places later Sichuan archaeology in the geographic context of the Chengdu Plain and delineates its role in Chinese history.

The Introduction is divided into parts 1 and 2 according to time period: before and after the Warring States. In part 1, Jay Xu, Curator of Chinese Art at the Seattle Art Museum, provides a multifaceted perspective on the pre-Warring States period that includes but is not limited to the Sanxingdui material. Xu begins with the geographic setting, which is introduced by a series of three maps of increasing detail that help the reader understand the location of Sichuan and its amazing discoveries. This is followed by an excellent summary of the field-work at Sanxingdui and the circumstances of the discoveries there. A fine series of photographs and a site map aid the reader in conceptualizing the site, where city walls are still visible in a few places. But it is the two sacrificial pits that receive the most attention. The objects in them had been deliberately broken and untold hours of conservation work were required to reconstruct them as they originally appeared. Xu does not stop at a description of the discoveries; he also places them in the context of Sichuan and of the Chinese world of the late second millennium B.C. This chapter provides the basic framework for understanding the earlier part of Sichuan archaeology.

The second introductory chapter, by Michèle Pirazzoli-t'Serstevens, concerns Sichuan in both the Warring States and Han periods. While the discoveries depicted here lack the otherworldly quality of the Sanxingdui material, they hold their own in interest. Putting the archaeology in the context of historic documents, the author discusses the times of the kingdoms of Ba and Shu. Ba was east of Shu (some of Ba will be flooded by the...