The Terracotta Army of Qin Shi Huang has always fascinated me. Buried with the Chinese emperor in 210–209 BCE, the entire clay army consisted of some “8,000 soldiers, 130 chariots with 520 horses and 150 cavalry horses”, according to Wikipedia, manufactured by about 700,000 workers. Can you imagine being among the farmers that just happened upon this buried necropolis in 1974? Hacking up some land and discovering a massive city of life-sized clay statues? Seeing them in their pits must have been so uncanny.
I’m not sure what it is that has made me intrigued by the Terracotta Warriors. I suppose its the same curiosity attached to the Pyramids at Giza. Life is so strange, so incomprehensible that enumerable ideologies have been constructed to make sense of it and that death, that singular event in one’s life have any meaning, is so terrifying that emperors and pharaohs devoted so much effort, cost so many lives, to ensure safety in the afterworld.
And, now that they’re gone and science assures us that enormous pyramids and vast armies will do nothing to ensure immortality, these symbols remain, as a reminder that no matter how powerful you are or how many workers you have slaving away for you, there is no certainty in life or in death.
So, why not 3D print your own symbol of life’s incomprehensibility? Now you can! Sketchfab user John Fino has uploaded five different warriors and one horse, all made from scans of a set of miniatures from China. The embed below demonstrates Sketchfab’s new playlist feature, not dissimilar from the playlist feature on YouTube.
So, start 3D printing these bad boys until you have your own brigade of soldiers. Use clay extrusion for a more accurate army. And, for extra points, bury them with you when you keel over. Just remember: these symbols will not make life, or death, any more sane.
