Terracotta Warriors & Rivers of Mercury

What happens when a farmer digging a well accidentally unearths one of the greatest archaeological discoveries in human history? You get the Terracotta Army, and about a million new questions. In this episode, we dig into the world of Emperor Qin Shi Huang: the man who unified China, obsessed over immortality, and may have accidentally poisoned himself with mercury trying to live forever. Two thousand years later, his clay army is still standing guard underground, and the tomb they're protecting has never been opened.

Photo credit: Aaron Greenwood, Unsplash

Resources:

Terracotta Army — Wikipedia

The Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor — UNESCO World Heritage

The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army — British Museum exhibition catalogue