On November 15th, 2007 Professor Yu Xin from Fudan University gave a seminar on a certain type of
figurine that has been found in archaeological excavations in sites
along the route of the Silk Road, as well as near the Han dynasty (206 BCE -220 CE) foundations of the Great Wall. The key term for
these artifacts is dairen (代人,
human substitutes), but many other terms have been used to describe
them in various studies. These figurines (which is the English term
preferred by Yu Xin) are carved from wood into a figure with roughly
human features, the bottom half sharply pointed and a face painted on
the top in dark ink. Much of the speaker's initial discussion
centered on the archaeologist Sir Aurel Stein's 1908 work Serindia,
which contains many pictures and descriptions of these artifacts. He
also noted that they were produced over a period spanning from the
20th century BCE to the 12th century CE. Yu Xin
has seen many examples of these figurines which are now located in
the National Museum of India, the British Library, and museums in
China and Japan. He was also able to access several sites in
Northwest China which have restricted access because of their
proximity to military bases and research centers.
Yu Xin's main
argument is that these figures were used as part of a
“life-sustaining religion”, that is, a system of religious belief
that chiefly aims to protect and secure the life and prosperity of
its adherents. He noted the key fact that most of these figurines
were originally produced along the Great Wall, and have been found in
great numbers in the ruins of military forts where soldiers would
have been stationed. From this and other factors he argues that these
figurines were designed as a spiritual protection against invasion.
They would be stuck into the ground at intervals along the Great Wall
or in the walls of a fort to repel human and spiritual enemies. This
is not associated with any particular religious teaching in China,
but later examples of the figurines do incorporate Daoist terminology
in the characters painted on them. These pieces have also been found
along the trade route that brought Buddhism to Japan, and indeed
several examples have been found there as well.
The material used
to construct the pieces is also significant, as most of them were
made of peach wood. Yu Xin connects this material with traditional
Chinese religious beliefs that ascribe to it the powers of longevity,
part of the practice of fangshu (方術,
or popular magical rites). Where the figurines were constructed of
other materials, it was only because of the scarcity of peach wood in
certain areas. The talk concluded with a list of unanswered questions
which the speaker hopes to address in the future, including the
significance of using different colored inks for the painted faces,
and the whether the ultimate origin of this artform was in China or a
foreign country.
