Jinsha Site Museum

Written by ivana Updated Aug. 26, 2021

Jinsha Site Museum is on the list of Important Historical Monuments under Special Preservation by the State council. The museum is composed of five parts, which are relics hall, exhibition hall, culture relics preservation center, garden zone and tourists reception center. The relics hall shows the real proceeding excavation of the relics.

Jinsha Relics is the first important archaeological find in China at the beginning of 21 century. Compared to other relics unearthed at the same period, it is one of the sites with the largest amount of ancient elephant tusks in the world, and the largest number of gold and jade artifacts in China.

Here you can see the grand sacrifice scene of the ancient Shu Kingdom 3000 years ago (Shu was the ancient name for Sichuan) and a large number of fine artifacts, you can also witness archaeological excavation at close range. The exhibition hall rebuilt the ecological environment, living scene and religious sacrifice etc. of the ancient Jinsha people. At the same time, you can learn how the old Shu civilization arised, developped, and transformed. Those artifacts are fabulous, unique in shape and with excellent craftsmanship, you will be amazed by the ancient Jinsha people’s creativity and exquisite workmanship. The famous gold Jinsha sunbirds foil is exhibited in this hall as well, this gold artifact is the symbol of China’s cultural legacy, and is the perfect combination of the ancient people’s philosophical thought of “unity of heaven and man”, extraordinary imagination, fabulous creativity and excellent craftsmanship.

There are academic lecture hall and 4D theatre in the museum which are used regularly to hold performances relevant to Jinsha culture. The other areas are mainly ecological garden, where you can get close to nature and have some wild fun in the beautiful scenes. In this area, the sunbirds sculpture, west hill, road of jade and ebony woods are worth visiting. The Jinsha Site Museum is one of a few site museums in China that well combine modern and the old Shu civilization, museum and beautiful garden scene.

Features

Sunbird - The Symbol of China’s Cultural Legacy

The gold foil “sunbird” (also called “four birds around the sun”) is has a dynamic look. On the foil you can see four birds flying around the a whirlpool like sun, and if it was put under a red background, it turns out to be four fire birds flying around a spinning flaming fire ball. The flying birds on the outer rim and the spinning sun in the center represent ancient Shu peoples’ worship and eulogia towards the sunbird and the Sun God. The image of the sunbird foil has been used as the logo of Chinese Culture Heritage by State Bureau of Cultural Relics of China, and has been sent to the outer space by the Shenzhou 6 Manned space craft in 2005.

Many precious gold, jade and bronze pieces were unearthed at the Jinsha site, as well as ivories and its artifacts which are rarely seen in china. Jinsha Site has three “mosts” in China’s archaeological field, which are the most numbers of gold and jade pieces and ivories.

The Most Number of Gold Pieces

Jinsha relics has the maximum amount of gold artifacts unearthed compared to other excavations at the same period in China. Up till now over 200 pieces of gold artifacts were excavated here, mainly in the form of gold foils and gold plates, such as gold masks, gold belts, the sunbirds foil, box shaped crafts, horn shaped crafts, frog shaped and fish shaped ornaments. Those artifacts are lifelike and full of vitality which show superb craftsmanship, outstanding imagination and carry rich historical information of ancient China.

The Most Number of Jade Pieces

Jinsha Relics has the maximum amount of jade artifacts unearthed compared to other excations at the same period in China. It has unearthed over 2000 pieces of jade artifacts, and with rich varieties, such as Cong (a long hollow piece of jade with rectangular sides), Bi (a round jade plate with a hole in the center), Ge (dagger-axe), Gui (an elongated pointed tablet of jade held in the hands by ancient rulers on ceremonial occasions), Zhang (half a Gui), Yue (battle-axe), axe, chisel, knife, sword, spear, ring, and bracelet and so on. The number of excavated jade pieces of Zhang especially outnumbers the total amount excavated in other parts of China. They have graceful shape and multicolored, which separate them from those jade pieces of the Shang dynasty (1600BC-1046BC) and Zhou dynasty (1046BC-256BC) excavated in other areas.

The Most Number of Ivories

Among the many excavated relics at Jinsha Site, there are tons of ivories, which is the most amount of ivories unearthed compared to other relics at the same period in the world. Hundreds of ivories were found, there are intact tusks, cut ivery tines, ivory segments, ivory plates, as well as polished and processed crafts including strips, cylinders, beads and so on. The archaeologists also found a few elephant skulls, cheek teeth in Jinsha Relics which belong to Asian elephants, and according to historical records and the unearthed artifacts, those ivories come from Chengdu, Sichuan province.

Location

No.2, Jiasha Site Road, Qingyang District, Chengdu City

How to Get There?

Tourists can take bus nos. 5, 7, 79, 82, 83, 84, 100 or metro lines 2, 4, 7 to the museum.

Ticket Price

80 yuan per person

Opening Hours

More Tips

There is a gourmet street near the museum. Tourists can take No.7 bus from the museum there.

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