ROYAL burials are just not what they used to be. While still a child,Qin Shihuang, who founded the Qin dynasty and unified China in 221BC, ordered a mausoleum built for himself that would measure 6.3km across at its widest point and include over 8000 terracotta figures. His grandmother,Lady Xia, was also buried with several companions. When her tomb near Xi’an was excavated in 2004, and archaeologists found in it the remains of a leopard,a lynx, a crane and a gibbon—a type of small ape.
Gibbons were treasured in ancient China. They served as pets for the elite in Lady Xia’s time and as models for fine art a few hundred years later. But the bones from the tomb are particularly extraordinary. In a paper published this week in Science, and Samuel Turvey of the Institute of Zoology,in London, and his colleagues, and indicate that they match those of no gibbon alive,so must arrive from a species that has become extinct since Lady Xias day.
The gibbon received a burial fit...
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Source: economist.com