A Study Of Han Mural Paintings In The Pei-Yuan Tomb At Liao-Yang

The tomb murals of the Han Dynasty, as concrete images of the society and people's ideologies at that time, integrated various aspects of political systems, social relations, production capacities, warfare modes, moral values, spiritual beliefs, etc. at that time, and they are of great importance to the study of the social customs, culture and art, etc. of the Han Dynasty. First of all, they provide us with in-kind image data for the recovery of the social culture and folk customs then. Secondly, examinations and analyses of the characteristics and evolutions of the tomb murals of the Han Dynasty will help us understand the politics, economy and ideology of the society as well as the funeral culture at that time.Since the early 20th century, China has found and excavated more than 60 Han tombs with murals, which has provided rich and valuable data for the historical study of the Han Dynasty. The study of the tomb murals of the Han Dynasty is popular with Chinese scholars, who have achieved fruitful academic results in this area. The tomb murals of the Han, Wei and Jin dynasties in the Liao-yang Region are regarded as the start-off point for the excavation and research of the Chinese tomb murals, but, due to the limitations in data release and research perspectives, the research on them at home and abroad is still insufficient, and their academic value has not received sufficient attention. This paper takes as its research objectives the mural paintings found in The Pei-Yuan Tomb at Liao-yang, which are the biggest in scale, the most complicated in structure, and the most refined and beautiful in mural painting among the tomb murals of the Han, Wei and Jin dynasties in the Liaoyang Region. It begins with descriptions of the basic contents and spatial distributions, and further analyzes and interprets the representative murals (in particular: the identity of the tomb owner, the identities of the nine figures on the right side of the"Music and Dance", and the exploration of the functions of the"Traveling with Horse-drawn Vehicles"), and elaborates on the artistic features of the murals.It is hoped that the paper will attain its aims of enriching research data for the study of the tomb murals of the Han, Wei and Jin dynasties in the Liao-yang Region, add data to individual case studies, and direct academic attention to the tomb murals of the Han, Wei and Jin dynasties in the Liao-yang Region for the purpose of their protection.