Treasures of the Ding Ling and other Ming bling.

The liù lóng sān fēng (six dragon three phoenix) crown of the Empress Wang Xiaoduan. It has five hundred and forty-nine pearls, seventy-one rubies, and fifty-seven sapphires. Kingfisher feathers were painstakingly cut and glued onto gilt silver, giving the effect of cloisonné, though no enamel could match the electric blue colour of the feathers.

In 1958 Chinese archaeologists excavating deep beneath the massive burial mound of the Ding Ling, the tomb of the 13th Ming emperor, managed to locate and enter the burial chamber. There they found four huge chambers totalling over 800 square meters in area. In the centre of the main chamber stood the coffins of the emperor and his two empresses.

On the floor around each coffin were almost three thousand priceless funeral objects: chests of fine porcelain, gold, silver, pearls, silk, jade, jewellery encrusted with precious stones and even stones chosen for their special shapes. There were bejewelled hat pins, jade pendants and belt fastenings, golden chopsticks, spoons, boxes, washbasins, lacquered toilet articles and a jade ewer, apparently for ceremonial use, with its lid attached to a chain of jade links all carved from a single piece of stone. There were models of furniture, spears, flagstaffs with banners used in imperial processions and a black iron helmet decorated with martial figures in gold and topped with a long red plume. There were bolts of silk and rolls of silk brocade woven in fine patterns, many with golden thread and with the date and place of manufacture, mostly the imperial workshops at Nanjing and Suzhou, embroidered on them, along with the names of the weavers and supervising officials.

The gold winged crown of the Wanli emperor. The mesh cap was made from a single strand of 2mm thick gold thread.

These grave goods represented the most exquisite and refined examples of their time. Most of the headgear, costumes, textiles, jewellery, jade items and ornaments of gold and silver were crafted especially for the burial. These objects had been produced without regard for cost and by engaging the most skilled and artistically creative craftsmen in the empire. They represented the pinnacle of design and production and illustrated the social habits, customs and artistic styles of early 17th century China.

The Ding Ling is the only Ming tomb to have been excavated to date.