A Nanjing Native’s View of Nanjing: Museum Chapter – A Walk Through the Six Dynasties
Address: 302 Changjiang Road, Xuanwu District, Nanjing
Hours: Closed on Mondays, open 9:00–18:00 (ticket sales stop at 17:00)
Admission: 30 yuan
Date visited: February 2021
How to get there: Metro Line 2, Daxinggong Station
Last November I visited the ‘Tiger Perched and Dragon Coiled’ exhibition at the Nanjing Museum (Chaotian Palace) to learn about Nanjing’s history. Over the long sweep of time, three periods—the Six Dynasties, the Ming Dynasty, and the Republic of China—were ages of great prosperity for the city. I’d long known there was a Six Dynasties Museum near Daxinggong, but I’d never found the right moment to visit. One day, chatting with a few friends, we realised none of us had been there, and we set off at once. Exiting Daxinggong metro station, it’s just a one- or two-hundred-metre walk to Hanfu Street, where the Six Dynasties Museum stands.
Nanjing has always been known as the Ancient Capital of the Six Dynasties, and is one of China’s four great ancient capitals. Starting from the Wu Kingdom during the Three Kingdoms period, over nearly 400 years six consecutive dynasties established their capitals here. That is why Nanjing came to be called the Ancient Capital of the Six Dynasties long before the Tang and Song eras. The museum before me is China’s most comprehensive site museum for Six Dynasties artefacts, and the most systematic thematic museum showcasing Six Dynasties culture. Above the five large characters reading ‘Six Dynasties Museum’ is the museum logo, designed after unearthed Six Dynasties human-face tile ends from Nanjing. The logo instantly reminded me of those tile ends with their hugely varied expressions at the Nanjing Museum.
Right at the entrance, off to one side, there’s a museum creative shop—the Nanjing Wenbo Six Dynasties Store. The merchandise is all cleverly conceived and delicately designed. Some products are even based on the shapes of treasures in the museum, bringing artefacts that were once ‘enshrined’ into our everyday lives.
The museum has a spacious, airy atrium that soars to a height of 16 metres. A transparent roof and large glass windows on one side invite sunlight straight inside. Six banners hang from the ceiling, each bearing the name of one of the six dynasties: Eastern Wu, Eastern Jin, Song, Qi, Liang, and Chen.
On the ground floor hall, a steel-and-glass skylight showcases structural beauty and the grace of materials, while the ‘moon gates’ and staircases set into the north-south straight walls add a symmetrical elegance. What really catches the eye, though, are the 78 glass windows set into the beige limestone floor.
A special exhibition is on in the hall: ‘Ink Encounters Huizhou – Nine Artists’ Zhaji Sketching Works Exhibition’. Through Chinese painting and oil painting, the works bring before us Huizhou-style architecture with its blue bricks, small tiles, and horse-head walls, along with natural landscapes of mountains and streams.
In one corner sits a ‘li-recording drum carriage’. In ancient times, this vehicle was used to measure distance, and was an essential part of the imperial procession when the emperor travelled. In another corner stands a ‘south-pointing carriage’, a direction-indicating vehicle and also part of the imperial retinue.
Wall panels display a chronology of the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, as well as a list of Six Dynasties emperors. A visitor guide on the wall tells you that the museum has four basic exhibitions: ‘The Six Dynasties Capital’, the temporary exhibition gallery, ‘Elegance of the Six Dynasties’, and ‘Outstanding Figures of the Six Dynasties’.
We chose to start in the site display hall on the lower ground floor. The exhibition ‘The Six Dynasties Capital’ introduces the urban history of the Six Dynasties. A chart shows the timeline of the building of Jiankang, the capital city. During the Six Dynasties, Jiankang was the most important southern capital in ancient China and the essence of Han culture.
In the centre of the ground floor, a glass enclosure protects the rammed-earth remains of the Jiankang city wall. This 20-metre-long, 10-metre-wide section was part of the eastern wall of Jiankang, and it is the very ‘root’ of the museum. It was because of this wall that the Six Dynasties Museum came into being. In 2008, when archaeologists were excavating the plot, they discovered this rammed-earth wall two metres beneath the surface. It was confirmed to be the architectural remains of the Six Dynasties Jiankang palace city from 1,700 years ago, and it was then decided to build a museum right here to bring that historical era to life.
Besides this thousand-year-old site, remains of drainage ditches and a revetment are also on display. A chart introduces the main waterways and hydraulic projects of Jiankang. Wooden piles unearthed at the Daxinggong South Library construction site, and pictures with text, explain the defensive weapon of the time—the bed crossbow. There are also city bricks unearthed from the Stone City site.
Here, an entire wall is covered with human-face tile ends, even richer and more varied than the display at Chaotian Palace. Tile ends were architectural elements used to protect the eaves of high-status buildings such as palaces and temples. But their diverse and stylized patterns also made them highly decorative. The main motifs include cloud patterns, human faces, animal faces, and lotus flowers. The human-face motif, rarely seen in other regions, is especially distinctive. The 162 faces on this wall, set against a red background, exude great force. Look closely: some are laughing heartily, some smiling with pursed lips, some feigning deep thought, some worrying, some gentle and kind, and some weeping bitterly. Some of the faces even have beards, and can be divided into male and female figures. These human-face tile ends are so amusing—like ‘QQ emojis’ of the Six Dynasties.
A mural recreates the scenes of those days. The residents of Six Dynasties Jiankang mainly lived along the banks of the Qinhuai River, and the names of those streets are still in use today. Texts introduce how the people of Jiankang lived. Among the unearthed artefacts are Six Dynasties pottery urns, pottery dwelling models, and iron keys. There are domestic furnishings, small shrines and sculptures that show the people’s beliefs, and food vessels. There are also fragments of pottery figurines, and a pair of ‘retro slippers’—Six Dynasties wooden clogs—complete with an illustrated guide to how they were fastened. A pottery model shows an official travelling procession, illustrating one of the ways people in Jiankang got about. Nanjing lies in the rainy south, so its main roads were already paved with durable brick and stone, and the main means of transport was the ox cart. Pottery well rings from the Daxinggong South Library site are also on show.
The lower ground floor covers the city and daily life of the Six Dynasties capital. The city section mainly shows the architectural scale, palaces, city roads, and drainage system of Jiankang. The daily life section uses a large number of artefacts to recreate the people’s clothing, food, housing, and transport.
From the lower ground floor, we slowly step into the Six Dynasties, and continue climbing the stairs to take in more.
Going up to the second floor, we look at the exhibition through a ‘moon gate’. From this angle, the ground-floor hall comes into view: the large glass windows draw the outdoor scenery into the overall beauty, while the transparent glass roof embraces the sunlight. The beige tones, accented by blue glass, make the space feel understated and refined.
Here, rustic wooden frames and dougong brackets create a spatial layout reminiscent of ancient gate towers. The four characters in the centre – ‘六朝风采’ (Elegance of the Six Dynasties) – tell us this section’s theme. According to the text and a floor-plan diagram, the second-floor gallery is laid out like the cosmetic boxes used by Six Dynasties women, with spaces large and small, both independent and interconnected, that respectively showcase the art of porcelain, the art of line, and the art of sculpture from the Six Dynasties.
An introductory text lets us glimpse the brilliance we are about to see. The first unit is ‘Art in Porcelain’, with an introduction to the birth of celadon. ‘Elegance of the Six Dynasties’ displays exquisite artefacts unearthed in the Nanjing area, using relics to interpret the Six Dynasties aesthetic.
Wooden partitions segment the space; the sense of partial concealment adds a feeling of flow. Inside the small galleries, all kinds of fine porcelain are on show: celadon dish-mouthed ewers in various shapes and sizes, celadon vases, and incense burners.
The paths leading to each exhibit are lined with bamboo shadows, lit by a dim yellow light. Bamboo shadows flicker, and silhouettes of bamboo leaves sway gracefully on the curtains, so vivid that you can almost hear the rustle of leaves in a bamboo grove—a space of understated charm. Large display windows feature an array of celadon chicken-head ewers. Also called ‘chicken-head’ or ‘heavenly chicken’ ewers, they typically have a chicken head on one side of the body and a handle on the other, with a dish-shaped mouth—a classic form of Six Dynasties celadon that paved the way for the handled ewers of the Tang and Song dynasties. A celadon chicken-head ewer from Ling Mountain in Qixia is on display, along with celadon lion-shaped vessels and a museum collection celadon tiger vessel.
The Six Dynasties Museum’s most treasured piece is the celadon lotus zun – a masterpiece of Southern Dynasties celadon, truly the ‘King of Celadon’ and a rare gem of Buddhist art. It was unearthed in 1972 from a Southern Dynasties tomb at Ling Mountain, outside Qilin Gate in the eastern suburbs. It is a celadon zun with a trumpet-shaped open mouth, a high neck, a round belly, and a ring foot; the lid is shaped like a monk’s cap. The decoration is richly ornate, with the lotus as the main motif, using relief carving, mould-impressing, incising and other techniques to appropriately adorn every part. Lotus-petal patterns are the most defining hallmark of Southern and Northern Dynasties porcelain, and the lotus zun is saturated with a strong Buddhist flavour.
There is also a celadon soul jar with moulded figures, towers, and pavilions, unearthed from a Wu tomb at Shangfang in Jiangning District, Nanjing. Soul jars, also known as ‘moulded jars’ or ‘granary jars’, were popular burial objects during the Three Kingdoms and Western Jin periods, made specifically for the tomb. These jars feature extremely rich decorative content and highly complex forming techniques. Above the shoulder, the celadon jar is crowded with moulded figures, birds, towers, pavilions and kiosks, all arranged in a pleasing, varied manner; the belly bears simple moulded ornamentation. The distinctive form—elaborate above and simple below—perfectly unites detail and wholeness. This decorative style, combining many motifs, is intimately linked with the belief of the time that the soul could ascend to heaven. Another celadon soul jar of the same type comes from Shizishan in Xiaguan, from the Western Jin period, and yet another from Shangfang in Jiangning, dating to the Three Kingdoms.
Celadon favoured an elegant green, but colour variations did exist; the changing tones are on display here. Text and pictures introduce the dotting technique—a decorative method of adding brown spots to celadon. There are various polychrome celadon vessel lids with dotted decoration, and a text explaining that underglaze painting is a beauty of painted lines.
A remarkable treasure is the celadon underglaze-painted jar with winged figures and a dish mouth, unearthed from a Wu tomb at Changgang Village in Yuhuatai District, dating to the Three Kingdoms period. The jar has a narrow neck, a round bulging belly and a flat base. The arched lid has a bird-shaped knob. The body is white with a greyish cast, and the surface is coated with a yellowish-green glaze. Arranged evenly and orderly across the jar are fantastic images such as winged figures, fairy herbs, paired birds, and Buddha images, all outlined in brown. The underglaze painting and applied decoration blend into a harmonious whole. The vessel is covered with flowing brown-painted patterns, lively and full of spirit—China’s earliest known object to use painting to beautify porcelain, an artistic treasure among early ceramics. Unearthed in 1983, this exquisite piece of underglaze painting overturned the earlier belief that the technique had begun in the Tang dynasty.
The exhibition hall twists and turns, with winding waterways and scenery at every step! There are almost no solid walls here; instead, bamboo, wooden rails and other installations divide the space, and with the play of light and shadow, the views are visually transparent and change with every move. Inside, both body and mind relax in the refined, tranquil atmosphere. Each exhibit is set off by light, surrounded by bamboo groves, and even the stone pillars under the lamps reveal an ultimate beauty. Bamboo leaf shadows flicker, and beside a winding-stream-like water feature, a calligraphic work of the ‘Preface to the Orchid Pavilion’ is displayed. The rectangular low seats were designed after pottery daybeds unearthed from Eastern Jin tombs. In the evocative atmosphere of the ‘Orchid Pavilion Gathering’, a stone qilin sits on guard.
After porcelain, we come to the ‘Sculpture’ theme. A pottery female figurine from the Eastern Jin period is displayed, and the calligraphy section introduces the beauty of Six Dynasties calligraphy, with stone carvings and script, seal carving art, and calligraphy on bamboo slips. There is an off-register brick painting of the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, and a heavyweight Six Dynasties relic: the stone gate from a Southern Dynasties tomb at Ling Mountain. The front sides of the gate pillars are incised with mythical beasts and floral patterns, while the inner sides bear floral patterns and warrior figures. This is the only stone gate with decorations ever found in a Six Dynasties tomb. The exquisite tomb walls reflect the painting and sculpture art of the era. The back wall of the tomb chamber is unusual in shape: on the upper part, the sides protrude outwards, and in the centre, pictorial and patterned bricks form a tower-like structure, with a pavilion at its heart.
The design of the gallery emphasises a garden-like atmosphere, and the arrangement of bamboo and plum blossoms lends an elegant quality to the space. The second-floor ‘Elegance of the Six Dynasties’ exhibition is rich in content, unfolding in three themes—porcelain, sculpture, and calligraphy—presenting three of the most representative facets of material life in the Wei and Jin periods. The pottery figurines, celadon wares, epitaphs, tile ends, stone carvings and many other precious artefacts on display lead us to understand the Six Dynasties from an aesthetic perspective. Here, accompanied by classical music, you walk through elegant settings admiring Six Dynasties celadon, calligraphy and painting—utterly enchanting. We continue up the spiral staircase to the third floor.
On the third floor, stone is the main scenic element. Perhaps because Nanjing is the ‘Stone City’, stone is used to divide the space, adding a sense of historical layering. Ancient withered branches, smooth reclining stones; the classic Chinese lyrical mood blends marvellously with the modern buildings outside the window. One design is particularly striking, and you instantly recognise it as the famous ‘Borrowing Arrows with Straw Boats’ episode from the Three Kingdoms. Hundreds of arrows have been shot in the same direction, their tips glinting brilliantly at the far end—a spectacular sight. From this angle, the idiom ‘ten thousand arrows fired at once’ comes to mind, a vivid metaphor for that period of history. Though splendid and bustling, the Six Dynasties was also a time of turmoil. For more than three hundred years, warfare was frequent, and six dynasties rose and fell in succession.
The Six Dynasties was a special era in history—an age of swords and fire, an age of poetry and wine, an age of unpredictable fate. This extraordinary era produced a host of exceptional figures. With so many famous scholars, these turbulent times forged immortal legends. ‘How magnificent old Jinling was back then, sweeping heroes from all under heaven into its fold.’ The third floor is dedicated to the outstanding figures of the Six Dynasties.
The first unit is ‘Governance’. Display panels introduce historical stories of statecraft. Sun Quan, the founding emperor of Wu during the Three Kingdoms period, was also the first emperor to establish his capital in Nanjing.
The third-floor gallery is laid out along a main winding corridor that runs through the entire space, like the endlessly flowing Yangtze River, with independent exhibition rooms distributed on either side. The whole space uses geometric lines to great design effect. Light shines on the white walls, creating a contrast between light and shadow. In the play of light, the ‘Good Generals and Ministers’ section introduces the great generals and officials of the Six Dynasties. Alongside the textual introductions, there are also fine Six Dynasties artefacts on display, such as a bronze crossbow mechanism unearthed from Tongji Gate on the Qinhuai River. The pictorial-brick walls, unique to the Six Dynasties, serve as a spatial backdrop, lending more historical depth.
The second unit is ‘Speculation’. Because of the turmoil, the Six Dynasties are noted for their free-spiritedness, their cool and profound reasoning, and their cultivated elegance. The troubled times gave birth to a host of ‘graceful and unconventional scholars, unfettered by material concerns’—such as Xie An, Ruan Ji, Ji Kang, Liu Ling, and Wang Rong. There is an introduction to ministers of state, and an entire section dedicated to the charismatic prime minister Xie An. The gallery adopts a simple but bold approach, using three-dimensional or flat divisions from different angles.
The Six Dynasties created an extraordinarily brilliant ‘Six Dynasties civilization’, reaching unprecedented prosperity in science, literature, art and many other fields. Zu Chongzhi, a scientist of the Southern Dynasties, made his most outstanding contribution by calculating a remarkably accurate value of pi—the earliest scientist in the world to compute pi to more than seven decimal places. He created the Daming Calendar, designed and built water-powered trip hammers, a south-pointing carriage, a thousand-mile boat and more, achieving great things in his lifetime. He Chengtian, a famous astronomer, mathematician and calendar expert of the Liu Song Southern Dynasty, created the more precise Yuanjia Calendar, which was officially promulgated and used for 65 years.
The third unit is ‘Literature and Art’. The Six Dynasties produced a group of special talents profoundly admired by later literati. In their conduct and speech, there was something different from the common crowd, and even from any other historical period. To later eyes, that was the true style of a famous wit. The Seven Masters of Jian’an, the Zhengshi Celebrities, the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, the Wang and Xie clans, the Peach Blossom Spring’s Tao Yuanming (Tao Qian), the calligraphy of the Right General Wang Xizhi—they all led the elegance of the Six Dynasties era. A combination of light and fabric creates an antique, graceful atmosphere. The figure in this scene is Liu Xie, the literary theorist and critic of the Southern Liang dynasty, a notable figure in Chinese literary history. There are displays on historiography, novels, and comic creation during the Six Dynasties, as well as the tools used for literary and artistic creation.
The museum has a façade with large glass windows almost everywhere. Moving through the museum, you travel through Six Dynasties history, and from here you can see the Presidential Palace just across the street, and further away, the cityscape with its rows of high-rises. It gives you a slightly unreal, time-lost sensation. A museum of quietude in the midst of bustle, a museum where history dissolves in art, a museum that lets you understand Nanjing from blood and soul!
Visiting the Six Dynasties Museum, the history and culture of the Six Dynasties are comprehensively displayed from the perspectives of ‘the city’, ‘the people’, ‘events’ and ‘beauty’. I gained an understanding of Nanjing’s historical opening chapters, and felt all the prouder to be here in Nanjing.
