After six months' excavation, archaeologists claim that the imperial palace site they discovered last October in Xi'an, capital of west China's Shaanxi Province, is of great significance to the study of the imperial palaces of the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-24).

The unearthed ruins of the imperial palace, covering an area of 2,000 square meters, is located in a northern suburb of Xi'an, once the capital of the Western Han Dynasty and known as Chang'an then. And it lies in the northwestern part of the palace group of the Changle Palace, the imperial palaces of the Western Han Dynasty.

At the center of the terrace which did not exist any longer, an underground palace was discovered, the main body of which is 24 meters west-to-east and 10 meters wide north-to-south.

"The palace was probably a two-story one comprising both the above ground and the underground part," said Liu Zhendong, a research member with the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences who leads the archaeological team investigating the Chang'an city site.

Relics of the palace are over one meter from the earth's surface. More than 40 base stones of palace columns were orderly arranged with the space between adjacent columns only two meters.

From signs of the palace relics, it can be judged that the main hall was exquisitely furnished. The floorboard of the main hall and its northern and southern passages is made of wood and is 50 to 60 kilometers over the earth to prevent it being affected by dampness.

At the eastern part of the terrace, there are six connected rooms. The largest room is a square one of more than 40 square meters, the floor of which was painted in bright red. To the north of the room, sidesteps whose surface was painted in bright red were discovered too.

"It conforms to the historical record that the red-surface sidesteps is of the highest rank and only could be used by the emperor," said Liu.

Over ten pieces of fresco fragments were discovered at the palace site. All of them are the size of a large palm with bright colors including red, cyan, purple, yellow and white, and the patterns are mostly of geometrical design.

"This is the first time for us to discover frescos in the palace of the Han Dynasty, although we had read about them in the historical records before," Liu said.

"This discovery filled the blank in the research of the frescos in the Han palace," Liu said.

Wells, boundary walls and drains were discovered at the west of the site.

According to Liu, the main hall is the place where the emperor and his officials handled the government affairs while houses at the east of the site are the residential region of the emperor and his royal family.

"The imperial palace was probably built in the early time of the Western Han Dynasty while destroyed in war at the end of the Western Han Dynasty," Liu said.

"The discovery of the imperial palace will provide valuable clues for the research of the layout and architectural techniques of the imperial palaces of the Western Han Dynasty," said Liu.

(Xinhua News Agency April 4, 2004)