An ongoing exhibition entitled "Genghis Khan" has been the subject of controversy. It has been praised for the fabulous relics displayed, but criticized for its curatorial shortcomings.

The show, which kicked off on Saturday (June 12), will run until August 28 at the Millennium Art Museum of the China Millennium Monument, in western Beijing.

In spite of the controversy, it is really worth a visit, as it includes almost all the best relics of grassland culture in the collection of the Museum of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

The more than 300 relics displayed, include swords, bows and armour that still shine with the glamour of past ages.

Most showpieces would take viewers breath away as they remind them of the epical events that happened on the vast grasslands of Inner Mongolia.

Though titled "Genghis Khan," most relics displayed have little to do with the great man, who lived from 1162 to 1227, approximately.

He created the Mongol empire that once stretched across Eurasia.

The "treasures" of the Inner Mongolian Museum, most of which have never been shown to the public before, shed light on the history of ethnic groups on the Inner Mongolian grasslands from the 8th century BC to the beginning of the 20th century.

They tell stories about the ancient Donghu, Xianbei, Turk, Khitan and today's Mongolian ethnic groups.

The curator of the exhibition attempted to depict the rise and fall of various ethnic groups on the grasslands.

"The history of the grasslands is a continuum, with one ethnic group often inheriting the culture of another," said Shao Qinglu, curator of the Inner Mongolian Museum.

However, the overly ambitious intention of covering the history of three millenniums on the grassland was obscured, it seems, in the dusts of the desert.

"The illustrations of some relics are wrong." remarked a curator with the National Museum of China,

"Some mistakes are patently obvious. What's more, characters on some of the explanatory boards are too small and almost impossible to read," said the curator, who declined to give his name.

"There are also problems with the sequence of presentation of the relics, and with the lighting of the exhibition hall," he said.

"The only explanation is that the job was done in too much a hurry."

(China Daily June 18, 2004)