Banner depicts earthly life Essay Example for Free

Banner depicts earthly liveness EssayArtifacts which are strand in burial shrines and in tombs are often rich with pagan and religious imagery. Not that are the types of artifacts which are selected to be enshrined within a given tomb of significance for inferring historical and cultural information, but the aesthetics evident in the individual items themselves can be studied in pose to discover important cultural, religious, and historical information.Such is certainly the case regarding the silk funeral pennant known as the call down banner which was uncovered as part of the Mawangdui tomb of the Marquisite. This banner, which is shaped like a T depicts a Chinese astrological configuration of the cosmos (including the afterlife) which can be understood as being afoot(predicate) in the Han Dynasty. The top of the T section of the banner shows heaven while the middle section of the banner depicts earthly life.One interesting aspect of the sectional representation is tha t certain figures travel through the sections. in that respect are angels of heavenly entities who descend to carry Lady Dai to heaven. The images of the banner suggest a cosmos in constant motion, a dynamic interdimensional universe which is both physical and spiritual in nature. Also interpret on the silk banner are images if Lady Dais earthly family, who perform rituals for her safe-passage in the afterlife.The funeral banner indicates a culture which believed in both life-after-death adn in the efficacy of ritual and prayer. There is a graceful concord present in the banner which suggests that Chinese culture at the time of the Han Dynasty had a vision of life and death which was seamless and that death was viewed as a continuation of life and life as a prelude to death. Viewed this way, the banner is an uplifting and spiritually exalting work of art, one which offers a dramatically unalike view of life and death than is prevalent in the Western world.