Investigations of the mausoleum of Cao Cao: problems and perspectives

The article is aimed at investigation of complex period in the history of Eurasia when the mighty wave of nomadic movement, once begun at Chinese frontiers, reached western boundaries of the continent. After final crash of antic world, the number of «barbaric» kingdoms arose on its ruins. Political division of once united Roman Empire stimulated this process. The similar phenomena took place on the eastern borders of Ecumene that gives us the possibility for methodological conclusions. The great Han Empire had been disintegrated into three fighting kingdoms and, after a short «remission of unity» during Jin dynasty, was cracked into two dozens of states during Nanbeichao epoch. Quite often the representatives of formerly persecuted nomadic tribes (Xiongnu, Xianbei, Qiang, Di) acted as the founders of these new states. All that period (3-6 centuries AD) was the time of endless wars which gave the impulse to development of military affairs. Through that very period, most probably among Xianbei, the new branch of forces appeared. It was heavy armored cavalry that became the military advantage of nomadic peoples for many centuries. That epoch also became the time when new religion, Buddhism, with its developed cult spread over China. The coming into «internal lands» of essential masses of non-Chinese population greatly influenced on material and spiritual cultures, which, in its turn, reflected on architecture, objects of art, funeral practice. We’ll try to fix these changes and to determine the reliable chronological and ethno-significant markers. It would give the possibility to make more precise, overall picture of ethnocultural development not only in China but also at the vast territories of Central and Northern Asia. This problem could be successfully solved now due to distinguished pivotal monuments, Mausoleum of Cao Cao, that was found at 2009. The person buried in that tomb «closed» the Han Dynasty and laid the foundation for the new one, Wei Dynasty, so he became the personalized symbol of the transitional period. His activity was widely reflected in chronics and fiction as well. It gives an opportunity to use narrative, epigraphic, and archaeological data altogether, and on the basis of this «source study synthesis» to carry out re-socialization of artifacts. The sphere of investigations includes also the objects in the northern areas of China which are important for studying of phenomenon of nomadic empires, as well as for the formation of cultural appearance of medieval nomads.