A Riddle in Stone: Identifying a Plinth of Yangling Mausoleum 陽陵

The archaeological investigation of Yangling started in the 1970s. By now, much more has been written about Han burial system and burial objects. A large number of excavations are valuable to the investigations of Western Han society that covers such realms as politics, economy, military and culture. Furthermore, they are also of great significance in the study of art history. However, the topic of this paper is about a stone selected from numerous unearthed cultural relics. For all the investigations on the basis of archaeological reports of Yangling, the focus on this stone is less than those of the burial system of Western Han and excavated objects from the angle of art history. The stone was recorded as Luojing shi 羅經石 in written form for the first time in the stele to memorize the significant archaeological discovery in 1997. In two of the most important archaeological reports, Pelorus is employed as its English translation. Both the Chinese name and English translation of the stone seemingly imply that the stone was placed in the site of Yangling to confirm the directions. However, it is not a generally accepted conclusion. This article aims to answer the riddle in the Stone in Yangling Mausoleum with more certainty. All previous studies and increasing accessible archaeological data make it possible to conduct a more comprehensive investigation of the nature and function of the Stone and the architecture inside which the Stone was placed. Compared to other speculations, I am more inclined to suggest that the Stone is a central plinth of a Mingtang style ritual architecture in Yangling. Therefore, I prefer to rename it as Plinth of Yangling 陽陵柱礎 rather than Luojing shi 羅經石, which is too misleading.