The role of dwarfs in Tang postmortem elite life

Abstract

During the Tang dynasty (618–906), sculptures of attendants and animals were placed in elite tombs designed to replicate mansions and palaces to be populated by the spirit of the deceased. Among the retinue of human figures, which include somber officials, exotic foreigners, and beautiful court ladies, are sculptures of dwarfs, identifiable by their comparative size and the proportions of their bodies. This chapter will consider surviving representations of dwarfs during the Tang dynasty to recover the roles these sculptures played in the virtualization of elite postmortem existence and examine Tang elite conceptions of the social category of “dwarf” created and codified by these sculptures. Elites living under the Tang Empire, which controlled large portions of modern China, placed murals, reliefs, and sculptures of attendants and animals in tombs designed to replicate mansions and palaces for the spirit of the deceased. All worked in tandem to articulate space within and around the deceased’s postmortem residence and virtualize a pleasant afterlife of activities for him/her to enjoy. Among the retinue of human figures, which include somber officials, exotic foreigners, and beautiful court ladies, are dwarfs (zhuru 侏儒), identifiable by their comparative size and the proportions of their bodies. Representations of dwarfs in Tang murals and stone reliefs are restricted to a few elite tombs, while ceramic figurines, which were mass produced and follow certain types, are more common. Like other Tang mortuary art, the dress, pose, position, and other characteristics of these figures help determine their postmortem functions. This chapter will consider surviving Tang representations of dwarfs to recover their roles in the afterlife and to examine elite conceptions of the social category of “dwarf” created and codified by these two- and three-dimensional depictions. Amid surviving tomb murals, reliefs, and figurines, two larger nodes of representation appear—dwarf as servant and/or entertainer and dwarf as dehumanized and/or objectified body.