Scientists have deciphered the manuscript, which indicates that the first Chinese emperor, buried with the Terracotta Army, was obsessed with searching for the elixir of immortality.

Qin Shihuang, very afraid of death, ordered his environment to search for the elixir of immortality throughout China. This is referred to in the decree, found during archaeological excavations in China.

The emperor’s obsession with eternal life was well known: he built a huge underground mausoleum of Xian in the north of China, filled with nearly 8,000 terracotta soldiers, designed to protect him in the afterlife. This unusual army in a giant grave, the creation of which worked for about 700 thousand people, was discovered in 1974. Only the perimeter of the tomb is 6 kilometers. The bodies of all the warriors are painted, and their faces are individualized.

Recently, studying the texts found at the bottom of a well in Hunan province in the center of the country, archaeologists have established that Qin Shihuang officially ordered to find a “potion” that will give eternal life. The text contains an imperial decree ordering these searches. In addition, documents were found containing reports of local authorities on the search for an elixir.

The decree was written on wooden planks, connected with each other by strings. This method was the most common means of writing in China until the appearance of paper at the beginning of the first millennium BC. In total, in the lower part of the well in the western part of Hunan in 2002, 36,000 such plaques were found with more than 200,000 vertically calligraphic Chinese characters. Archaeologists continue to study them to understand their full meaning.

According to China News, Duxiang village reported that “no miraculous drug has been found yet, assuring that its” searches will continue. “Another locality, called Langya, located in modern Shandong province,” reported the grass collected from the sacred mountain ” However, the potion apparently did not have any effect, since Qin Shihuang died in 210 BC, after 11 years of reign.It is believed that he died by taking another “elixir of immortality”, actually containing mercury.

Qin Shihuang, the first king of the Qin state, conquered one after another the other six kingdoms, which then constituted China, uniting the country in 221 BC and calling it the name known today in the world. Cruel and despotic, he, on the one hand, adopted a reformatory decision on the construction of the Great Wall of China, also built roads throughout the country, on the other – ordered to burn books and execute scientists. Imperial title existed in China until the Xinhan Revolution of 1912.