Two 2,000-yr-old palace buildings excavated in Northwest China

XI'AN -- Archaeologists said they have excavated foundations of two palace buildings that could be dated back to more than 2,000 years ago in Northwest China's Shaanxi province.

The buildings were part of Yueyang, a capital city of the Qin state in the Warring States Period (475 BC-221 BC). They are located in the Yanliang district of Xi'an city, the Shaanxi provincial capital. The Qin state later unified China for the first time to start the Qin Dynasty.

Archaeologists discovered the first ancient city complex in the 1980s, and the second and the third ones after 2012. The two buildings belonged to the No.3 complex.

According to Liu Rui, a researcher with the Institute of Archaeology in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the two buildings were rectangular and facing south.

Some semi-circular eaves tiles were unearthed, which provided evidence for the discussion of the use of ancient eaves tiles. Archaeologists also found ruins of a lavatory at one of the sites, which was comprised of a toilet seat and sewage system.

The excavation for the first time gave an overall picture of the layout of important palace buildings inside the capital city's central areas between the mid-Warring States Period and the early Western Han Dynasty (202 BC-25 AD). A central axis through the No.3 complex was also discovered, which was believed to be helpful for the study of ancient capital cities.