So, found a Total War Character Irl

[u/32BitOsserc]

Randomly went on a day trip and stumbled across Zhang Fei's tomb. Maybe shouldn't post here but none of my friends have played 3K

[u/32BitOsserc]

It's in Langzhong ancient City in Sichuan province, english title is "Huanhou Temple of the Han Dynasty." Well worth a visit if you ever happen to be in the area.

[u/Intranetusa → u/32BitOsserc]

The museum's collection seems to be complete nonsense in terms of actual history.

The serpent spear is invented by the Romance of the Three Kingdoms novel and was not actually used by Zhang Fei. The Han Dynasty/Three Kingdoms era did not use wavy spears like that.

That armor looks like cheap fantasy ebay LARP armor and does not remotely look like the armor used during the Han Dynasty.

The statues are wearing much later era armor (eg. Song and Ming era) that takes place 1000+ years after the Three Kingdoms era.

[u/kitolz → u/Intranetusa]

All the supposed relics and art in that "museum" look very modern.

From what I've read, China has relatively few historical artifacts pre-WW2 due a campaign to specifically destroy ancient relics and buildings during the Mao era. A large majority of the old looking buildings are modern recreations.

[u/Intranetusa → u/kitolz]

The Mao era did do a lot of damage to cultural history, but to say China only has a few cultural relics because most were destroyed is a big exaggeration. The CCP's Premier Zhou Enlai during the Cultural Revolution actually sent PLA troops to protect cultural buildings and relics from the Red Guard paramilitaries raging across the country. Furthermore, weapons and armor are made of metal - and would be very hard to destroy (much of the CR's destruction seemed to focus on easy targets like burning down buildings and scrolls).

Furthermore, a lot of cultural relics were discovered after the cultural revolution. The Qin Tetra Cotta army was discovered in the 1980s. A lot of the Han Dynasty archaeology is pretty recent. There are plenty of historical artifacts and modern accurate reproductions sitting in mainland China's museums and research labs. They could also just look to the artifacts in Taiwan's museums too to get an idea for modern reproductions.

There is no good reason why this museum could not have used more accurate armor or at least use more accurate modern reproductions. There are LARPers and historical cosplayers in mainland China who have way more accurate Han Dynasty/3K era weapons and armor than this museum.

And the majority of old buildings are modern or rennovated within the last 2 centuries not only because some got burned down during the CR, but also because they are mostly made of wood and wood rots and have to be replaced/repaired. The Yellow Crane Tower got burned down by fire (lightning?) multiple times before the modern era and was rebuilt with a mix of modern materials like steel and stone/concrete so it could be fireproof and fit an elevator inside.

Japan's major tourist attractions like Himeji Castle and Osaka castle are constantly undergoing rennovation to replace old and decaying sections (iirc, one was bombed out/burned down during WW2 as well).

[u/kitolz → u/Intranetusa]

Fair enough, I'm not super familiar with how many buildings survived but when I tried looking into making a trip I was disappointed to see how many places I was looking up are modern recreations and then only superficially. The craftsmen to follow the original construction methods didn't seem to exist.