Workers fasten bronze swords made more than 2,000 years ago on a panel. They will be displayed to visitors in the Jinsha Site Museum in Chengdu, Sichuan province from August 20 to October 31. [Photo by Huang Zhiling/chinadaily.com.cn]

More than 5,000 cultural relics including the bronze, lacquer and jade ware, armors and two chariot pits have been excavated. The pits are the largest and best preserved chariot pits which have been excavated in China.

"Such a large number of relics excavated in the tombs of a general and his wife rather than of a king and his wife show the prosperity of the Chu Kingdom,” she said.

Regarded as one of the seven most powerful states at its time, the Chu Kingdom consisted of today’s Hubei, Hunan, Henan, Jiangxi, Anhui, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces.