纪录片《大英博物馆世界简史》 055唐代墓葬俑(4)（在线收听）

Liu's obituary tablet is a model of colourful self-praise, and he aims a great deal higher than Anthony Howard's "man of unusual charm". He tells us that his behaviour set a standard which was destined to cause a revolution in popular manners. In public life he was an exemplar of, "benevolence, justice, statesmanship, modesty, loyalty, truthfulness and deference", and his military skills were compared to the fabled heroes of the past. In one great feat, we're assured, he beat off invading troops "as a man brushes flies from his nose". It's great stuff!

刘廷荀的墓志是狂热的自我褒扬的典范，其定位显然高过安东尼提到的“他是一个极具魅力的人' 他声称自己行为世范，必将彻底改变百姓的举止礼仪。在朝为官时，他“仁、义、贤.耻、忠、信、礼”。他的军事才能可与传说中的英雄媲美。在一次战役中，他轻松击退入侵的敌军，“如拂蝇于鼻”。

Liu Tingxun pursued his illustrious, if turbulent, career in the high days of the Tang Dynasty, which ran from 618 to 906 AD. The famous Silk Road was in full swing. The Tang era represents for many Chinese a "golden age" of achievement, both at home and abroad. This great outward-looking empire, along with the Abbasid Islamic Empire in the Middle East, together created what was effectively a huge single market for luxury goods, that ran from Morocco to Japan. You won't find it written in many European histories, but these two giants, in effect, shaped and dominated the early medieval world. Western Europe, by contrast, when Liu Tingxun died in 728 and our tomb figures were created, was a remote and underdeveloped backwater, an unstable patchwork of small kingdoms and precarious urban communities. The Tang ruled a unified state that stretched from Korea in the north, to Vietnam in the south, and far west along the Silk Road into Central Asia. The power and the structure of this state-along with its enormous cultural confidence-are vividly embodied in Liu Tingxun's ceramic tomb figures.

唐朝的统治自618年起至906年止，刘廷荀显赭而起伏不定的仕途正处于此朝的鼎盛时期。对中国人而言，无论内政还是外交，唐朝都是成就斐然的黄金时代。当时，这个扩张中的伟大帝国，与中东阿拔斯王朝的伊斯兰帝国一起，卓有成效地建立了西起摩洛哥东及日本的庞大的奢侈品专营市场。虽然在欧洲史文献上很难看到相关记述，但这两大帝国一度统治并塑造了中世纪早期的世界。在刘廷苟去世、墓葬俑完工的728年，西欧还是由许多小国与城邦拼凑在一起、政局混乱、岌岌可危的落后之地。而唐朝作为一个统一的国家，趣域北至朝鲜，南抵越南，向西循丝绸之路一直延伸到中亚。这个国家的结构.实力以及对自身文化的极度自倍都在刘廷苟的陶瓷某葬诵上得到了生动体现。