A Pit Full of Broken Buddhas

Near the ancient Chinese city of Ye, archaeologists have found a pit containing about 3,000 statues of the Buddha. They are about 1,500 years old, and many are broken. Some of China's rulers fought to keep Buddhism out of China, before it was officially embraced under the Tang Dynasty (618-907), and this pit is likely the remnant of some anti-Buddhism campaign:

The Buddha statues—most of which are made of white marble and limestone and many of which are broken—could date back to the Eastern Wei and Northern Qi dynasties (A.D. 534 to 577), experts say. The statues—discovered during a dig outside of Ye, the ancient capital of the Eastern Wei and Northern Qi dynasties—may have been rounded up and buried after the fall of the Northern Qi dynasty by later emperors in an attempt to purge the country of Buddhism.