As blockbuster exhibitions go, they don’t come much bigger than this, a display of some of the figures from the famous terracotta army discovered buried in the soil of Xi’an, China in in 1970s. Built from clay, the figures are thousands of years old, dating from around 210, created under the command of Qin Shi Huangdi, the first Emperor of China who gives this exhibition its name and its story.

The exhibition is presented in the central circular Reading Room of the British Museum, within the glass-roofed Great Court. To preserve the historic reading desks, a temporary raised false floor has been built over the desks, with fabric hung around the edges to create a space that’s dark and atmospheric.

The first half of the exhibition tells the story of Emperor Qin’s dynasty, and what a story it is. In all likelyhood you’ve entered the exhibition knowing little or nothing about him, and yet this was a man who became a king at 13, and then ruthlessly conquered other states in order to form the unified China that we know today. Even the name China probably originates from his name, pronounced ‘Chin’. This story is told in the exhibition through a series of artefacts and a projected video that’s well worth watching the full loop of. The objects include decorative pieces weapons, including a replica crossbow showing the elaborate firing mechanism that was invented.

Further on, the story turns to the bureaucracies and systems that the Emperor imposed, including a single currency complete with mass-produced coins, and a universal script (writing system). He also began to build a great wall - not the Great Wall of China that we know today, but a precursor to it. Lest you begin to admire this leader though, the next section begins to reveal his madness and egotism, showing models and remnants from some of the hundreds of palaces that he built in his name.

By this point, visitors might begin to get impatient to see the actual terracotta figures, so it’s lucky that the narrative winds towards this point, with a brief warm up to explain the chance discovery of the Emperor’s tomb, where the figures were found buried, by a local farmer in 1974. There’s also a chance to reflect on how they were produced, which is brilliantly explained by a clay model that shows a production line of scantily clad workers casting the body from a mould, firing it, and then separately adding and customising the feet and head.

Then it’s a quick turn and the main attraction is revealed. You do get sneak peeks of the figures earlier in the exhibition, but it’s only on the final reveal that you truly get to take them in. There aren’t, of course, anywhere near the 8,000 or so that are believed to be in the tomb site in China. But there are more of the figures than have ever been allowed to leave the UNESCO World Heritage Site before. So if you’re looking to experience the scale of the army, you may be disappointed, but that’s probably not ever achievable in a museum context anyway, and here the point is more to convey the immense skill, ingenuity, and sheer man-power that went into producing the figures.

The figures themselves are displayed on a series of rectangular podiums, the main one featuring a set of soldiers all standing in formation, facing forward. That the aren’t behind glass gives you the opportunity to examine the fine detailing from all angles, and stare into the eyes of these frozen warriors. Placed slightly more randomly at the back of the room, four more figures show examples of the non-combatants that were also buried, a fat-bellied acrobat (presumably for entertainment in the afterlife) and two civil administrators (this was a bureaucratic regime, remember).

One of the more startling revelations is that the figures were never meant to be the grey clay that we see now, and were once painted in bright ‘realistic’ colours, as can be seen from a rare few patches of ancient pigment on some of the figures. This is fully brought to life in one of the last exhibits of the exhibition, a replica figure painted up as it would have appeared originally (or at least, as close as can be inferred). Suddenly you realise that the now tasteful earthly figures started out as a gaudy form of ancient waxworks.

There’s one last story to tell before the exhibition ends, and that’s of the actual final resting place of the Emperor. Still buried underground, the Chinese authorities have taken the decision not to excavate the site in order to preserve its contents. Whilst the exhibition carries quotes from academics ‘hoping’ that one day we’ll be able to scan the ground in a non-invasive fashion, more intriguing are the Indiana Jones style rumours of booby traps, curses and ‘rivers of mercury’ (which are in part evidenced by traces of mercury in the nearby soil). Thus you leave the exhibition with a sense that there are still mysteries to solve and new treasures to one day be uncovered. Which seems as good a mood as any in which to enter the exhibition shop.

The First Emperor is an exhibition which has already been wildly successful, and deservedly so. The initial batch of pre-bookable tickets sold out so fast that the exhibition is incredibly now open until midnight on Thursdays to Sundays. In addition the 500 tickets that are available on the door every day have made queues outside the museum a regular early morning sight. Journalists have rushed to compare the frenzy to the historic ‘The Treasures of Tutankhamun’ exhibition, which drew 1.7 million people to the British Museum in 1972. The comparison is fair only in that the Terracotta Army is the only other set of historic artefacts (possibly along with the Titanic) which can draw a crowd simply on the back of the name alone. However this isn’t an exhibition which is content to simply rely on its key ticket-selling showpieces, and instead the British Museum have created an experience which is genuinely thought-provoking, educational, and even a little awe-inspiring.

The First Emperor: China’s Terracotta Army is on at the British Museum until 6th April 2008. Admission charges apply.