Emperors and other royal members of the Chinese Han Dynasty were buried in jade burial suits, which consists of jade plaques threaded together with wire through small holes drilled at the corners of each plaque.

Jade was considered imperishable and able to prevent the decay of the body. The jade burial suit in the picture above is displayed at the Emperor Qin Shi Huang's Mausoleum Site Museum in Xi'an, and the one in the photo on the right is exhibited at the Nanjing Museum in Nanjing.