1,300-year-old stele eyed by Chinese, Japanese archaeologists

An important and ancient stele, inscribed with just 29 Chinese characters and looted by Japanese soldiers early last century, could provide experts with some important clues to understanding the mysterious 1,300-year-old Bohai Kingdom.

The Honglujing Stele, which is about 3 meters wide, 1.8 meters tall and 2 meters thick, sits in virtual seclusion in the Japanese imperial palace as a "trophy" of the Japanese army who took it from Lushun in northeastern China's Liaoning Province after the 1904 war between Japan and Russia.

The stele is the only one known to belong to the Tang Dynasty (618-907) in northeastern China. It indicates that the first king of the Bohai Kingdom (698-926), a mysterious state during the Tang Dynasty, was conferred with the title by the Tang emperor.