Inner Manor, Outer Wilderness: Functional Transformation, Spatial Narrative, and Identity Construction of Pastoral Imagery in Han Dynasty Northern Frontier Mural Tombs

Pastoral imagery in Han dynasty mural tombs of China’s northern frontier may offer unique visual evidence for examining subsistence patterns, ethnic interactions, and the processes of elite identity construction in imperial borderlands. Existing scholarship has predominantly interpreted this motif through three frameworks—livelihood reflection, Hu-Han ethnic integration, and the origins of Chinese landscape painting—yet has not fully addressed its functional transformation within mortuary contexts and the underlying spatial logic of identity construction. Drawing on seven systematically documented mural tombs from the Ordos Plateau and Hetao Plain, this study combines archaeological typology, formal iconographic analysis, and spatial contextual analysis to trace the full evolutionary trajectory of pastoral imagery. This study suggests that the motif may be interpreted as undergoing a transition away from explicitly sacred contexts toward a closer association with material representation from the late Western Han to the late Eastern Han: early stylized renditions, derived from the Central Plains xian (immortal) mountain iconographic paradigm, appear to have served the construction of a sacred cosmic space for post-mortem ascension, while later realistic depictions were increasingly repositioned in storage side chambers, potentially functioning as visual representations of manorial livestock assets. Spatially, pastoral imagery gradually formed a stable “Inner Manor/Outer Wilderness” sequential narrative, which visually domesticated the heterogeneous frontier wilderness and enabled local magnates to construct a transcultural elite identity integrating Han ritual orthodoxy and control over diverse frontier resources. This study recalibrates the regional position of pastoral imagery in the secularization of Han mortuary art, and is consistent with a perspective for understanding the northern frontier as a dynamic transcultural frontier zone of cultural negotiation and integration.