(Screenshot photo)
Despite its reputation for touting its millennia of history, the city of Xi'an was schooled recently after a Net user spotted an inaccuracy in a subway station mural of historic proportions.
The Dayan Pagoda station mural features the likeness of Xuanzang - the famed Buddhist monk who departed from Xi'an around the year 630 to retrieve sutras from India.
However, social media users were quick to point out the mural's inclusion of India's iconic Taj Mahal. Completed in 1643, result was an anachronism of nearly 1,000 years.
"Xuanzang traveled to India, then a Buddhist country in the seventh century while Taj Mahal was built by the Moguls, the Muslim conquerors, a thousand years later," Sina Weibo user "Doctor Shi Leiming" posted Sunday.
An employee at the nearby Dayan Pagoda worried that the mural would mislead visitors.
Li Lukui, the mural's designer, explained his team had aimed to create something that "transcended time and space."
Others, however, saw the anachronism as a practical choice. "The Taj Mahal is merely a symbol of India and the painting is just meant to let people know Xuanzang traveled there for Buddhist sutras," said a 21-year-old student surnamed Wang at Shanghai Jiaotong University.
