Discover Guangzhou
Nanyue King Museum
南越王博物院
Built over the intact 2,000-year-old tomb of the second king of Nanyue, discovered under a hill in 1983. You walk down into the burial chambers, then see the jade burial suit and bronzes that came out of them.
The story
What makes this place special
In 1983, builders digging a hotel foundation on Xianggang Hill in central Guangzhou cut into a tomb about twenty metres down. It belonged to Zhao Mo, second king of Nanyue, who ruled 137–122 BC over the Lingnan region; a seal in the tomb titles him 'Emperor Wen', suggesting he called himself emperor at home while remaining a king in dealings with the Han court. The chamber is nearly 11 metres long and over 12 metres wide, built from 750 large stones with painted decoration, in seven parts: front chamber, east and west wings, main coffin chamber, east and west side rooms, and a rear store. Its most famous object is a burial suit of 2,291 jade plaques sewn with silk rather than the gold, silver or copper wire used elsewhere — the only one of its kind known. The museum opened in 1988, and in 2021 it was merged with the Nanyue Palace Museum to form a single institution with two sites.
What you’ll discover
Two separate sites under one name, several kilometres apart, and visitors routinely go to the wrong one. The tomb site on Jiefang North Road is the one with Zhao Mo's tomb: galleries of grave goods — the jade suit, bronzes, Persian silver, ivory — and then the excavated stone chamber itself, which you enter and walk through. A separate gallery holds a donated collection of ancient ceramic pillows. The palace site, at the Nanyue Kingdom palace excavation downtown, shows garden waterworks, a Southern Han palace floor and a stack of wells spanning two thousand years.
A little local insight
Good to know before you go
- Check which site your plan means. The tomb (王墓展区) on Jiefang North Road is where the jade suit and the burial chamber are; the palace site (王宫展区) is a different address and a different experience. Doing both in one day is reasonable and most visitors do neither properly.
- Entry into the lower tomb chamber has been subject to timed, capped admission — book or ask on arrival rather than assuming you can walk in.
- Go up into the tomb chamber before the galleries if there is any queue for it. The objects make far more sense once you have seen the rooms they came out of.
- The ceramic pillow collection is a genuine oddity — hundreds of them, by period — and is skipped by nearly everyone. It takes fifteen minutes and is one of the odder things in Guangzhou.
- A permanent gallery on Nanyue's place in the Qin and Han southern frontier was added in 2023 and is the only part that gives you the political story; the older displays are object-led.
When to come
A weekday morning, and a hot or wet day, since it is almost entirely indoors. Allow two hours for the tomb site alone.
Getting around
The exhibition galleries are modern, with lifts and level floors. The tomb chamber itself is not accessible: it is reached by steps up the hill and then down into a stone structure with low openings and uneven floors, and there is no lift into it. A wheelchair user gets the full object displays, including the jade suit, but not the chamber. A bad knee can do the chamber slowly; the steps are the hard part.
Worth knowing before you go
The museum has two sites; this is the Wangmu (tomb) site on Jiefang North Road, not the palace ruins site near Beijing Road.
Compare established providers
Check live tours and tickets
Search for Nanyue King Museum in Guangzhou. Prices, availability, payment and confirmation are handled by the booking provider.
China Travel Select does not take payment or create the reservation. Confirm the exact name, dates, inclusions and cancellation rules on the provider’s page.
Take a closer look
Maps, videos & more
Prices and hours change. These are the places to check on the day.
