With thousands of life-sized soldiers, horses and chariots lined up in underground tunnels, the Terracotta Warriors in Xi’an City, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, attract around 100,000 visitors every day.

The clay sculptures are an invaluable example of the richness of Chinese history and a real wonder. And their discovery brought to the world a well-kept secret from ancient times.

The man who unveiled these figurines, however, has passed away on May 16 at the age of 82.

Zhao Kangmin, the discoverer of the Terracotta Warriors, devoted his whole life to the relics ever since they were excavated in 1974.

He was the first expert to have arrived at the burial site of the Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an at the time. The discovery was the start of a decades-long excavation of one of the wonders of the ancient world.

"Zhao Kangmin was the first true discoverer of the Terracotta Warriors, and their importance. Also, he is one of the pioneers of the excavation of the relic site. He devoted his whole life to working on cultural relics and museums, and participated in the excavation and study of many important relic sites, making some indelible contributions," said Hou Ningbin, head of the Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum.

Zhao directed excavations at some of China's other important relic sites, including the Ginger Village from the Neolithic Era, the Qingshan Temple from the Tang Dynasty (618-907), and the Huaqing Palace of the Tang Dynasty.

Years of hard work in the field took a heavy toll on Zhao's health, contributing to the development of stomach and lung diseases. But illness wasn't enough to stop him from working. In the last month of his life, Zhao was still busy at work, studying epigraphs from the Tang Dynasty.

The news of Zhao's death has made international headlines, with the BBC, the Telegraph, and the New York Times reporting his death and reviewing his contribution to the discovery and preservation of the Terracotta Warriors.

(With input from China Radio International)