The Astana graveyard is located in the Gobi Desert in the Turpan basin, Xinjiang, China, and is believed to have been the public cemetery for ancient Gaochang Country dating to a period between the Western - Jin and the mid - Tang Dynasty. Large amounts of clay sculptures with multicolored painted patterns, including warriors, horses, tigers, etc., have been unearthed from the graveyard. In order to illuminate the pigments and techniques used for the polychrome on the clay sculptures, micro - Raman spectroscopy analysis along with microscopy observation and EDXRF were used to analyze six clay figure shards selected from a Tang Dynasty tomb dated to A. D. 687 -745. Cross - sectional observation revealed that the thickness of the pigment layer among samples varied and that in one case the white ground underlayer was anhydrite, which suggested the influence of mural painting tradition. Some pigments were identified, including red/ orange (cinnabar, red lead or massicot) , brown ( haematite) , yellow ( orpiment ) , black ( carbon black ) , white ( anhydrite ) , green ( atacamite ) and pink (anhydrite+ red lead or anhydrite+ massicot/red lead). This appears to be the earlier report of the use of massicot as a pigment in Xinjiang. Furthermore, the blue pigment was identified as indigo, which is an essential discovery. These identified pigments reflect the diversity and complex palette of ancient peoples. The investigation of pigments and ground layers will provide reference for the restoration and conservation of these precious artworks.