Beijing: In a chance discovery, a young man in China who stopped for a roadside pee break found a centuries-old porcelain figurine hiding in a mound of soil which washed away when he urinated.

he 20-year-old man, surnamed Xu, pulled over on his way home to answer nature`s call on a mound of soil in Chengdu, Sichuan province.

While urinating, he uncovered the head of a ceramic figurine in the soft earth

Xu recently delivered the figurine to local cultural authorities, who identified the piece as a kowtowing female dating back to the Song Dynasty (960-1279), `Global Times` reported.

Tan Ying, an employee at the Cultural Relic Management Institute of Pixian county, explained that such figurines were commonly used in Song funeral rites.

"These figurines were usually buried in pairs near tombs to ward off evil," said Li Tiechui, a senior consultant from the Ancient Ceramic Research Center in Sichuan Province.