Lot Essay

The belt hook is inscribed on the reverse with a two-couplet poem by the Qing-dynasty writer and minister Zhang Ying reflecting on the transience of life and power. It reads, “Writing a letter from thousands of miles away from just for a wall. All that argument over one meter or two. Looking at the ten-thousand-mile-long Great Wall, which is still standing, but its builder, Emperor Qin Shi Huang, has long passed away.”