Object Image

The Lifting of the Siege of the Black River Camp

This print depicts the end of the siege of a camp at Qara usu (the Black River), near Yarkand in 1758 where Qing troops were blockaded over the winter for three months. The siege was lifted in 1759.

Part of a set of sixteen, "The Lifting of the Siege of the Black River Camp" was commissioned by the Qianlong Emperor in 1765 to commemorate Manchu victories (1755-59) over the Eleuths, the Dzungars, and other Central Asian peoples in the present-day region of Xinjiang. Made under the direction of Charles-Nicolas Cochin (1715-1790), the prints, which follow reduced-scale copies of paintings by Jesuit artists working in Beijing, were etched and engraved in France from 1767 to 1774 by the finest prin...

1771
Etching and engraving
65.5 x 100.8cm
45.100.7
Image and text © Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2019

Where you'll find this

The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Permanent collection