EARLY QING DYNASTY, 17TH CENTURY

The cartouche in the lower proper left corner includes the name Zhou Tiancheng, who is known to have served as one of the court translators during the third year of the Shunzhi reign (1646). He was later placed in charge of the imperial silk factories in Suzhou and continued to be active into the early Kangxi reign.

Guandi, also known as Guangong (Lord Guan), is reputed to be the military hero, Guanyu of the Three Kingdoms period (AD 220-280), who was killed in battle along with his adopted son Guanping and his trusted general Zhoucang in Jingzhou by the army of Sun Quan, the ruler of the state of Wu. The accounts of his superhuman abilities and incorruptible character are dramatized in the fourteenth-century historical novel, Sanguozhi yanyi (Romance of the Three Kingdoms). The figure of Guandi underwent much transformation in Chinese history from military hero to being deified as a God of War. For further discussion on see J. Larson and R. Kerr, 'A Hero Restored: the Conservation of Guan Di', Orientations, July 1991, pp. 28-34.

The cult of Guandi was actively supported by the Ming Court and his image can be found in Court paintings, such as the large hanging scroll, Guan Yu Captures an Enemy General by the early fifteenth-century painter Shang Xi, illustrated by C. Clunas, Art in China, Oxford and New York, 1997, p. 70, fig. 32. In the Qing period his popularity continued to grow, and he became an important deity for both Daoist and Buddhist devotees.