ADORNING THE EMPRESS
Holdsworth May
Be jewelled women, embroidered robes, hairpins inlaid with kingfisher feathers and delicately painted fans conjure up a lost world of the rich elite of imperial China. This was a world of spacious mansions and gardens, of high-ranking officals and earthy landlords, of their virtuous and accomplished wives and daughters, and of a domestic life conducted with decorum and taste. Adorning The Empress tells another story, for the women of the elite, no less than for those in peasant homes, had bound feet and a strict social code which kept them confined within their imprisoning courtyards. Theirs was a world as much of cruelty and sorrow as of grandeur and luxury.

Price: Bht 650.00