BEIJING (AP) — China's National Museum on Friday unveiled a pair of Qing dynasty bronzes that were looted from a Beijing palace more than 150 years ago and returned this year by the family that runs French luxury-goods conglomerate Kering.
The recovery of the bronze heads of a rat and rabbit is a major victory for China's campaign to erase a legacy of past bullying by foreign powers, but also a masterful stroke of corporate public relations for a firm seeking fat profits from newly wealthy Chinese consumers with a growing taste for luxury.
The bronzes were among 12 animal heads that formed the centerpieces of an elaborate zodiac fountain and were carried off during the sacking of the old Summer Palace in Beijing by French and British troops in 1860 at the close of the Second Opium War.
The palace's buildings were burned and left in ruins as a punishment for the Qing emperor's obstinacy, and the bronzes spirited abroad into private hands.
China has made a priority of recovering them in recent years amid burgeoning pride in the country's economic achievements and a desire to reconstruct its former cultural and political glory. Five have already been returned to China and one is in Taiwan, but the whereabouts of four others remain unknown.
The symbolism of the bronzes derives from their origins in the reign of the Qing emperor Qianlong during the second half of the 17th century, a time when the empire's power, prestige and national territory were at their zenith.
