RARE ETRIER EN BRONZE DORE

A stirrup cast with gilt-bronze dragon-heads depicted in a scroll painting entitled 'Emperor Qianlong Reviewing Troops', in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Qingdai Gongting Huihua, Paintings by the Court Artists of the Qing Court, p. 151, no. 29. The painting, thought to be attributed to the Jesuit painter Guiseppe Castiglione, is dated to the fourth year of Qianlong's reign (1739) and portrays the young Emperor seated on horseback dressed in formal military regalia.
A stirrup displayed threaded with a broad strap through the aperture between the dragon-heads and suspended from an imperial saddle, is illustrated by Y. Wan, S. Wang and Y. Lu, Daily Life in the Forbidden City, no. 17.