Warrior

This fine fella accompanied me in a rucksack all the way from Xian in China, back to my then home in Scotland. Cast from the same timeless clay as the thousands of terracotta warriors uncovered in the vast 2000-year-old burial site at Xian, he spent some years in southern Spain before making the journey north in December to take his place on my mantelpiece here in France, where late afternoon sunlight played today upon his ancient features.

We visited Xian while researching my China series, and a letter of introduction from the Ministry of Public Security in Beijing paved the way to a close encounter with the original warriors, still in the process of excavation.