Cheng-chou

The train filled with merchants and students left Hankow on February 22 and arrived in Cheng-chou that night.

Perhaps the most important monument of Chinese Buddhist sculpture in the Rietberg collection, this stele was acquired by Baron von der Heydt before 1924, after having been in the possession of C.T. Loo, Paris. It is most likely the work of a metropolitan sculptor's atelier located in the vicinity of present Cheng-chou in Honan Province.

The Shang civilization itself arose in a relatively small area of western Honan province. At Erh-li-t’ou and Cheng-chou excavations have documented the transition from the Lung-shan to the earliest stage of the Shang.

Being located about four kilometers from the Yellow River and twenty-three kilometers northwest of Cheng-chou, the early walled site at Hsi-shan lies in the core cultural area.