Nanjing, China: a Buddhist priest supervising labourers. Photograph by John Thomson, 1869.

An elderly monk, in a light-coloured robe, supervising several labourers, some of whom have shovels and stones, others carry panniers of earth: they are reconstructing a destroyed building in the city of Nanjing. In 1853 Taiping rebels captured the ancient 'southern capital' Nanjing and made it their 'Heavenly capital'. Some ten years later, in 1864, the Qing and foreign troops crushed the Taiping's Heavenly Kingdom and sacked Nanjing. When Thomson visited Nanjing a few years later, the city had literally become "many dreary acres of demolished streets with not a single occupant". Yet he noted that an active restoration had just begun. The photograph shows a group of coolies at work near a temple, while a Buddhist priest wearing a robe supervises them