Harmon

@john ezra Mesopotamia is also a TMBG tune

@Steve L Well, first of all the Great Wall was constructed in several phases across dynasties and centuries. Second of all, while the salt tax was omnipresent throughout Chinese history (as well as in many other parts of the world such as India), I have never read anything that suggested it was the primary source of funding for the wall at any point. Google doesn’t turn up anything besides blogs, that slate article, and Wikipedia. Wikipedia’s source is an article about contemporary salt production and taxation in the 1930s, which, while interesting, has nothing to do with the Ming Dynasty and doesn’t mention the wall at all. I don’t have access to the tax and budget documentation primary sourcing (nor would I be able to read it), but in the plethora of secondary sourcing I’ve read the salt tax funding the wall is never brought up, which is strange because that would be a significant thing to note given how often the salt taxes led to revolts or widespread theft at salt quarries. Ultimately, I cannot prove a negative, but in my research I have never seen it brought up. A better clue would have been something like “source of funding China did not abolish until 2014.”

@Jim it wasn’t for sale on eBay.

@Mick would you consider “funding for parliament’s robe budget” a good clue for “stamp act”? A government collecting a tax at the same time they engage in a project is not evidence that that tax was used to specifically fund that project, unless you view all taxation as a lump sum. Again, I can’t prove a negative, but the idea that funds from the salt tax funded the Great Wall is not evident. Forgive me if I don’t always trust the factoids presented by puzzle constructors given the Buford, Wyoming error just a week ago.

@kkseattle it was never listed on eBay