Ten Sides is documented as a martial section (武板) in the 1916 score Yinzhou Gudiao (《瀛洲古调》, 瀛洲古调派, Shanghai) compiled by Shen Zhaozhou, alongside 22 slow, 17 fast and 5 wen pieces. The Pudong school (浦东派, Shanghai Nanhui), a separate lineage, lists it among its representative martial suites (武套) alongside Pingsha Luoyan and Jiangjun Ling. The national heritage record for that school describes martial pipa music as imposing in character, calling for the large pipa and a full bow with heavy force.
Two limits are deliberate. First, no composition date, authorship or narrative subject is stated here: the official records establish the work by 1916 and classify it as martial, but they do not establish when or by whom it was composed, and the accounts that circulate widely on this piece online are not backed by an authoritative Chinese source. Second, a piece of the same name exists in an unrelated tradition - the Changshan battle-drum repertoire of Zhengding, Hebei, where it was developed as a percussion qupai. The two are different works that share a title.