Asian and African studies blog

The Chinese collection at the British Library includes an interesting series of around 40 posters produced in the 1970s and 1980s in the People’s Republic of China which represent an extraordinary example of popular visual material created by official sources to promote a sense of shared history and national identity.

Detail from富裕童喜, Fu yu tong xi, Wealthy and Happy Baby, author: Zhang Guiying, 1982, 77.5 x 53cm (British Library ORB. 99/104)

The Chinese collection of posters from the 70s and 80s can be grouped by different subject areas and themes: New Year Prints, including the “chubby babies” series, theatre and film posters, educational posters, prints on the Mao cult, ethnic minorities and so on. While they use and combine a range of different visual language and signs, their intention is the same: to encourage a certain vision of the nation and its culture, to evoke selected values, to show examples of role models, to strengthen the sense of community and belonging among the citizens.

In some of the posters we find a repetition of colours or symbols that for the Chinese viewer have significant meanings and which are immediately recognizable. Most of the material, and in particular the “chubby babies” posters, show a predominance of the colour red, an auspicious colour in both traditional and modern Chinese culture, while other items display particular types of flowers (for example, the chrysanthemum, symbol of longevity) or animals.

The British Library Chinese collection also includes some examples of official posters for the so-called yang ban xi (样板戏). The term Yang ban xi literally means “model operas” and it refers to six operas and two ballets written during the first years of the Cultural Revolution, when the traditional themes of the Chinese opera were banned and replaced with stories aligned with Mao Zedong’s thoughts and personally approved by Mao’s wife, Jiang Qing. The protagonists of the stories were often soldiers of the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) who stood out for their bravery, heroism and support to the rural people. 

 
Detail from the yang ban xi opera poster 沙家浜, Shajia bang, Shajia Creek, 1960s, 77.5 x 53cm (British Library ORB. 99/177)

The yang ban xi monopolised the artistic production of the years of the Cultural Revolution and were massively distributed: they were not only performed on stage, but also broadcasted on radio and reproduced as movies. Coloured posters depicting key scenes from the plays begun to circulate widely throughout the country. Despite the range and the variety of distribution, the content of the yang ban xi had to be the same and strict guidelines were issued in order to guarantee that all the productions and performances were identical and were not deviating from the approved version.

The two ballets listed as “model operas” are Hong se niang zi jun (红色娘子军, The Red Detachment of Women) and Bai mao nü (白毛女, The White-Haired Girl). The first premiered in 1964, while the second was performed as an opera in 1945 and was later produced as a movie in 1950. The White-Haired Girl is based on a traditional story which is centred on the misery suffered by the local peasantry, particularly the women, and depicts the Communist Party as their saviours and heroes. The songs are now classics of Chinese culture and, unlike other ballets, the music contains a lot of vocal solos and choruses.

Detail from the yang ban xi ballet poster白毛女, Bai mao nü, The White-Haired Girl, 77 x 53cm, 1972 (British Library ORB. 99/178)

A selection of posters from the Chinese collection produced in the 1970s and 1980s will be featured in the new free online course “Propaganda and Ideology in Everyday Life”, a ground-breaking project which allows students to interact with the British Library’s original collection items. The course is developed in cooperation with the Centre for the Study of Ideologies at the University of Nottingham and will start in May 2015, on the FutureLearn platform.

You can find a video trailer here and access the course registration at this page.

Resources:
Mary Ginsberg, The Art of Influence: Asian Propaganda, British Museum, 2013.
Stefan R. Landsberger, "Contextualising (Propaganda) Posters", in Christian Henriot and Wen-hsin Yeh (eds.), Visualising China, 1845-1965. Moving and Still images in Historical Narratives, Brill, 2013, pp. 379-405.
Eberhard Wolfram, A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols: Hidden Symbols in Chinese Life and Thought, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1986.
Lu Xing, Rhetoric of the Chinese Cultural Revolution: The Impact on Chinese Thought, Culture, and Communication, University of South Carolina, 2004.

Sara Chiesura, Curator, Chinese collection

With thanks to Ian Cooke, Curator, Social Sciences 

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Tracy Chevalier’s 1999 novel Girl with a pearl earring was inspired by the magnificent painting by the Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer. Griet, the heroine of the Chevalier novel, always wore a distinctive white cap. Chevalier explained that behind Griet’s symbolic cap was an idea originally from the Bible, which considered women’s hair to be seductive and therefore subversive. Chevalier built upon that idea, as if Griet's cap served to shield the wilder and more sensual side of her persona that she did not want to reveal to others.

In Japanese folklore, more specifically the stories known as Otogizōshi 御伽草子,  we find another girl who always wore an impressive object on her head. This extremely odd piece of headgear led her to be known as “the girl with a kneading bowl” (Hachikazuki 鉢かづき).


'The girl with a kneading bowl' (Hachikazuki 鉢かづき), early Edo period (ca. 17th century). Naraehon manuscript. British Library, Or.12897.

Otogizōshi is an umbrella term used to identify a miscellaneous body of Japanese short narratives, covering a wide range of subjects such as fairy tales, war epics, stories from Shinto myths, Buddhist legends, and so forth. These texts were produced from about the late Kamakura period (1185−1333) until the Muromachi period (1333−1568), but their popularity continued into the Edo period (1603-1868). Otogizōshi circulated in both manuscript form and printed versions. Between the late Muromachi and mid Edo periods they were often reproduced as fine manuscripts, called Naraehon 奈良絵本, which were enriched with colourful hand-painted illustrations elegantly illuminated with gold and silver foil. From the Edo period onwards, these stories also began to be circulated in various printed versions, most notably Otogi bunko 御伽文庫, a collection of 23 otogizōshi published in Ōsaka by Shibukawa Seiemon 渋川清右衛門 in the early 18th century. The British Library Japanese collection holds several Naraehon manuscripts and printed versions of otogizōshi, including various editions of the Tale of Hachikazuki.
 

'The girl with a kneading bowl' (Hachikazuki 鉢かづき), early to mid Edo period (ca. 17th-18th century). Naraehon manuscript. British Library, Or.12885, f. 24.


The same Hachikazuki story in a woodblock printed version, Otogizōshi ( お伽草子), early Edo period (ca. 17th century). British Library, Or.75.g.15.

It is possible to identify the basic storyline of Hachikazuki as a subspecies of the classic story of Cinderella. Hachikazuki loses her mother, suffers from the maltreatment of her wicked stepmother, and eventually meets a handsome young man with prospects who has all of the essential features of the ideal husband of her time.

In actual fact, the prototype of the Cinderella story originated in China. It is believed that this was first recognised by a renowned Japanese scholar of the 19th century. Minakata Kumagusu (南方熊楠 1867-1941) was a multi-talented researcher with many interests; amongst other things he was a naturalist, biologist and folklorist. In an article of 1911 (details below), Minakata compared European and Oriental folk stories in order to identify significant similarities in the story patterns. He was interested in  prior research by Pedroso on Portuguese folk-tales which had already categorised some stories of the Cinderella type, but which had overlooked the Chinese version.

The study by Pedroso mentioned by Minakata in his 1911 article: Portuguese folk-tales collected by Consiglieri Pedroso, and translated from the original ms. by H. Monteiro.  ([S.l.] : Folklore Society, 1882.) British Library, 7062.900000

In the year 853, during the Tang dynasty, the scholar Duan Chengshi (段成式) wrote a series of stories, some of them taken from legends and folk tales, collected together under the name of Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang (Youyang za zu 酉阳杂俎). It is in this work that the story of a girl called Ye Xian (葉限), set during the 3rd century BC, appears for the first time.


First page from an 1849 copy of the Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang, in the version called重刊酉陽 雜俎正續 (Zhong kan Youyang za zu zheng xu), by Duan Chengshi, published by小嫏嬛山館 (Xiao lang huan shan guan). British Library, 15297.b.14.

The list of similarities between Cinderella and Ye Xian is quite extensive:
1) Both lost their own mother
2) Both were mistreated by their stepmothers
3) Both obtained or were given magical treasures to enable them to surmount obstacles   
4) Both met ideal husband figures
5) Both their future husbands found the girls by means of the right-sized shoe

The Story of Ye Xian, which Minakata highlighted, has been widely accepted as an early version of Cinderella. In contrast to the tale of Ye Xian, the tale of Hachikazuki is not always categorised as a Cinderella-type story because of two significant differences:
1) The method of obtaining her magical treasures
2) The method of proving she was the one her future husband was destined to marry

Hachikazuki obtained her magical treasures from her kneading bowl, which no one (including herself) had previously managed to remove from her head. It was her mother who had put the kneading bowl on to her daughter’s head just before she passed away. All she wanted to do was ensure the happiness of her daughter who she was leaving behind, and so she prayed to the Avalokiteśvara, and then acted in accordance with a revelation from the Avalokiteśvara. Hachikazuki had to endure wearing the kneading bowl on her head until the right moment eventually came. Although she found love with a gentle young man, she had to pass a test. This test was not fitting her foot into the right-sized shoe like Cinderella and Ye Xian. Instead, Hachikazuki had to convince her future husband’s family that she was a truly suitable bride for him. Miraculously, at this moment, the bowl fell off from her head, and she discovered that she possessed all the highly sophisticated acoutrements and attributes of a refined beauty.


Hachikazuki and her trousseau emerging from her kneading bowl. From 'The girl with a kneading bowl' (Hachikazuki 鉢かづき), early Edo period (ca. 17th century). Naraehon manuscript. British Library, Or.12897.


The same scene in a different naraehon manuscript. 'The girl with a kneading bowl' (Hachikazuki 鉢かづき), early to mid Edo period (ca. 17th-18th  century). British Library, Or.12885, f. 36.


The same scene in a woodblock printed edition of Otogizōshi (お伽草子), early Edo period (ca. 17th century). British Library, Or.75.g.15.

Regardless of the differences and similarities between the stories of Hachikazuki and Cinderella, in both we can enjoy a traditional well-loved folk tale with a happy ending.

References

Tracey Chevalier. Girl with a pearl earring (London: HarperCollinsPublishers, 1999). For a description of Griet's cap, see p.11; see also 'Tracy Chevalier Q&A', Mail Online (July 5th 2002).

Minakata’s 1911 article: 南方熊楠「西暦九世紀の支那書に載せたるシンダレラ物語」『東京人類学会雑誌』26巻300号 (1911) is available online as a part of Minakaga zuihitsu (南方随筆) at Kindai Digital Library service, the National Diet Library.

With special thanks to:
Alessandro Bianchi, Asian and African Studies and PhD student, University of Cambridge
Sara Chiesura, Curator for Chinese

Yasuyo Ohtsuka, Curator for Japanese

This year the Chinese New Year will be celebrated on the night between the 18^th and the 19^th of February, when the year of the Horse will end and a new year of the Goat will begin.

The celebrations for the Chinese New Year (年节nian jie), also called Spring Festival (春节 chun jie), mark the beginning of a new year in the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar. Even though the traditional calendar is now not officially used in China, it is still essential to determine the Chinese festivities. The Chinese New Year Festival is the most important event of the year for the Chinese communities and its occurrence determines also the date of other important events related to the lunisolar calendar, such as the Lantern Festival (元宵节 yuan xiao jie), the Dragon Boat Festival (端午节 duan wu jie) or the Mid-Autumn Festival (中秋节zhong qiu jie). Furthermore, the traditional calendar is widely used to determine the best date for some special occasions in people’s life, such as marriages. The traditional Chinese calendar is called农历 nong li (in traditional characters 農曆, which can be translated as “rural calendar” as nong means agriculture) or 阴历 yin li (in traditional characters 陰曆, where yin represents the moon, as opposed to the official solar calendar which is called 阳历 yang li).

Detail from a printed almanac from Dunhuang dating from AD 877. From right to left, the figures of a snake, a horse, a goat, a monkey and a cock are visible (BL Stein Collection Or.8210/P.6) International Dunhuang Project website

Every year of the lunisolar calendar is traditionally associated with one of the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac, which are called 生肖 (sheng xiao). These animals are: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog and Pig. Each of them is associated to a natural element (Wood, Fire, Metal or Water) and, as in Western astrology, it is believed that people born under a different zodiac sign have different personality characteristics. The year when a person is born is called in Chinese their 本命年 (ben ming nian), meaning “the year of destiny’s roots”. People born during the year of the Goat (so, for example, in 1955, 1967, 1979 and 1991) are said to be peaceful, polite, helpful and trustworthy.

Five of a set of the twelve zodiac animals dating from the Tang dynasty (618–907), depicting (left to right) dragon, snake, horse, goat, and monkey. Shaanxi History Museum, Xi'an © U. Sims-Williams

 

Illustration from the album “Coloured Drawings of Chinese Flora and Fauna”, 18^th century, China (BL Sloane collection Add. 15503, f.10)

The Chinese New Year is celebrated not only in Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, but in other countries where the Chinese population is significant, such as Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines and the Chinatowns across the world. Furthermore, the traditional Chinese calendar and the related zodiac animals can be found in literature and art productions of countries which have been influenced by the Chinese traditional culture, such as Japan, Korea, Mongolia and Thailand.

Mongolia
In Mongolia, for example, the 12 animals of the zodiac are called Арван хоёр жил which means “12 years”. The Mongolian calendar is slightly different from the Chinese one and therefore sometimes New Year's day falls on a different date.

Mongolian diagram showing the twelve animals of the zodiac. From B. Batzhargal, Ėrtniĭ Mongolyn Matematik (Эртний Монголын Матэматик, “Early Mongolian Mathematics”. Ulaanbaatar, 1976, p. 171 (British Library MON 596) ⓒ


Japan
In Japan, the Chinese calendar was introduced in the 6^th century and it was officially used in some variations until 1873, when the Gregorian solar calendar was formally adopted. In the Japanese collections at the British Library, we find a variety of representations of the animals of the Chinese zodiac, sometimes depicted in form of Gods, warriors or spiritual entities. The first woodblock-printed item below, for example, shows the Twelve Heavenly Generals of the Buddhist tradition (called十二神将, pronounced Jūni Shinshō in Japanese and Shi er shen jiang in Chinese). Each of them is associated with one of the twelve animals of the zodiac.

Left: “Great miscellany of calendrical and practical knowledge” (Eitai daizassho banreki taisei  永代大雑書萬暦大成), 1856 reprint. Woodblock printed. Right: the same image has been modified to highlight the position of every animal (BL 16000.a.8)

Some illustrations (left) and cover page (right) of a practical design book (Ōyō manga 応用漫画), illustrated by Ogino, 1903. The goat’s stylised shape is visible on the bottom of the left page (BL ORB.30/6167)

Detail from Ichiyūsai Kuniyoshi 一勇斎国芳 (1798-1861) “The comic transformation of actors into the twelve animals of the zodiac” (Dōke miburi jūnishi 道外見富利十二志).  Single sheet woodblock colour-printed [c.1844-1855] (BL ORB.99/102)

Thailand
The British Library holds a magnificent manuscript from Thailand dated 1885 (Or.13650). It contains a series of drawings based on the Chinese Zodiac and its animals. A male or female avatar, a plant and a number are associated to every zodiacal sign. This manuscript has been fully digitised and can be seen here.

Horoscope for the year of the goat. The four goats on the left represent four three-month periods within the year. On the right there is the female avatar for the year of the goat (BL Or.13650, f.8v)

Illustrations of omens for events that could happen on a certain date within the year of the goat. In the upper left corner the female avatar for the year is riding a goat. Only a ritual specialist (หมอดู) would have been able to interpret these omens and to give advice on how to avoid unfortunate or dangerous events (BL Or.13650, f.20v)

Central Asia
A unique 9^th century document from Khotan, (present-day Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, China) written in the middle-Iranian language Khotanese,  is called “The twelve year leaders and their influences”, and lists the animals in the 12 year cycle with predictions for people born in that year. A man born in the year of the Sheep (or Goat) “will be blessed, meritorious. He will be blessed in everything, in crop and money”. However, it is not all good news! The description continues: “He will be sickly and short-lived. There will be bad illnesses upon him. And a lot of itching will arise for him as well as a wound. If his wives [become] pregnant, they will die. And whatever sons they bear will be short-lived”[1].

Predictions in Khotanese for the man born in the year of the Goat, dating from the early 9^th century. Document from Khotan (present-day Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, China) (BL Or.11252/1, lines 38-41)  International Dunhuang Project website

It is worth mentioning that the character 羊 (yang) in Chinese is associated with various animals which belong to the Bovidae family and it therefore can be translated as goat, but also as sheep or even antelope. This is why in English, when referring to the Chinese zodiac sign 羊, “goat” and “sheep” are both widely used as translations.

We hope that the images in this article will be inspiring and auspicious to all our blog readers and we wish you a wonderful New Year of the  羊!

 新年快乐！ 新年快樂！

 
Curators of the East Asia, South East Asia and Middle East collections

The world of scholarship has been revolutionised by numerous digitisation programmes undertaken in libraries throughout the world. Now, instead of having to travel thousands of miles for expensive and extensive visits to cities where unique historical sources are housed, it is ever more possible to make a detailed study of a manuscript from one’s own home, in any country, via the internet. Digitisation programmes are usually shaped both by the interests of patrons and the strengths of an institution’s collections, and among the exciting projects to digitise material from the Asian and African collections of the British Library are those of Malay manuscripts in collaboration with the National Library of Singapore supported by William and Judith Bollinger, Thai manuscripts funded by the Royal Thai government, Persian manuscripts in partnership with the Iran Heritage Foundation, and Hebrew manuscripts with the Polonsky Foundation. However, with the emphasis on large projects, it is not always easy to prioritise the digitisation of other important manuscripts from smaller language groups, or from regions for which funding proves difficult to source.

Note in the Bugis language and script, from the diary of the king of Bone, south Sulawesi, 1775. British Library, Add. 12354, f. 2r (detail).

The Southeast Asia section of the British Library is fortunate in that a legacy from the estate of the late Henry D. Ginsburg (1940-2007), who was for over thirty years the Library’s curator for Thai, Lao and Cambodian collections, has enabled the digitisation of a small number of significant manuscripts, some representing writing traditions rarely accessible on the internet. In 2013, seven of the most important illuminated and illustrated manuscripts in Vietnamese, Burmese and Javanese were digitised. In 2014 we completed the digitisation of a further 15 manuscripts from Southeast Asia, in Vietnamese, Burmese, Shan, Khamti, Lao, Thai, Bugis, Javanese and Arabic, which this month have been made accessible through the Digitised Manuscripts website.

Artistically, the highlights are probably six Burmese folding book (parabaik) manuscripts, all lavishly and exquisitely illustrated. Three of the manuscripts depict scenes from the Life of the Buddha (Or. 4762, Or. 5757 and Or. 14197) while the other three contain Jataka stories (Or. 13538, Or. 4542A and Or. 4542B, and MSS Burmese 202).


The Jātaka stories about the previous lives of the Gautama Buddha are preserved in all branches of Buddhism. These stories show how he gradually acquired greater strength and moral stature as his soul passed from one incarnation to the other. Shown above is a scene from the Latukika Jataka. The Bodhisatta, the leader of the elephants (gilded) protects the offspring of a quail who had laid her eggs in the feeding ground of the elephants. British Library, Or. 13538, ff. 20-22.

Also in folding book format is a lavishly decorated Buddhist manuscript, Buddhānussati, in Shan language (Or. 12040), a copy of Tamrā phichai songkhrām in Thai language (Or. 15760), and a rare Lao dictionary in three volumes from the 19th century (Add. 11624).


This Shan folding book (pap tup), dated 1885, with the title Buddhānussati contains a text on recollections of the Buddha, explaining mindfulness with the Buddha’s virtues as objects. The embossed gilded covers are studded with multi-coloured mirror glass for ornate floral decoration. British Library, Or.12040, front cover.

Folio 16 of the Tamrā phichai songkhrām, explaining various appearances of sun and how to interpret them. This Thai divination manual for the prediction of wars, conflicts and natural disasters also contains explanations of the shapes of clouds, the moon and planets. British Library, Or.15760, folio 16.

Another rarity that has been digitised in this project is a bound and scrolled paper book (pap kin) in Khamti Shan script, Kuasala Ainmakan (Or. 3494). The book, dated 1860, is sewn in a blue cotton wrapper with a white and pink braided cotton string. It contains the Mahāsupina Jātaka about the dreams of King Pasenadi, the King of Kosala.  

From the Vietnamese collection was selected ‘The Northwards Embassy by land and water’, a rare pictorial manuscript map, Bắc Sứ Thủy Lục Địa Đô (Or. 14907), illustrating the journey from Hanoi to Beijing in 1880. This manuscript is currently on display in the exhibition ‘Geo/Graphic: celebrating maps and their stories’, at the National Library of Singapore (16 January – 19 July 2015).


Tai Ping City , located by Gu Fang Mountain. The city was well fortified with a fortress and could be dated back to the Ming dynasty.British Library, Or. 14907, f. 11r.

Two very different Javanese manuscripts were digitised. The first, Serat Jaya Lengkara Wulang (MSS Jav 24), contains ethical teachings of the royal house of Yogyakarta, with many fine examples of illumination. The other manuscript (Sloane 2645) is a work on Islamic law, Mukhtasar Ba Fadl or Muqaddimat al-Hadrami, here going under the title Masa'il al-ta'lim, written in Arabic with interlinear translation and marginal commentary in Javanese in Arabic (Pegon) script. The manuscript, which is dated 1623, is from the founding collections of Sir Hans Sloane, and may be one of the earliest dated examples of a Javanese manuscript in Pegon script, and written on Javanese paper dluwang) made from the bark of the mulberry tree.

Illuminated architectural section heading from a Javanese manuscript, Serat Jaya Lengkara Wulang, Yoygyakarta, 1803. British Library, MSS Jav. 24, f. 22v.

Start of a new chapter (bab) in Masa'il al-ta'lim, in Arabic with interlinear translation in Javanese, 1623. British Library, Sloane 2645, f. 34r (detail).

The final manuscript, also from Indonesia, is in the Bugis language and script (Add. 12354). This is the personal diary of Sultan Ahmad al-Salih Syamsuddin of Bone, in south Sulawesi, covering the years 1775-1795, and written in his own hand. The diary contains a wealth of detail on the social, political, economic and cultural life of Sulawesi in the late 18th century.

Entries for the first few days of August 1781, in the Bugis diary of Sultan Ahmad al-Salih. British Library, Add. 12354, f. 52r (detail).

Annabel Teh Gallop, San San May, Jana Igunma, Sud Chonchirdsin

Southeast Asia section curators

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The BP exhibition Ming: 50 years that changed China runs at the British Museum until 5 January 2015. The exhibition focuses on the years 1400-1450 when the Chinese empire reached a peak in its cultural and artistic production.  At the same time trade and exchange with other lands also flourished and the impact of Chinese culture was widely felt across Asia. 

By the time of the Ming Dynasty the interaction between China and Japan was already an ancient one.  For more than eight centuries official trade and diplomatic embassies had taken place between the two countries and many aspects of Japanese government, religion, philosophy, art and literature had been influenced by contacts with China.

Among the British Library items loaned to the British Museum’s Ming exhibition is Shūbun inryaku 聚分韻略, a rhyme dictionary to aid in the composition of Chinese poetry.  It was compiled by the celebrated monk-poet Shiren 師錬 (1278-1346), also known as Kokan 虎関, who resided at the Nanzenji 南禅寺 in Kyoto, the leading temple of the Rinzai School of Zen Buddhism.

The work has a preface by the compiler dated Kagen 4 [1306] and a postscript dated Tokuji 2 [1307].  The British Library’s copy belongs to an edition printed at the Reigen’an 霊源菴, part of the Tōfukuji 東福寺, a Zen temple in Kyoto, in Ōei 19 [1412].  This is the earliest dated edition of the work although copies survive of two undated but possibly earlier editions and a version of the work may have been published during the lifetime of the compiler (ie. pre-1346)[1].

End of preface of Shūbun inryaku , showing the date Kagen 4 嘉元丙午 [1306] and the name of the compiler Kokan Shiren 虎関師錬 (British Library Or.72.g.20 f. 6v-7r)

The use of Chinese characters or kanji 漢字 (literally ‘Han script’) was introduced to Japan in the fifth century and initially the Chinese language was the medium of written communication.  Later, systems were developed for representing the sounds and grammatical structures of the Japanese language:  man’yōgana, hiragana and katakana – all of which were based on Chinese characters.

Composition of Chinese poetry (kanshi 漢詩) was a popular pastime among the Japanese elite and the earliest anthology, the Kaifūsō 懐風藻 ‘Fond Recollections of Poetry’ was compiled in 751. It includes 120 poems by 64 different poets, many of them members of the Imperial Family or high-ranking courtiers.

The Shūbun inryaku is one of the earliest Japanese examples of insho (Chinese:yun shu 韻書, dictionaries of Chinese characters arranged according to rhyme and tone to assist in the composition of classical Chinese poetry.  Standard kanji dictionaries are organised according to a system of radicals reflecting the component parts of the individual character.  In Chinese rhyme dictionaries, the characters were first arranged by tone and then each of the four tones was divided into rhyme groups (Japanese: in, Chinese: yun ), traditionally named after the first character of the group.

The beginning of the Shūbun inryaku showing the first rhyme group headed by the character 東 (east).  The copious handwritten annotations in black and red show that this was a well-used reference work (British Library Or.72.g.20 f. 8v)

The compiler of the Shūbun inryaku, Shiren, entered holy order on Mt Hiei in 1287 at the age of 9.  In addition to Buddhism he also studied Chinese language and classics from the age of 17 and learned calligraphy from the famous Chinese monk Yishan Yining 一山 一寧 (1247-1317).  He rose through the Buddhist hierarchy to become abbot of the Tōfukuji and Nanzenji temples and in 1342 was accorded the eminent title of Kokushi 国師 ‘National Master’ by Emperor Go-Murakami, being subsequently known as Honkaku Kokushi 本覚国師.  In addition to an anthology of poetry called the Saihokushū 済北集, Shiren also wrote the Genkō Shakusho 元亨釈書, a 30-volume work completed in 1322 which is the oldest history of Buddhism in Japan, and Butsugo shinron 仏語心論, a treatise on the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra.

The growing importance of Zen Buddhism in Japan during the Kamakura (1185-1333) and Muromachi (1333-1573) Eras led to a renewed interest in Chinese culture.  Many Zen monks composed poetry and prose in Chinese and these works have come to be known collectively as Gozan bungaku 五山文学 or ‘Literature of the Five Mountains’.

The term ‘Five Mountains’ refers to the principal Rinzai temples - five in Kyoto and five in Kamakura  -which were both protected and controlled by the shogunate.  The system underwent a number of revisions until 1386 when the designated temples were the Tenryūji 天龍寺, Shōkokuji 相国寺, Kenninji 建仁寺, Tōfukuji 東福寺 and Manjuji 萬壽寺 in Kyoto and the Kenchōji 建長寺, Engakuji 円覚寺, Jufukuji 壽福寺, Jōchiji 浄智寺 and Jōmyōji 浄妙寺 in Kamakura.  The Nanzenji occupied a pre-eminent position above all 10.

The Gozan temples were the focus of printing activity in Japan during the 14^th and 15^th centuries when many Chinese works were reprinted.  Collectively these books are referred to as Gozan-ban or ‘Five Mountain Editions’.  Over 400 different works have been identified, the majority relating to Zen and other Buddhist sects.  However, 100 are non-Buddhist including Confucian texts and literary works.  They have a distinctly Chinese style since they were often reprints of Song or Yuan Dynasty editions or, in the 14^th century at least, because the woodblocks from which they were printed had been carved by Chinese blockcutters who had crossed to Japan.  The British Library has some 30 Gozan-ban in its Japanese collection.  One of these, an edition of the Rongo 論語 or ‘Analects of Confucius’ (British Library ORB.30/171), printed c.1390-1450 is also included in the British Museum’s Ming exhibition.

Title page of Rongo 論語 or ‘Analects of Confucius’, printed c.1390-1450, showing handwritten Japanese glosses and marginal notes as well as the seals of previous owners (British Library ORB.30/171)

Kunshin koji 君臣故事 ‘Moral stories for sovereigns and subjects’, a guide to Confucian behaviour and one of the few illustrated Gozan-ban. c.1370 (British Library ORB.30/196)

Most of the British Library’s Gozan works, including the Shūbun inryaku, Rongo and Kunshin koji illustrated above, were acquired by the British Museum Library in 1884-1885 as part of the collection of the diplomat and bibliophile Ernest Mason Satow (1843-1929).

Ming: 50 years that changed China is open at the British Museum until 5 January 2015.


Select bibliography

Carpenter Bruce E., 'Priest-Poets of the Five Mountains in Medieval Japan', in Tezukayama Daigaku ronshū, no. 16, 1977, Nara, Japan, pp. 1-11.

Gardner, Kenneth B, Descriptive catalogue of Japanese books in the British Library printed before 1700. London and Tenri, 1993.

Kawase, Kazuma, Kojisho no kenkyū 古辞書の研究. Tokyo 1955, revised edition 2007

Todd, Hamish A., ‘The Satow Collection of Japanese Books in the British Library: its History and Significance’ in Daiei Toshokan shozō Chōsenbon oyobi Nihon kosho no bunkengakuteki gogakuteki kenkyū  大英圖書館所蔵朝鮮本及び日本古書の文獻學的・語學的研究.  Toyama University, 2007)

Ury, Marian, Poems of the Five Mountains: An Introduction to the Literature of the Zen Monasteries, Michigan Monograph Series in Japanese Studies, No 10, 1992.

Hamish Todd, Asian and African Studies

Related articles

Two Persian ‘Ming’ manuscripts on view at the British Museum

Three volumes of the Yongle Dadian now on display at the British Museum

Tangram is a simple yet very entertaining dissection puzzle game which involves 7 flat shapes and the player’s imagination. The aim of the game is to create figures of given silhouettes and its rules are simple: the player must use all seven pieces, without overlapping them, and every piece must touch at least one other. Tangram is still one of the most popular puzzle games in the world. It comes from China, where it is called 七巧图 (qi qiao tu) or 七巧板 (qi qiao ban), meaning "seven tablets of ability" and where it has a long tradition. The English has thought to have been derived from Tang, with reference to the Tang Dynasty, and the Greek suffix –gramma (graph). However, both the origin and the etymology of the English name remain uncertain.

First page of the 七巧图解(Qi qiao tu jie), Tangram puzzle book solutions, China c. 1815 (British Library 15257.d.14)

Usually, the Chinese Tangram game books include, in two separate volumes, the silhouettes to be created and the solutions. In the picture below there is a pair of books published in China in 1815: the one on the top displays the silhouettes, the one below contains the corresponding solutions, which highlight the position of each of the seven pieces to produce the desired figure. Generally, the shapes are stylizations of common objects or animals.


Patterns from the 七巧图合璧 (Qi qiao tu he bi), Tangram puzzle book, China c. 1815 (British Library 15257.d.5) and below 七巧图解(Qi qiao tu jie), Tangram puzzle book solutions, China c. 1815 (British Library 15257.d.14)

The classic version of the Tangram comprises five triangles of different sizes, a square and a rhomboid which together form a square. Despite its simplicity (we can create a Tangram set to play with from a piece of paper, even though there are Tangram sets carved from precious jade or ivory), this game involves creativity and patience. Since its arrival in Europe it has been considered as an intellectual and challenging game both for children and adults. Much research has been conducted on the use of Tangram in the fields of mathematics[1], geometry, psychology and education[2].

The birth and development of Tangram and other visual games in China has been connected by some scholars to the 燕几圖 (Yan ji tu), commonly attributed to Huang Bo’en (1079 – 1118), which was transmitted during the Yuan and Ming dynasties in a collection called Xin shang Bian. The Yan ji tu is a monograph about the arrangements of tables for convivial gatherings. The text is very schematic and reduced to captions of a series of drawings showing seven geometrical table pieces in different arrangements.

Around the 1820s there was a craze for the Tangram in Europe, called at the time “Chinese enigma” or “Eastern Puzzle”. Its attraction lay in its exoticism and a fascination for everything coming from East Asia. The game was especially popular among the upper classes because, despite being a solitary game, it allowed players to compete with each other in solving the problems and could be used to entertain guests. Several manuals were published in England, France, Germany and Italy, with figures and solutions. The Eight Book of Tan by Sam Loyd, published in New York in 1903, made this traditional Chinese game popular in the Unites States and at the same time reinforced its popularity in Europe at the beginning of the 20^th century.

Left: The Great Eastern Puzzle, London, 1817: English reproduction of the Chinese 七巧图合璧  Qi qiao tu he bi, with all the 316 original puzzles contained in the 1815 Chinese version. An English introduction was added (British Library 15257.d.13)
Right: First and second pages from the original Chinese version, 1815 (British Library 15257.d.5)

Another widespread guide, Le Véritable casse-tête, ou Énigmes chinoises, was published in Paris in 1820, and it testifies to the popularity of the game in France in that period. The fascination for Tangram included some famous personalities, among them, apparently, Napoleon and Edgar Allan Poe. Lewis Carroll, born Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, writer and mathematician, recreated the main characters of his novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland using the seven pieces of Tangram.

Left: Introduction to the game and illustrations with figures from Le Véritable casse-tête, ou Énigmes chinoises, Paris, 1820 (British Library 1210.m.41)
Right, Tangram silhouettes from Lewis Carroll's Bedside Book - ‘Entertainments for the Wakeful Hours’, edited by Edgar Cuthwellis with illustrations by Lewis Carroll and Phuz (British Library X.529/34199)

Almost fifty years after the publication of the 七巧图合璧 (Qi qiao tu he bi) in 1815, Tong Xiegeng, a scholar from the city of Hangzhou, developed a new puzzle made of 15 pieces, six of which with curvilinear edges. This new version of the Tangram was called Yi zhi ban 益智板, or “Tablets for Enhancing Intelligence”. Tong Xiegeng published in 1862 a two volume book called Yi zhi tu 益智图, containing several puzzles to be solved with the fifteen pieces. These puzzles include scenes from classical Chinese poems or stories.

Illustrations from the Yi zhi tu 益智图 by Tong Xiegeng, 1878 copy (British Library 15257.d.300)

A fifteen pieces Tangram set, ca. 1920 (British Library Or.62.a)

More recently Donald Verry took some beautiful pictures in the British Library building in St. Pancras and named two of them “Tangram”. Can you guess from which spot they were taken?

Tangram (left) and Tangram II (right)
ⓒ Donald Verry

Further reading
Bussotti, Michela, “Jeux de tables: le Yanji tu, livre sans texte d'«images en action»?”, in Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient, n. 89, 2002
Loyd, Sam, Sam Loyd's Book of Tangram Puzzles (The 8th Book of Tan Part I). Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, 1968
Read, Ronald C., Tangrams: 330 Puzzles, New York: Dover Publications, 1968
Slocum, Jerry, et al., The Tangram Book: The Story of the Chinese Puzzle with Over 2000 Puzzles to Solve. New York: Sterling Publishing Company, 2004

Sara Chiesura, Asian and African Studies

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Ghoulish images from East Asia

The new exhibition Terror and Wonder: The Gothic Imagination, which will run until Tuesday 20 January 2015, provides fascinating insights into the dark side of British literary culture and explores its diffusion through different media. But the attraction of terror and wonder was a phenomenon of no lesser importance in other literary cultures as well. Despite being set in completely different landscapes and employing diverse imageries the weird, the macabre, and the mysterious enthralled readers of all ages across the globe.

In China, for example, short tales about extraordinary or unusual events, called chuan qi 傳奇, had a long-lasting popularity which began in the Tang dynasty (618-907) and continued throughout the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). There are in fact numerous collections of chuan qi produced in those periods, most notably Jian deng xin hua 剪燈新話 (1378) by Qu You 瞿佑, Jian deng yu hua 剪燈餘話 (c. 1420) by Li Zhen 李禎, and Mi deng yin hua 覓燈因話 (1592) by Shao Jingzhan 邵景詹. Their popularity was long lasting, and in the mid-19th century these three works were still being reprinted under the collective title of San deng cong hua 三燈叢話.

These collections of chuan qi circulated widely throughout East Asia. Reprints of the original Chinese texts, for instance Shinpen sentō yowa 新編剪燈餘話 (see Gardner, pp. 87-88), bear witness to their great success even outside China. In particular, Jian deng xin hua was very well received in Korea, Vietnam and Japan, and became the source of inspiration for other similar collections of weird stories compiled in those countries: Geumo Sinhwa 金鰲新話 (Korea), Truyền kì mạn lục 傳奇漫錄 (Vietnam), and Otogibōko 伽婢子 (Japan).

Left: title page of a later edition of Jian deng xin hua 剪燈新話, which is included in San deng cong hua he ke 三燈叢話合刻 (1847) (British Library 15331.d.14)
Right: preface of Shinpen Sentō yowa 新編剪燈餘話, movable-type edition of Jiandeng yuhua 剪燈餘話 published in Japan during the seventeenth-century (c. 1615-30)  (British Library ORB 30/217)

In Japan, the publication of Otogibōko 伽婢子 (1666) heralded the start of a new vogue for stories concerning mysteries and supernatural events. This multi-volume collection of 13 booklets, compiled by Asai Ryōi 浅井了意 and published in Kyōto by Nishizawa Tahee 西澤太兵衛, contain numerous tales of terror and wonder written in vernacular Japanese and illustrated with beautiful black and white woodcuts. Asai Ryōi drew inspiration from pre-existing stories, originally composed on the continent, translating and adapting them to meet the taste of early-modern Japanese readers of popular fiction. Of the 68 tales contained in Otogibōko, 16 are taken from the above-mentioned Jian deng xin hua, 2 from Geumo Sinhwa, 2 from Jian deng yu hua, and the remainder were taken from other Chinese collections of weird happenings.

Close-up of some of the volumes comprising the edition of Otogibōko held at the British Library (British Library 16107.c.45)

The array of tales narrated in Otogibōko varies considerably, ranging from the bizarre to the macabre, from the grotesque to the surreal. Each story vividly sketches scenes of ordinary life, which are then flavoured with a supernatural twist, mysterious illness, inexplicable happenings, the appearance of monsters, ghosts, or other ghoulish creatures.  

Details from some of the illustrated leaves in Otogibōko (vol. 11, f. 26v; vol. 2, f.14v; vol. 3, f. 13r; vol. 3, f. 18r)  (British Library 16107.c.45)

Asai Ryōi’s text was widely appreciated long after its first publication. Otogibōko itself was reprinted several times (in 1699 and 1826) and served as archetype for other collections of tales of terror and wonder produced in the following decades – for example Shin Otogibōko新御伽婢子 (1683) and Shui Otogibōko 拾遺伽婢子 (1704). The publication of Otogibōko marked an important milestone in the history of Japanese literature, and many other works of popular fiction featuring ghosts, demons and other supernatural beings drew their inspiration from the stories contained therein.

Although the Chinese and Japanese literary traditions leave little or no room for Dracula- and Frankenstein-like monsters, they were nonetheless populated by equally terrifying and nightmarish monsters.

On this night of horror, better keep an eye out......

Bakemono Yotsugi no hachinoki 化物世櫃鉢木 (1781) ( British Library 16107.c.20)

Further Reading

Gardner, Kenneth Bursham, Descriptive Catalogue of Japanese Books in the British Library Printed Before 1700 (London, Tenri: The British Library, Tenri Central Library, 1993)
Nienhauser, William, The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986), pp. 275-76
Asai Ryōi, Otogibōko, in Tōyō bunkō v.475 and v. 480 (Tōkyō: Heibonsha 1988)

Alessandro Bianchi,  Asian and African Studies and PhD student, University of Cambridge
together with Hamish Todd, Ohtsuka Yasuyo and Sara Chiesura

The BP exhibition Ming: 50 years that changed China is open at the British Museum until 5 January 2015. During the years 1400-1450 the Chinese empire reached a peak in its own cultural and artistic productions and in its trade and exchange with other cultures. The stunning exhibition at the British Museum vividly represents the first-class  products of those years, with 280 extraordinary works from the Museum collections and from many other institutions.

Among the most interesting pieces from the British Library collections which are now on display, we find 3 volumes of the Yongle Encyclopaedia (永樂大典 Yongle Dadian), which takes its name from the Ming Emperor who commissioned it.
 

Emperor Yongle (Yongle 永樂 means perpetual happiness) as portrayed in an 18th century painted album (British Library Or. 2231)

Emperor Yongle (born with the name of Zhu Di 朱棣) was the third Emperor of the Ming dynasty and he reigned from 1402 to 1424. He was a key figure of the development of the Chinese empire: he transferred the capital of the empire from Nanjing to Beijing and ordered the building of the Forbidden City. Under his reign Admiral Zheng He travelled to the Middle East and East Africa strengthening the trade and diplomatic links with foreign countries. Indeed the importance of China as a production centre for the export of high quality goods during the first half of the 15th century is testified by some exquisite British Library Persian manuscripts, written on Chinese decorated paper, now on display in the exhibition.

Emperor Yongle commissioned the Yongle Dadian in July 1403 and the project involved 2169 scholars and compilers from the Hanlin Academy and the National University. Completed in 1408, it was the world’s largest literary compilation, comprising 22,877 chapters bound in 11,095 volumes. The Yongle Dadian was taken as an example and frequently quoted in the Qing dynasty encyclopaedia Siku quanshu (四庫禁書 “Complete Library of the Four Treasuries”), a colossal compilation in 36,275 volumes commissioned in 1773 by Emperor Qianlong.

The size, the type of paper, and the binding of the volumes are different from the other Chinese encyclopaedias. The paper is heavy with dark red vertical rulings. The subject headings are written in red on the outer edges of the pages. The binding is in the “wrapped-back” style (包背裝 bao bei zhuang), but with a distinctive yellow silk hard-cover to protect the paper.
 

Distinctive yellow hard cover from the volume containing chapters 7389 and 7390 of the Yongle Dadian (Jiajing to Longqing period, 1562-7) (British Library Or.11758)

The Yongle Dadian is unique not only for its physical appearance but also for its content arrangement: unlike other Chinese compilations, the parts are not ordered by subject, but by the rhythm system of the dictionary 洪武正韻 (Hongwu zhengyun). This system is closer to the idea of an alphabetical arrangement, and in this way it was easier to find a specific entry.


A page from the woodblock printed dictionary 洪武正韻 (Hongwu zhengyun) which is named after Hongwu (r. 1368-1398), the first emperor of the Ming dynasty who commissioned this work in 1375. 16th century copy (British Library 15342.b.14)

The content of the encyclopaedia covers all aspects of traditional “Confucian” knowledge and contains the most representative literature available at that time, ranging from history and drama to farming techniques. It comprises large sections of historical documents and other sources, transcribed character for character, with the name of the author or the source in red.
In fact, the term encyclopaedia, which is commonly used when referring to the Yongle Dadian, is slightly misleading since 大典 (da dian) means grand “canon” or “code” and the Yongle Dadian should be regarded rather as the Chinese literary genre of 類書 (lei shu), which literally means “classified writings”. These literary compilations span a wide variety of texts, such as dictionaries, reference books, manuals and anthologies. Unlike Western encyclopaedias which are based on edited entries, the Yongle Dadian is a collection of readings and excerpts from existing literature. Despite the non-originality (as we understand the term now) of these types of work, the value of the Yongle Dadian is enormous as it preserves many texts which otherwise would have been lost.

Left: Chapter 7389 (Jiajing to Longqing period, 1562-7) of the Yongle Dadian, concerned mainly with funeral rites (喪禮  sang li) (British Library Or.11758, f.1r)
Right: Illustration from the same item (British Library Or.11758, f.3v)


Even though printing techniques were already well developed in the Ming dynasty (the earliest dated woodblock-printed item, the Diamond Sutra, dates back to the 9th century), the Yongle Dadian was handwritten because of its length and extent. The only 1408 manuscript was almost destroyed by fire during the sixteenth century, and as a result two other copies were produced during the reigns of Jiajing 嘉靖 (1522-1566) and Longqing 隆慶 (1567-1572). This was not enough to keep the precious manuscripts safe: during the fall of the Ming dynasty and the rise of the Qing in 1644, the 1408 copy was destroyed and some of the later ones were lost or dispersed. The 1562-7 copies were at that time the earliest edition to survive and the number of volumes went down to 800. During the Boxer Uprising in Beijing during the spring of 1900, half of the remaining volumes which were stored in the Hanlin Academy were destroyed and now less than 400 juan (chapters) remain. They represent only the 3% of the total initial corpus.

Soy bean recipes on folio 3 (verso) of  chapter 13340 from the Yongle Dadian (British Library Or. 12020, Jiajing to Longqing period, 1562-7)


David Helliwell, Curator of Chinese Collections at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, has worked extensively on the Yongle Dadian volumes held in the European libraries (see Helliwell below), tracing their arrival from Beijing and identifying in 1997 a new volume in the University of Aberdeen Library [1]. Today there are about 56 volumes in Europe (51 in the United Kingdom and the remaining 5 in Berlin). The British Library currently holds 24 volumes of the Yongle Dadian, corresponding to 49 chapters. During the 1930s the National Library of China made copies of some chapters and donated them to the British Museum Library. Furthermore, in 1960, the Chinese publisher 中華書局 Zhonghua Shuju produced facsimiles of all the existing volumes.

Geomantic diagrams in chapter 14219 from the Yongle Dadian dedicated to geomancy (British Library Or. 14446, f. 5r, Jiajing to Longqing period, 1562-7)

Ming: 50 years that changed China is open at the British Museum until 5 January 2015.
The British Library’s Yongle Dadian volumes 7389-90, 14219-20 and 13340-41 pictured in this article are on display.

References
Grinstead, Eric Douglas, “The Yung-lo Ta-tien: an Unrecorded Volume”, in The British Museum Quarterly no. 26, 1962.
Harrison-Hall, Jessica, “‘Ming: 50 years that changed China’ at the British Museum”, in Orientations, vol. 45, no. 6, 2014.
Helliwell, David, “Holdings of Yongle Dadian in United Kingdom libraries” in Yongle Dadian bianzuan 600 zhounian guoji yantaohui lunwenji, Beijing, 2003.
Shih-shan, Henry Tsai, Perpetual Happiness: the Ming Emperor Yongle, University of Washington Press, 2001.

Sara Chiesura, Asian and African Studies