The ''Taiping Yulan'', translated as the ''Imperial Reader'' or ''Readings of the Taiping Era'', is a massive Chinese ''

leishu The ''leishu'' () is a genre of Reference work, reference books historically compiled in China and other East Asian countries. The term is generally translated as "encyclopedia", although the ''leishu'' are quite different from the modern notion ...

encyclopedia An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles ...

compiled by a team of scholars from 977 to 983. It was commissioned by the imperial court of the

Song A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetitio ...

dynasty A dynasty is a sequence of rulers from the same family,''Oxford English Dictionary'', "dynasty, ''n''." Oxford University Press (Oxford), 1897. usually in the context of a monarchical system, but sometimes also appearing in republics. A ...

during the first

era An era is a span of time defined for the purposes of chronology or historiography, as in the regnal eras in the history of a given monarchy, a calendar era used for a given calendar, or the geological eras defined for the history of Earth. Comp ...

of the reign of Emperor Taizong. It is divided into 1,000 volumes and 55 sections, which consisted of about 4.7 million

Chinese characters Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanji' ...

. It included citations from about 2,579 different kinds of

documents A document is a writing, written, drawing, drawn, presented, or memorialized representation of thought, often the manifestation of nonfiction, non-fictional, as well as fictional, content. The word originates from the Latin ''Documentum'', w ...

spanning from books, poetry,

ode An ode (from grc, ᾠδή, ōdḗ) is a type of lyric poetry. Odes are elaborately structured poems praising or glorifying an event or individual, describing nature intellectually as well as emotionally. A classic ode is structured in three majo ...

proverbs A proverb (from la, proverbium) is a simple and insightful, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and use formulaic speech, formulaic language. A proverbial phra ...

steles A stele ( ),Anglicized plural steles ( ); Greek plural stelai ( ), from Greek , ''stēlē''. The Greek plural is written , ''stēlai'', but this is only rarely encountered in English. or occasionally stela (plural ''stelas'' or ''stelæ''), whe ...

to miscellaneous works. After its completion, the Emperor Taizong is said to have finished reading it within a year, going through 3 volumes per day. It is considered one of the ''

Four Great Books of Song The ''Four Great Books of Song'' () was compiled by a team of scholars during the Song dynasty (960–1279). The term was coined after the last book ('' Cefu Yuangui'') was finished during the 11th century. The four encyclopedias were published an ...

''. The team who compiled the Taiping Yulan includes: Tang Yue (湯悅), Zhang Wei (張洎), Xu Xuan (徐鉉), Song Bai (宋白), Xu Yongbin (徐用賓), Chen E (陳鄂), Wu Shu (吳淑), Shu Ya (舒雅), Lü Wenzhong (吕文仲), Ruan Sidao (阮思道), Hu Meng (扈蒙), Li Fang (李昉), and others. It is one of the sources used by

Ming The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last ort ...

and

Qing The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speaki ...

scholars to reconstruct the lost ''

Record of the Seasons of Jingchu The ''Jingchu Suishiji'', also known by various English translations, is a description of holidays in central China during the 6th and 7th centuries. It was compiled by Du Gongzhan in the Sui or early Tang (early 7th century) as a revised, ...

''..

References

Citations

Bibliography

* * in Florence Bretelle-Establet and

Karine Chemla Karine Chemla (born in Tunis February 8, 1957) is a French historian of mathematics and sinologist who works as a director of research at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS). She is also a senior fellow at the New York Universi ...

(eds.), Qu'est-ce qu'écrire une encyclopédie en Chine?. Extreme Orient-Extreme Occident Hors série (2007), 39–76. *

Endymion Wilkinson Endymion Porter Wilkinson (born 15 May 1941) is an English diplomat and scholar who served as the European Union Ambassador to China and Mongolia from 1994 to 2001. He is particularly noted for '' Chinese History: A New Manual'', the first ver ...

. '' Chinese History: A New Manual.'' (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series, 2012; ), pp. 651–652. Chinese prose texts Chinese encyclopedias Chinese literature 10th-century Chinese books Song dynasty literature Diplomatics Leishu 983 10th century in China {{China-lit-stub