U-PARL has provided the Zhonghua Zaizao Shanben Shujuku 中華再造善本數據庫. This has clear, digitized images from the national and international Chinese rare books, which are included in the Zhonghua Zaizao Shanben Gongcheng 中華再造善本工程 published by the National Library of China Publishing House 國家圖書館出版社.
The Zhonghua Zaizao Shanben Shujuku contains more than 1,300 facsimiles of supremely unique and rare books, covering the Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing periods, which have been specially selected by experts from the editions and manuscripts that are in the possession of more than 50 domestic and overseas institutions including the National Library of China, Shanghai Library, Peking University Library, and the British Library. All the editions are displayed in high-resolution color images that are very close to the original, including the specific details of the edition. There are five divisions: “Tang and Song periods 唐宋編” ,“Jin and Yuan periods 金元編”, “Ming period 明代編”, “Qing period 清代編”, and “Ancient documents of ethnic minorities 少數民族文字古籍編”. These are classified as per the Jing Shi Zi Ji 經史子集(four-fold classification), and the collection scope is as follows.
Collection Scope
First period: 758 items of the Tang, Song, Jin, and Yuan periods.
Second period: 554 items of the Ming and Qing periods, and ancient documents of ethnic minorities.
There are three main functions of this database as given below:
(1) With the “Edition Comparison” function, it is possible to have a comparative display of different editions on the same page.
(2) It is possible to search for information about the ownership stamp based on the seal with the expanded functions such as seal identification.
(3) It is possible to quickly find the same title in different editions with comprehensive search functions for book names, editions, and authors. The bibliographic annotation (tiyao 提要), which is capable of full-text searches, provides information about the author and the origin of the edition, which is useful for understanding its academic value.
Using the Database
*Limited to on-campus* Please access from here. Accessible from GACoS. To access from off-campus, please see this page.
【User Manual】
For more details, please refer to the user’s guide provided by the Japanese agency Uchiyama Shoten.
*Caution* Access is limited to 5 at a time. Please click the “Zhonghua Zaizao Shanben” button in the center of the start screen. When you finish, click “Exit System” at the bottom left of the screen to log out.