SERICA

It will soon be fifty years since I began to study the pre-modern Chinese materials in the Bodleian Library, during which time I’ve learned a little about everything and a lot about nothing. But that hasn’t prevented people from regarding me as an authority on the earliest acquisitions of Chinese books in Europe, the Yongle Dadian, the Red Decree, and much else. In fact only a few of days ago I was asked to speak about the Laud Rutter for a Chinese documentary on Diaoyu (the Senkaku Islands), an invitation which I had to decline: my knowledge of this subject, like all the others, goes no further than what is contained in my blog entry.

The same certainly goes for the Red Decree, of which I gave an account in my second blog entry, published over fourteen years ago in November 2011. But that notwithstanding, a couple of years ago my former colleague Cordula Gumbrecht (Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz) invited me to write a short essay on the Berlin copy of this remarkable document for the publication Sammellust und Wissensdrang : vier Jahrhunderte Asiatica in Berlin. [1] This beautifully produced volume contains accounts of forty-two of Berlin’s East Asian treasures, and its contents are also available online. I think it is essential reading for anyone with an interest in old Chinese books in general and the development of European collections in particular.

The three works in the Bibliography / Further Reading section of my contribution were provided by the editors. But in the same year as the Berlin volume was published, there appeared a substantial monograph on the Red Decree written by Sun Litian. [2] Last month, YS drew attention to Sun’s work in a comment on my original blog entry, but this was followed by a further comment from Manuel Sassman pointing to an excoriating review of it.

At the beginning of his preface, Sun reproduces my list of all the known surviving copies of the Red Decree. When both Sun and I were writing our respective contributions, these numbered eighteen. But in only a few weeks after our work had been submitted to the editors, in November 2023 a nineteenth copy was found by Chris Boobier in the Kent History and Library Centre in Maidstone. Of course I have been able to add this to my original blog entry, but unfortunately the published lists are already out of date. Perhaps (like the 17th-century acquisitions), even more copies are awaiting discovery.

This entry was posted on 8 December 2025 at 13:13 and is filed under Uncategorized.