Rare books: Precious books or literary materials. Such as precious revolutionary documents and extremely precious ancient books. Rare books are "rare". For example, there are many Chinese versions of the Manifesto of the Productive Party, but the version published by the People's Publishing House founded by the Party in Shanghai in the 1920s has become a rare revolutionary cultural relic, which should be regarded as a "rare book" from the typological point of view.

Jane's book is a good book.

The original concept of rare books refers to books that have been strictly collated and have no mistakes. Before printing appeared, books were mostly written by hand. Carefully write down manuscripts or other books, and after checking with the original, it becomes a rare book. In the Western Han Dynasty, Liu Xiang edited books for Emperor Han Chengdi for twenty years. When writing a new edition, he must first write the original on bamboo slips and then on silk books. How to change and delete? Liu Xiang recorded the method of "survey and correction" in Bielu, saying: "If you study alone, you can correct it from top to bottom, and you will get a fallacy; One holds a book and one reads. If the enemy is opposed, the two are opposed. " The collating figurines unearthed from Jin Yongning's two-year tomb in Changsha, Hunan Province show the collating activities of people at that time. Therefore, Ye Mengde's Misty Rain in the Stone Forest in the Song Dynasty said: "Before the Tang Dynasty, all books were written by hand, and there was no method of stamping. People value books. There are not many books, and Tibetans are good at collating, so there are often rare books. "

After the Tang Dynasty, block printing was gradually applied, books were repeatedly printed and widely spread, and the concept of "version" began to appear. Different versions of books have different documents and different collations, so there are whole books and residual books, excellent books and inferior books; Different versions of books appear at different times in the morning and evening, and their rarity is also different, so there are differences between ancient books and modern books, and there are differences between orphans and duplicates. The connotation of rare books is also expanded than the original. Zhang Zhidong in the Qing Dynasty said in the Bibliography Question and Answer: "Rare books are not new editions of paper, which means that they are the basis of careful proofreading and careful investigation by predecessors, and they are correct." A rare edition has three meanings: first, the full edition [no shortage of volumes and no deletion], second, the refined edition [fine proofreading], and third, the old edition [old engraving and old copying]. "Ding Bing, a bibliophile in the late Qing Dynasty, also put forward four criteria for rare books: first, old engravings; The second is the essence; The third is the old copy; The fourth is the old school. Since then, many scholars have constantly summed up the concept of rare books, and finally formed the current universal theory of "three natures" and "nine articles" of rare books.

The "three characteristics" of rare books mean that books should have high historical relics, academic materials and artistic reproducibility. The "Nine Articles" of rare books are the supplements and specific provisions of the "three natures", which mainly include: books engraved and copied before the Yuan Dynasty; Books carved and copied in Ming Dynasty; There were few woodcuts and manuscripts before Qianlong in Qing Dynasty. Books published by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the peasant revolutionary regimes of past dynasties; Before the Revolution of 1911, there were manuscripts with original opinions, school characteristics or systematic opinions in academic research, and few printed editions and manuscripts were circulated; Manuscripts that reflect a certain period, a certain field or an event before the Revolution of 1911, as well as rarely circulated engravings and manuscripts; Before the Revolution of 1911, famous scholars recognized, inscribed or recorded printed copies and transcripts with reference value recognized by predecessors; In printing, it can reflect the development of ancient printing and represent the technical level of a certain period, such as various movable type paintings, overprint or block printing with fine proofreading prints and illustrations; The printed spectrum of Ming Dynasty, the printed spectrum of ancient collections in Qing Dynasty, famous seal cutting plates and unique calligraphy inscriptions. It should be pointed out that rare edition is a historical concept, and its content will be constantly developed and updated with the development of the times. For example, the lower limit of the rare edition era thinks that Ming is a rare edition; Now, from the reality of book circulation, it is generally recognized that 60 years of Qianlong (AD 1795) is a development process.

The National Library is the largest collection of ancient books in China in the world, with 270,000 rare books carefully selected, including the royal collections of the Xi Hall of Song Ji, the National History Institute of Yuan Hanlin, the Yuanmingyuan Pavilion, and the Qing Cabinet Library, as well as the rare and secret books of many great bibliophiles in the north and south, as well as the unique collections of ancient books such as lyrics, novels and local documents. This edition will be introduced in the column of "Rare Books Stories" one after another, so that these rare rare rare books can get out of the golden chamber and be known to readers and friends.