1925, after the establishment of the Palace Museum, it was turned into the office of the Palace Library. For more than 90 years, thousands of people in the Forbidden City have studied here. This year marks the 92nd anniversary of the transformation of Shou 'an Palace into a library. As a library over eighty years old, Shouan Palace still nurtures countless people in the Forbidden City with her profound knowledge and culture.
As a museum, the basic function of the Palace Museum is the preservation and collection of cultural relics. The scope of cultural relics is very wide. Broadly speaking, it includes historical cultural relics left in society or buried underground, and can be divided into movable cultural relics and immovable cultural relics. Books and prints belong to the systematic category of cultural relics. Next, the author briefly talks about the collection of the Palace Museum. At present, the collection of the Palace Museum can be roughly divided into two parts according to the materials. Some of them are paper cultural relics, including scroll documents and ancient books. The other part is woodcut cultural relics, mainly printed in kind in Ming and Qing Dynasties.
Paper books are the first cultural relics, and Tianlu's collection of books is beautiful. In the ninth year of Qianlong (1744), Qianlong ordered that his rare books be selected from the books of the secret government and presented to the imperial court, and then put aside in Zhaoren Hall, giving it the name "Tianlu Lin Lang". After years of searching, Tianlu Lin Lang's books are getting richer and richer. Books are divided into classics, history, books and collections according to the "four-part classification", and each part is arranged in chronological order. There are detailed explanations in Tianlu Lin Lang Collection, which is an important material for the study of philology. Unfortunately, in the second year of Jiaqing (1797), Gan Qing Palace caught fire, Yanzhaoren Hall was burned, and all Tianlu's books were destroyed in Zhu Rong. Jiaqing immediately ordered the re-compilation of Tianlu's "A dazzling collection of books", which also had a detailed explanation.
At present, the collections related to Tianlu Lin Lang's books in the Palace Museum include three volumes of Tianlu Lin Lang's Books edited by Zhu Ge, the inner government during the forty years of Qianlong (1775), five volumes of Tianlu Lin Lang's Bibliography edited by Zhu Ge, the inner government during Jiaqing, and the Shelf Map of Tianlu Lin Lang drawn during Jiaqing.
Second, the collection of the cabinet library in Qing Dynasty. Cabinet Treasury is a warehouse for collecting cabinet documents and files. Cabinet vault files are especially valuable for historical data. In the late Qing dynasty, he moved out because of the repair of the cabinet treasury, and then he dispersed in many places. China No.1 Historical Archives located in the Forbidden City has a large number of cabinet vaults, and the Palace Museum also has some collections of cabinet vaults in the Qing Dynasty.
Third, Yang Shoujing and Guanhaitang Library. Yang Shoujing was a great scholar in the late Qing Dynasty, and his textual research was extremely meticulous. Yang Shoujing and his teacher Xiong's Notes are the epitome of Zhu's research. Yang Shoujing is not only a historical geographer, but also a famous tablet engraver and bibliophile. Guan Hai Hall is a library building in Yang Shoujing. 19 15 After Yang Shoujing's death, some of his collections entered the Palace Museum. The Palace Museum showed me two books, namely, Bibliography of the Grand Palace Museum and Bibliography of the Palace Museum, mimeographed 1926.
There are also numerous books in the Palace Museum, such as Yongle Dadian, Integration of Ancient and Modern Books, Sikuquanshu and so on. Readers must be familiar with Yongle Dadian and Sikuquanshu. Here is a brief introduction to the integration of ancient and modern books.
Integration of Ancient and Modern Books is a book compiled by Chen Menglei, a famous scholar in Kangxi Dynasty. The book is divided into six parts-Chronology, Yu Fang, Naming, Natural History, Neo-Confucianism and Economics. Each compilation is divided into several parts, such as classics, knowledge and literary compilation. The Collection of Ancient and Modern Books is the largest existing book in China. The so-called book is to break up the original and then compile it in different categories. It is different from Sikuquanshu, which is a series of books, completely retaining the chapter structure of the original work. The ancient and modern books are kept in units, and there is one in the palace library, which was originally stored in Gyeonggi Mountain Villa, Panshan Palace, Jizhou, Tianjin.
"Taking history as a mirror, we can know the rise and fall." There are also many books in the history department of the Palace Museum. In addition to the Twenty-four History, Zi Zhi Tong Jian and Zi Zhi Tong Jian series of books, there are also political books introducing the rules and regulations of the Qing Dynasty, such as Qing Tongzhi, Qing Tongli and Qing Dian. Geography books also belong to the history department in the four classifications, and the Palace Museum also collects geography books such as General Records of Qing Dynasty and Unified Records of Qing Dynasty.
The Palace Museum also has a large collection of Buddhist and Taoist books. Needless to say, Daozang and Longzang (a collection of Buddhist classics compiled during the Qianlong period, also known as the Qianlong Tripitaka), there are also some rare Buddhist scriptures, such as those written by court officials and ministers.
The so-called imperial calligraphy refers to Buddhist scriptures or Taoist scriptures written by emperors in previous dynasties. As far as the cultural relics in the Forbidden City are concerned, the copied Buddhist scriptures are large in size and luxuriantly packaged, and most of them are mainly folded. So when do you copy Buddhist scriptures in the palace? The emperors of the Qing Dynasty copied Buddhist scriptures mostly on the first day of each month and the eighth day of April, with the purpose of praying for their parents, cultivating themselves and symbolizing the long-term national luck. The royal calligraphy classics collected by the Palace Museum include a volume of Merits and Merits of the Pharmacist Liu Yu Tathagata copied in the thirty-seventh year of Kangxi (1698), a volume of Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra copied in the forty-first year of Kangxi (1702) and a volume copied in the ninth year of Qianlong (1744). The Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra, referred to as Heart Sutra for short, is concise and meaningful, and it is widely spread. Many Qing emperors copied this scripture, except Kangxi, Qianlong, Jiaqing, Daoguang, Tongzhi and Guangxu.
The writing of scriptures by courtiers mainly refers to various Buddhist scriptures and Taoist scriptures copied by princes and ministers in Qing Dynasty. Most of them are copied on the emperor's longevity day, the queen's Millennium day, New Year's Day, winter solstice and other celebrations, and then presented to the emperor and the empress dowager as a symbol of blessing. The book written by the minister is signed "I am respectful" or "I am respectful" and stamped with the minister's private seal. These Buddhist scriptures have become unique documents and classics of the Palace Museum. They are well-made, beautifully packaged and have good paper and ink. In the thirty-second year of Qianlong (1767), Yang wrote the Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra with a thousand bodhi leaves, which is unique. In short, copying classics has placed good wishes such as auspiciousness, smoothness and peace.
In terms of maps, the Palace Museum has a large number of special maps and local records, which provide information for geographical research. There are mainly Guang Yu Ji printed in the 28th year of Wanli (1600), Tiger Hill Shan Zhi printed by Huai Chongtang in the 41st year of Kangxi (1702), Panorama of the Forbidden City printed in the 56th year of Kangxi (17 17) and the 43rd year of Qianlong.
There are also some ancient books of ethnic minorities in the Palace Museum. Many Confucian works about Confucius and Mencius and Zhu Cheng School's Neo-Confucianism works were translated into Manchu in Qing Dynasty, such as Four Books of the Day, Interpretation of Meaning, University Cultivation and Righteousness, Confucius' Family Talk, Persuading Learning, Persuading Kindness and Speaking, etc., which shows that the Qing emperors respected Confucius and Confucianism. Important literary works written in Chinese characters have also been translated into Manchu, such as Romance of the Gods, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Romance of the West Chamber, and Journey to the West. Some medical works have also been translated into Manchu, such as Theory of Traditional Chinese Medicine Processing by Lei Gong and Pulse Diagnosis in Wang Shuhe.
In the Qing Dynasty, several language reference books were compiled, among which "Royal Five-Style Literatures" was the most important one. The so-called "five bodies" are Manchu, Tibetan, Mongolian, Uygur and Han. Under a Manchu word, listing Tibetan translation, Mongolian translation, Uygur translation and Chinese translation in turn is an important material for understanding minority languages and their translation with Chinese. There is only one book in the world.
In addition to paper books, the Palace Museum also has a large number of carved cultural relics. Statistics show that there are 244 153 carved cultural relics in the Palace Museum. The engraving of the Forbidden City belongs to the category of movable cultural relics. In Shuo Wen Tong Xun Ding Sheng, the definition of "edition" is "judging wood as a piece, it is called edition", and there is also a saying that "every wood is a piece, it is called edition"
The engraving of the Forbidden City includes books, boards, notes and prints. In chronological order, from the Ming Dynasty to the Republic of China, the earliest engraving of the Forbidden City was the Mahayana Sutra, which was published in the forty-second year of Jiajing (1563). According to different materials, there are woodcut plates, copper plates and stone plates. In terms of categories, there are five categories: classics, history, sub-books, collections and books. Literally, it is divided into four languages: Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian and Manchu. As far as engraving time is concerned, books can be divided into first engraving, second engraving and second engraving. From a technical point of view, the book version is divided into relief, intaglio, missing version and so on.
The court carving in Ming and Qing Dynasties left a large number of carved cultural relics. Among these carved cultural relics, the Tibetan version printed by the Forbidden City is the most exquisite. In Ming and Qing Dynasties, there were two places for woodcut printing in Neifu: Jingchang in Ming Dynasty and Wuying Hall in Qing Dynasty. The printed version of the Inner Hall inherited by Wuying Hall in Qing Dynasty is called "Dianben". As an ancient cultural relic, it witnessed the exquisite skills of ancient people and the style and style of court printing.
There are four main sources of the collection of books in the Forbidden City: First, after the Qing court entered the Forbidden City, it received books left by the Ming court, such as the orthodox collection, Yongle Northern Tibet, the twenty-first history, and the notes on the thirteen classics. The North Bamboo Slips refer to the books published in imperial academy, Beijing. In the Ming Dynasty, there were imperial academy in Beijing and South Kyoto, and the books published in imperial academy, Nanjing were called South Bamboo Slips. Secondly, the book-printed cultural relics carved by Wuying Hall and various yamen in Qing Dynasty; Third, craftsmen in the Qing Dynasty carved books and presented them, such as Complete Poems of Tang Dynasty. Fourthly, books allocated and donated by the higher authorities after the founding of New China, such as Poems of the Late Qing Dynasty, Political Book of Returning Farmland to Tang Dynasty, Eight Famous Banknotes of Ming and Qing Dynasties, etc. , carved by Xu Shichang in the Republic of China.
To sum up, the collections of the Palace Museum, whether ancient books or carved cultural relics, are of great research value. It not only contains the value of cultural relics, but also contains far-reaching significance in content. It is really an academic rich mine to be excavated. In particular, the Forbidden City has a large collection of woodblock printing works, among which Neifu Edition occupies an important position in the history of woodblock printing in China.
Every time after Tomb-Sweeping Day, there are blooming apricot flowers and begonia flowers everywhere in Shouan Palace, and the fragrance is overflowing. Du Fu, a great poet in the Tang Dynasty, once wrote: "Reading is like breaking ten thousand volumes, and writing is like a god." For those who like reading, Shouan Palace is the best place in the Forbidden City. Reading and asking questions in Lantai is the happiest time for people in the Forbidden City.