Great Wall Encyclopedia: Cultural Relics, Museums

Author: Editorial Department of the China Encyclopedia Press
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2004-09-01
Features: The China Encyclopedia is a large-scale comprehensive encyclopedia. China has a long tradition of compiling reference works. Over two thousand years, more than four hundred types of reference works have been published. These works are treasures of China's cultural heritage, collecting, organizing, and preserving important materials from the scientific and cultural classics of various dynasties. Some earlier reference works have been lost, but many have been passed down or partially preserved to this day, valued by scholars in China and around the world. Various reference works differ in structure, with some approaching the type of encyclopedia but not meeting the modern definition of one. In the mid-18th century, as China was compiling the massive Siku Quanshu, modern-style encyclopedias were published successively in Western European countries such as France, Germany, England, and Italy. Later, countries like the United States, Russia, and Japan also followed suit. Modern-style encyclopedias concisely summarize past human knowledge and history while emphasizing the latest achievements in contemporary science and culture. Over the past two hundred years, the experience of compiling encyclopedias has been accumulated, with improvements in knowledge classification, editing methods, illustration arrangements, and indexing systems, making them increasingly comprehensive and scientific. Today, encyclopedias play a vital role in human cultural activities, with various types and specialized encyclopedias becoming almost as essential as dictionaries in daily life. The Chinese intellectual community, with a long tradition of compiling reference works, has long aimed to produce modern-style encyclopedias. In the early 20th century, several small, practical encyclopedias were attempted, including the dictionary-like Cihai, which was similar to an encyclopedia. However, none of these met the requirements of a modern encyclopedia. In the early days of the People's Republic of China, the State Publishing Administration considered publishing a Chinese encyclopedia, and later plans for the development of science and culture over a twelve-year period also included the compilation and publication of encyclopedias. In 1958, a plan to carry out this work was proposed, but it was not realized. It was not until 1978 that the State Council decided to compile and publish the China Encyclopedia and established the China Encyclopedia Press to oversee the project. As the first encyclopedia in China, the compilation work was inevitably challenging. However, due to the urgent demand from scholars, it was not possible to wait for the collection of materials from all disciplines to be relatively complete before compiling and publishing; nor was it feasible to wait for all entries to be written before arranging them in alphabetical order and compiling the entire book. Instead, experts and scholars across the country were invited to write entries in their respective fields, with the book being published in volumes according to discipline. That is, as soon as a subject (one or more volumes) was completed, its volume would be published, allowing the entire encyclopedia to be released progressively. This approach inevitably introduced many shortcomings, but under the current circumstances, it was the only viable option. We plan to adopt the general practice of encyclopedias compiled by other countries in the second edition, arranging all entries in alphabetical order rather than by discipline, making it easier for readers to find and reference information. The China Encyclopedia first edition is organized by discipline in volumes, with entries within each discipline still arranged in alphabetical order, supplemented by a stroke index and other indexes for convenience of reference.