Dragon Cave Mirror (Goryeo Edition)

Author: Xie Xingjun
Publisher:
Publication Date: 2006-04-01
Features: This book is a photocopied edition. The Dragon Cave Mirror (Longkang Shoujing) is a dictionary compiled by the monk Xingwei of Youzhou during the Liao Dynasty for the study of Buddhist scriptures. The book contains over 26,400 characters, with annotations totaling over 163,100, resulting in a total of over 189,610 words. The radicals are arranged in the order of the four tones (ping, shang, qu, ru), and the characters under each radical are also arranged in the order of the four tones. Each character is listed with its standard form, cursive form, ancient form, modern form, and variant forms, accompanied by brief phonetic and semantic annotations. It is an important reference tool for the study of linguistics, reading and researching ancient historical and literary works, and studying Buddhist scriptures. The Dragon Cave Mirror was compiled during a period when the Khitan strictly prohibited the smuggling of books, with those who smuggled them into other countries being sentenced to death under law. As a result, this book was not brought into the Song Dynasty until the Xining era, when it was obtained by a captive. When the Song Dynasty had it reprinted, they changed the title from The Dragon Cave Mirror to The Dragon Cave Mirror of Reflection to avoid the taboo name of Zhao Kuangyin's grandfather, Zhao Jing. The Dragon Cave Mirror of Reflection has several surviving Song-era editions, such as the old collection of the Mao family's Jiguanguan and the collection of the Jiang'an Fu family's Shuangjinglou. There are also photocopied editions based on these, such as the Continuation of Ancient edition, the Continuation of the Four Treasuries edition, and the Xuzhuang edition. Additionally, there are Ming-era handwritten copies, Qing-era handwritten copies, Qing-era printed copies, and Ming-era photocopied Song-era handwritten copies. These versions have many errors due to repeated copying and printing, especially the Qing-era Hanhai edition, which is particularly riddled with mistakes.