Research on the Turpan Documents Collected by Stein (Revised Edition)

Author: Chen Guocan
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1994-12-01
Features: During the late Qing Dynasty, the British explorer Aurel Stein visited China multiple times, taking away ancient books and cultural relics discovered in Dunhuang and Turpan. The Turpan unearthed documents obtained by Stein during his third visit to China were compiled by the French scholar Paul Pelliot and published only after his death. However, Pelliot did not understand the relationship between the numbering of Stein's documents and the tombs, so he did not return the documents to their original burials. As a result, most of the undated documents remained undated. Mr. Chen Guocan has long been engaged in the study and organization of Turpan documents. He was the first to discover the relationship between the document numbering and the burials, which allowed him to conduct the identification, transcription, removal of seals, and combination of the documents. This led to dating, categorization, interpretation, and classification, completing the burial classification of these documents. He also corrected many of Pelliot's errors and supplemented the documents he had missed, thereby restoring the important value of these documents. At the same time, this book also explores other academic topics in the context of its historical background, providing significant assistance to the academic community in the study of Turpan documents and the history of the Sui and Tang dynasties.