Chapter 8 Section 3 China's First National Bibliography

Many of the slips that were hidden due to Qin Shihuang’s burning of books were excavated from cellars, walls, and mountains after Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty issued a call for books. There are many, "then it is divided into two, and the "Poetry" is divided into three, with differences between Qi and Lu. Classics and Records").Therefore, it is urgent to organize, collate and catalog the collection. In the early Han Dynasty, the work of sorting and cataloging books began.According to the records of "Hanshu Yiwenzhi": "Han Xing, Zhang Liang, and Han Xin sequenced the art of war, and there were a hundred and eighty-two schools. If you want to use them, you must delete and use them, and there are thirty-five schools."

When Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty needed to use troops abroad, he sorted out and compiled military books, and there is a record in the "Han Zhi" that "Military and political Yang servant 捃摭〔junzhi county position〕 left behind, Ji Zou "Bing Lu"".Although this catalog is not complete, it is the first specialist catalog in my country after all, and it is worth mentioning. In the third year of Heping, Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty (26 BC), Emperor Cheng "ordered Guanglu doctor Liu Xiang to review classics, biography, scholars, poems and Fu, infantry captain Ren Hong to review military books, Taishi Ling Yinxian to review mathematics, and physician Li Zhuguo to review prescription skills. Every Once a book is finished, Xiang Zhe will write out its contents, summarize its meaning, record and play it" ("Han Shu·Yiwenzhi").Liu Xiang died after working for 19 years. Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty Liu Xin ordered Liu Xiang's son Liu Xin (about 50 BC-AD 23) to continue to complete this work.After long-term work, the pioneering works of the first national bibliography in Chinese history - "Bie Lu" and "Seven Strategies" were completed.These two official catalogs not only laid the foundation for China's book industry, but also had a profound impact on Chinese bibliography and book collection management in the past dynasties.

"Bie Lu" is also known as "Liu Xiang Bie Lu", to be precise, it is a record of the revised version.The books at that time were very chaotic, and there were several different manuscripts for each kind of book, and many titles were different.Liu Xiang’s job is to first use a variety of manuscripts to verify the content, then select the better manuscript as the original, refer to other manuscripts for correction, and then write a summary (narrative) of each article, explaining the process of sorting or editing and the general idea of ​​the content.The final procedure is to transcribe the final draft.For example, for the book "Guanzi", Liu Xiang used 389 pieces from the national collection and 175 pieces from the private collection, and edited 86 pieces after eliminating duplication.Another example is the book "Xunzi", which was not written before Liu Xiang. There were only many papers written by Xunzi and his followers. "Bie Lu" has a total of more than 13,000 volumes of books, opening up a new chapter in the history of ancient book collection.

In the second year of Jianping (5 BC) of Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty, Liu Xin compiled a general catalog of books according to Liu Xiang and others, named "Qi Lue", which became China's first systematic and comprehensive national collection catalog . "Qi Lue" is divided into Ji Lue (general preface of the six categories of catalogues), Liu Yi Lue (classification of classics), Zhu Zi Lue (writings of various schools), Poetry and Fu Lue (literature), Bing Shu Lue (military works), Shushulue (divination category), formula technique strategy (medicine category).During the editorial process, each category writes a preface and a table of contents.Under the six categories, it is divided into 38 subcategories and 603 subcategories.In book classification, the "Seven Strategies" classification is the earliest, relatively systematic and scientific classification in the world, 1,500 years earlier than the Vientiane classification method proposed by Germany in 1545.

Both "Bielu" and "Qilue" are bibliographies. "Bielu" writes an abstract for each of the collated books, explaining the collation process of this book, including the author's life, main ideas, the A summary of the contents of the book and reviews of the book. "Qi Lue" only lists the title of the book and the name of the author, and there is no description. It can be said that "Qi Lue" is an excerpt of "Bie Lu". "Bielu" and "Qilue" were lost in the late Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties, but the basic part of "Qilue" was preserved in Ban Gu's "Han Shu·Yiwenzhi", only the edited part was deleted in "Yiwenzhi" go.

In the Eastern Han Dynasty, Shi Bangu, the order of Lantai in charge of book management, specifically recorded the general catalog of books in the Western Han Dynasty in his "Hanshu·Yiwenzhi", providing posterity with the titles of books in that period.From the perspective of book collection history, "Hanshu·Yiwenzhi" is the starting point of a new form of bibliography—historical bibliography.The so-called catalog of historical records refers to the addition of catalogs to history books.From then on, "Yiwenzhi" or "Jingjizhi" were included in the official history, which made it easier to study the history of book collection in various eras. "Hanshu Yiwenzhi" inherited the traditions of Liu Xiang and Liu Xin's "Bie Lu" and "Qilue", and put forward its own different opinions. For example, "Hanshu Yiwenzhi" classified and belonged to "Qilue" There are three processing methods: "in and out", "in" and "province". "In and out" means to exclude from other categories and enter this category; "in" means to add those not included in "Seven Strategies", and "province" means to delete those that are repeated. "Hanshu·Yiwenzhi" is not only the creation of the catalog of Chinese historical records, but also a link between the past and the future, becoming the earliest comprehensive national collection catalog in my country.

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Notes: It is divided into two, referring to the modern and ancient "Shangshu"; "Poetry" is divided into three, referring to Qi, Lu, and Han; There are "Gongyang Biography" and "Gu Liang Biography".