History of Sinology
I. Beginnings of Sinology: The Jesuits (16th to 18th centuries)
Sinology in the West does not properly begin until the 16th century, when the Jesuit
missionaries commenced their activities in China. Many of the Jesuits were prominent scholars,
and they had an intense curiosity about Chinese civilization. They were able linguists, and they
acquired a knowledge of both Chinese and Manchu that few Westerners since could match. They
probably knew Manchu better than Chinese, for they found it an easier language to learn, and one
that purportedly better conformed to Indo-European notions of grammar.
Almost as soon as they arrived in China, the Jesuits began to write about this unknown
land to provide background information for future missionaries. The earliest Jesuits to reach
China were Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian, and the first Western language book on China was
by the Portuguese Jesuit Gonzalez de Mendoza (Historia de las cosas más notables ritos y
costumbres del Gran Reyno de la China / History of the Most Notable Rites and Customs of the
Chinese Empire), published in Rome in 1585, and translated into French, Italian, and English,
Latin, German, and Dutch a few years later. This book actually was based on three different
accounts: one by Galeote Pereira, a Portuguese sailor-merchant, who had been a prisoner in south
China from 1549-1552; one by Gaspar da Cruz, a Portuguese Dominican, who based his account
largely on that of Pereira; and a third by Martin de Rada, a Spanish Augustinian who visited
Fujian in 1575. Mendoza’s book painted an idyillic picture of China, which the author described
as a country of no poverty or beggars, a kingdom governed by sage rulers.
The title of first European Sinologist should be bestowed on Matteo Ricci (1551-1610),
whose approach to the study of China was followed by the next two centuries of Jesuit
History of Sinology 2
scholarship. Ricci lived in China from 1583 until the time of his death in 1610. He compiled a
Chinese-Portuguese dictionary, which was never published, and a Latin translation of the Sishu
(Tetrabiblion Sinense de moribus), which was lost. Ricci’s treatise on his experiences in China
(Della entrata della Compagnia di Giesù e Christianità nella China or On the Entry of the
Society of Jesus and Christianity into China) was first published posthumously in a Latin
translation by Father Nicolas (or Nicola) Trigault (1577-1628).
Father Trigault, who had translated Ricci’s account into Latin, came to China the year
Ricci died and was a missionary in Xi’an. Trigault was the first European scholar to study
Chinese phonology. His Xiru ermu zi (Western Scholar’s Aid to Pronunciation) was an attempt
to provide a transcription for Chinese in Latin letters. It was edited and printed by two Chinese,
Wang Zheng 王徵 (1571–1644) and Han Yun 韓雲 (juren 1612) in Hangzhou, 1626.
The Jesuit scholars were primarily interested in what they considered the fundamental
orthodox religious texts, which meant to them the Confucian classics. Even though they extended
their interest to other subjects, notably astronomy and geography, they virtually ignored
Buddhism and Taoism, which they condemned with as much animosity as the most conservative
Confucian scholars of the Chinese tradition. They also showed little interest in belles lettres. The
Jesuits’ focus as scholars was on translating and interpreting the Confucian classics. The
translation by Father Philippe Couplet and others (P. Intercetta, C. Herdrich, F. Rougement) of
selections from works attributed to Confucius was enthusiastically received in Europe by
prominent intellectuals. One of the most well-informed and avid admirers of Chinese thought
was the philosopher Leibniz. Leibniz carried on a long correspondence with the Jesuit missionary
2
History of Sinology 3
Father Bouvet. Leibniz had no knowledge of the Chinese language, and he thus had to rely on the
translations made by the Jesuits.
B. Eighteenth Century French Jesuit Sinology
During the 18th century, Sinology was almost completely dominated by the French
Jesuits. One of the most important developments in this period was the establishment in France
of journals that were devotedly exclusively to publishing the writings of the Jesuits. In 1703 the
Lettres édifiantes et curieuses began to appear in Paris. Some of what is included here is not
strictly Sinological (the Jesuits published treatises dealing with the Rites Controversy), but
especially in the later issues, one finds a number of scholarly contributions.
The editor of the second series of the Lettres édifiantes et curieuses (issued 1711–1743)
was Jean-Baptiste du Halde. Du Halde never went to China, but nevertheless possessed a vast
knowledge of Chinese civilization. His monumental work, Description de la Chine in 4 vols.
published in 1735, is the first encylopedic account of Chinese civilization in its totality, and even
includes the first translation of a Chinese drama, Joseph de Prémare’s abridged rendering of the
Yuan drama, Zhaoshi guer (first done in Canton, 1731). This translation inspired Voltaire to
write his famous play, L’Orphelin de la Chine, which was first performed in Paris in 1735.
Prémare also was a linguist, who wrote the first grammar of Chinese, the Notitia linguae sinicae.
In the latter half of the 18th century, the Jesuits produced another multi-volume
compilation that has been considered the best of Jesuit scholarship, the Mémoires conçernant les
Chinois, published in sixteen volumes between 1776 and 1814. The publication was supported
by the French government and was edited by the greatest of the Jesuits Sinologists of the period,
Antoine Gaubil (1689-1759). Gaubil lived for thirty-seven years in Peking, and was both a
3
History of Sinology 4
scientist and an exacting philologist. He was a member of the Academy of Sciences as well as
the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres of Paris (he also was affiliated with the Imperial
Academy of St. Petersburg and was an associate member of the Royal Academy of London). He
wrote a monumental study of Chinese astronomy, as well as a study of Yuan dynasty history.
Many of his works were published posthumously, the most important of which was his
translation of the Shu jing, edited by C.L.J. de Guignes and printed in 1770. Apparently Gaubil
also translated the Li ji and the Yi jing, but these works were never published.
Another work of Jesuit Sinology of the late eighteenth century was de Mailla’s 13volume translation of the Manchu version of the Zizhi tongjian gangmu. Until the 20th century,
de Mailla’s work was the principal Western language history of China.
Finally, one should mention Father Amiot, who compiled several dictionaries, including a
Manchu-French dictionary, and a Dictionnaire polyglotte that included words in Sanskrit,
Tibetan, Manchu, Mongolian, and Chinese. He also is important for his huge monograph on
Chinese music, which is still useful.
II. Nineteenth Century Sinology
By the end of the 18th century, Catholic Church support for the Jesuit activities in China
ended, and Sinology was no longer the preserve of the Jesuits. However, the French domination
of Sinology continued throughout the 19th century. At this time Sinology first achieved academic
recognition as a legitimate part of the French university. The first chair of Sinology was
established in 1814 at the Collège de France. The Collège de France has no registered students,
no examinations, and does not offer degrees. Each Professor is required to twenty to thirty hours
4
History of Sinology 5
of lectures per year on any subject he so chooses. Anyone may attend the lectures, which since
1901 have been published in the Annuaire du College de France.
Appointed to the first chair of Sinology at the College de France (“Chair of Chinese and
Tartar-Manchu Language and Literatures”) was a young 27-year old scholar named Jean-Pierre
Abel Rémusat (1788–1832). Rémusat’s early training was in medicine, and he wrote his doctoral
thesis on Chinese medicine. When he assumed the chair of Sinology at the College de France,
Rémusat was primarily concerned with establishing a firm philological foundation for Sinology.
He worked extensively on Chinese grammar--the only grammar of any consequence done up to
this time was Prémare’s Notitia, which was locked away unpublished in the royal library. After
extreme difficulty, Remusat gained access to it. Following Premare’s principles, he compiled his
own Elements of Chinese Grammar, which was the first scholarly attempt to distin- guished
between the spoken and classical language. Rémusat also was interested in belles lettres, and he
translated one novel, the Yu jiao li (a sequel to the Jin Ping Mei), and some stories from the
Jingu qiguan. This was the beginning of the European interest in Chinese fiction, something that
was not studied in China as a scholarly discipline until the 20th century.
Rémusat died prematurely at the age of 44 in the cholera epidemic of 1832. He was
succeeded at the College de France by the most formidable Sinologist of the 19th century,
Stanislas Julien (1797-1873). Julien was a polyglot--he knew Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Persian,
Sanskrit, Chinese, and Manchu. He was one of the first Europeans to do serious work on Chinese
Buddhism, and he translated with amazing skill the travel records pertaining to Xuanzang’s
journey to the west. Like Rémusat, he had a strong interest in belles lettres, and he was the first
to do extensive studies and translations of Chinese drama. He retranslated the Zhaoshi guer,
5
History of Sinology 6
made a French version of Huilan ji, the famous “Chalk-circle” drama that was adapted by several
European dramatists, and notably the Xixiang ji. Julien also translated a number of minor novels.
Stanislas Julien dominated French Sinology much the way that Paul Pelliot did in the
20th century. He was, however, extremely difficult to get along with. Demiéville says “he had a
character as abominable as his learning was irreproachable. Jealous, irascible, quarrelsome, he
monopolized positions and dismissed all rivals” (81). He wrote vitriolic denunciations of those
who dared disagree with him. To Guillaume Pauthier, who had been one of his fellow students
under Réusat, he wrote an essay entitled “Simple expose of an honorable deed odiously distorted
in a recent slander.” He attacked another scholar in an essay titled “Obligatory response to a
pretended friend of justice who hides under the veil of anonymity.”
In 1874 Julien was succeeded by one of his students, Le Marquis d’Hervey Saint-Denys
(1823-1892), “one of the first in Europe to be interested in Chinese poetry” (Demiéville, 81). His
Poésies de l’époque des Thang (1862) is the first solid study of Tang poetry and includes
reasonably competent translations. He also translated the famous poem by Qu Yuan, “Li sao,”
and published a series of translations of vernacular stories from the 17th century Jingu qiguan
collection.
In addition to the Collège de France, another chair of Sinology was established at the
École nationale des Langues orientales vivantes, which was founded primarily to teach spoken
Chinese and to train interpreters. The first professor of Chinese at the Ecole was Antoine Bazin
(1799–1863), who is best known for his many works on Yuan drama, most notably his Le Siècle
des Youen, and his translation of the Pipa ji.
6
History of Sinology 7
Toward the end of the 19th century, several other French scholars showed interest in
Chinese poetry. The first of these is Camille Imbault-Huart (1857–1897), a former consul in
China. He did extensive translation of Ming and Qing poetry, which remains up to this day one
of the few volumes containing Western-language renderings of poetry from this period. He also
did the first study of the famous Qing poet Yuan Mei, to whom Arthur Waley devoted one of his
most entertaining books. There also was Judith Gautier (1846–1917), who was not really a
scholar. She was the daughter of the French symbolist poet Théophile Gautier (1846–1917), who
had an interest in Chinese literature himself. Théophile Gautier hired a Chinese scholar, Ding
Denglin 丁登林, who had fled China after the Taiping Rebellion, to instruct his daughter in
Chinese. She learned enough Chinese by the age of 21 so that she was able to published under
the pen-name of Judith Walter La Flute de jade (1867), which included translations of ci 詞
rather freely but poetically rendered. She also published a number of other books dealing with
China and Chinese poetry, but none of these is of scholarly significance. Her main contribution
was in interesting other French poets in Chinese poetry.
One cannot discuss French Sinology of the 19th century without mentioning several other
scholars. Edouard Biot (1803–1850), who died prematurely, could have been one of the leading
Sinologists of his day had he lived longer. He was the son of a famous French scientist, and he
did research himself on Chinese science. Biot’s best known work, and one that is still useful, is
his translation of the Zhou li.
Another great Jesuit scholar of the late 19th century is Séraphin Couvreur (1835–1919).
His monumental dictionary of classical Chinese still is used today, as are his translations of
7
History of Sinology 8
almost all of the classics. Couvreur spent most of his life in China at the Jesuit center in Hejian
fu (in modern Hebei). His translations are notable for their precision—he translated the same
Chinese text both into French and Latin. Latin, with its flexible word order, is an excellent
language for translating Chinese.
Another notable Jesuit is the Alsatian, Father Léon Wieger (1856–1933). Wieger was
originally a medical doctor who converted to Catholicism. He compiled an etymological
dictionary of Chinese characters, which is still being reprinted today. However, it is not based on
sound principles. Wieger wrote widely about Chinese religion, folklore, philosophy, and
literature. He had an extremely low opinion of Chinese literature. In one of his later publications,
Histoire des croyances religieuses et des opinions philosophiques en Chine, he delivered the
following derogatory denunciation of Chinese literature:
Voltaire has been credited with these words: ‘Of all peoples, the Chinese are those who
have written the most to say the least of things’. I do not know if the quote is authentic,
but what it affirms is exact. Yes, purely native Chinese literature...is a vast jumble, poor
in ideas. The present volume contains all that the nation has thought; and two thirds of
these thoughts are exotic, are imported. The rest is rubbish, imitated one hundred times,
reproduced a thousand times. Up to now foreigners have had too naive an admiration for
the whole of Chinese black-books, have accorded to them too much credit, and are prone
to see by scrutinizing them sensational revelations. This outline has a larger purpose-perhaps it will communicate to the reader something of the impression that thirty years of
Sinology have left me, to know that Chinese books....
From afar they are something
8
History of Sinology 9
Close up they are almost nothing!
Wieger’s views are extreme, but he was the only Westerner to view Chinese literature as
worthless. He was a minority voice among the French Sinologists, who into the 20th century
continued to stand at the forefront of Chinese studies.
B. German
Chinese studies in Germany were far behind those in France. The first chair of Sinology
was not established in Germany until 1909. The early German Sinological contributions are not
particularly notable. In literature Heinrich Kurz (see B1) produced as translation in 1836 of the
minor novel Huajian ji.
The German Sinologists were well-trained philologists, and they applied strict linguistic
methods to the study of the Chinese language. A leading German philologist of the 19th century
was Johann Plath (1802–1874), who actually taught himself Chinese. See B2. Plath was trained
in Western classical philology and taught at Gottingen from 1829 until 1831, when he was
arrested for participating in the liberal political movement. He was imprisoned between 1836 and
1843. In 1848 Plath received an appointment as royal librarian in Frankfurt. In 1848 he moved to
Munich, and was elected a member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences in 1860. He
contributed a number of studies on Chinese material civilization to the proceedings of the
Academy. Herbert Franke says these works “are noted for their erudition and exactitude.” He
also notes that “Plath was moreover free of the historical arrogance which many European
historians exhibited in their attitude toward Asia and particularly towards China at that time”
(Sinology at German Universities, p. 9). Platt perhaps is best known for his Die Völker der
Manschurey, published in 1830. This is a historical study of the northern minority peoples.
9
History of Sinology 10
The first survey of Chinese literature in a Western language also was written by a
German, Wilhelm Schott (B3), who taught Oriental languages at Berlin for over fifty years.
Schott’s notion of literature was the broad 19th century concept of everything written in a
language, and his study contains only a short treatment of belles lettres. He mentions the Chuci,
Quan Tang shi, Li Bo, and the Qing poet Wu Weiye and a few novels such as Sanguo yanyi,
Shuhu zhuan, and several minor works such as Haoqiu zhuan and Yujiaoli.
B4 Julius Klaproth (1783-1835)
Julius Klaproth is generally considered to be the first professional German Sinologist. He
was born in Berlin and seems to have begun the study of Chinese on his own. In 1804 he went to
Russia and in 1805 accompanied a Russian expedition to China, where he studied Manchu,
Mongolian, and Chinese. Upon returning to Russia, he became a member of the St. Petersburg
academy. He eventually ended in Paris as an unaffiliated professor supported by a generous
stipend from the King of Prussia. He died in Paris in 1835.
Klaproth had a strong interest in languages and lexicography. He was such an avid
dictionary collector he even went so far as to steal from other scholars and public collections.
Klaproth’s work has recently been studied extensively by Harmut Walravens.
B5 Georg von der Gabelentz (1840–1895)
Georg von der Gabelentz was the son of a famous linguist and statesman, Hans Conon
von der Gabelentz (1807–1874). Von der Gabelentz began the study of Chinese at the age of
eighteen. He eventually became the leading German authority on Chinese philology. He held the
post of professor first at Leipzig (1876–1889) and then at Berlin (1889–1895). His most
important work, which is still useful today, is Chinesische Grammatik (published in 1881).
10
History of Sinology 11
B5 Wilhelm Grube (1855–1908)
Wilhelm Grube was born in Saint Petersburg, and it was here that he began his oriental
studies. He eventually went to Leipzig, where he studied under von der Gabelentz. In 1880 he
com- pleted his first thesis for the doctorate, and in 1881 he presented his inaugural dissertation
(Habilitationsschrift). In 1883 he obtained a position as assistant at the Museum für Volkerkunde
in Berlin. He also was a privatdozent (unsalaried lecturer) at the University of Berlin. Finally, in
1892 he received an appointment as assistant professor.
Grube received excellent philological training from von der Gabelentz. He was also an
accomplished scholar of Manchu. His main interest, however, was ethnography, and he wrote a
number of good studies of Chinese folk customs. His best work, however, is his Geschichte der
chinesischen Literatur (1902), which is still one of the most useful Western language histories
of Chinese literature.
C. Holland
Holland has a distinguished Sinological tradition. Toward the end of the 19th century it
produced several important Sinologists. The most notable is Gustav Schelgel (C1--1840–1903),
who began studying Chinese at the age of nine. He was sent to China as a teenager to serve as an
interpreter. Schelgel resided in Xiamen 夏門 from 1869 to 1872. After brief service in Batavia,
he returned to Holland. He began teaching Chinese at Leiden University in 1875. In 1877 a Chair
in Chinese was created especially for him. Schlegel is primarily important for his study of
Chinese astronomy, Uranographie chinoise, which still is the best source book on the
identification of Chinese star names and the lore associated with them. He also is the founder of
11
History of Sinology 12
the leading Sinological journal, T’oung Pao, which he and the French Sinologist, Henri Cordier
established in 1890. This journal has always had a French editor and a Dutch editor.
Another great Dutch Sinologist, who actually pursued his academic career in Germany, is
J. J. M. de Groot (C2—1854–1921). de Groot was named to the chair in Chinese at the
University of Berlin in 1921. His studies were quite wide-ranging, including a still important
study of the Xiongnu, and his huge monograph on Chinese folk beliefs, The Religious System of
China.
D. Great Britain
D1 James Legge (1815–1897)
In Great Britain in the 19th century, there really is only one Sinologist of distinction:
James Legge. Legge was a Scotsman who went to Hong Kong in 1843 as a missionary. Until
1873 he was almost constantly in Hong Kong doing both missionary work and scholarship.
Legge’s major contribution to Sinology was the five-volume Chinese Classics, for which he
earned the first Stanilas Julien prize in 1875. These volumes include the complete Si shu, Shang
shu, Shi jing, Chunqiu, and Zuo zhuan.
Legge was ably assisted in his translation work by the Chinese scholar Wang Tao 王韜
(1828–1897) worked with Legge in Hong Kong from 1862. He assisted Legge in translating the
Shu jing, Shi jing, Chunqiu, and Zuo zhuan. When Legge returned to England for a brief stay in
1868, he invited Wang to accompany him. Wang stayed with Legge in Scotland. He also visited
the Continent where he met Stanlas Julien. In 1868 he lectured at Oxford in Chinese.
When Legge left Hong Kong, he returned to England where he was appointed to the first
chair of Chinese at of Oxford in 1876. Here he continued his scholarly work. In 1882 he
12
History of Sinology 13
published a translation of the Yi jing; in 1885 he issued his translation of the Li ji. In his later
years he worked on Taoism and the Chuci. In 1891 he published his translations of the Laozi and
Zhuangzi. One of his last works was a long article on Qu Yuan.
D2 Alexander Wylie (1815–1887)
Alexander Wylie was a Scotsman who was born in London. He was trained as a cabinetmaker. In 1846 he met James Legge, who had returned to England for a brief period because of
illness. Wylie had already begun studying Chinese on his own, and Legge offered to teach him.
In 1847 Wylie went to China to manage the printing office of the London Missionary Society in
Shanghai. He held this post until 1860. Wylie began reading widely in Chinese texts, and he
acquired a profound knowledge of classical Chinese literature. Wylie was one of the founders of
the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, which was established in 1860. The society
published a distinguished journal (Journal of the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic
Society), which continued to be published until 1948.
Wylie left China for a brief period between 1860 and 1863, when he resided in London.
He returned to China in 1863 as an agent of the Bible Society. This time he made the journey
over- land through Russia--the first Englishman to do so. Wylie resided in Shanghai until 1877,
when, for reasons of failing eyesight, he had to return to England. He eventually lost his sight
altogether. He died in 1887.
Wylie wrote a number of important Sinological works. He did some remarkable
investigations in the history of Chinese science, particularly mathematics and astronomy. He also
was an authority on Manchu. His most important work is Notes on Chinese Literature, published
13
History of Sinology 14
in 1867, and reprinted as recently as 1964. This is a collection of bibliographical notes based on
the Siku quanshu zongmu.
D3 John Francis Davis (1795–1890).
Davis is not a particularly distinguished Sinologist. However, he deserves mention for
writing one of the first extensive studies of classical Chinese poetry. His work was even reprinted
as recently as 1970.
D4 Herbert A. Giles (1845–1935).
Giles spent twenty-nine years in China as a member of the British Consular Service
between 1867 and 1893. In 1897 he was appointed Professor of Chinese at Cambridge
University. (He succeeded Thomas Wade, who along with Giles is associated with the famous
Romanization system.) He held this post for twenty-five years until 1932. He died in 1935. While
at Cambridge, Giles had only one student. Apparently he did not encourage students to undertake
the study of Chinese, and he viewed his main duty the safe keeping of the Chinese books, which
he was reluctant to allow others to use.
Giles was a prolific scholar. He probably is best known for two works: Chinese-English
Dictionary, published in 1892; and A Chinese Biographical Dictionary, published in 1898. The
Chinese- English Dictionary was the standard dictionary of Chinese until the appearance of
Mathews’ dictionary in 1931. Giles also specialized in Chinese literature. However, he was more
a popularizer than a researcher who wrote for other scholars. He wrote a history of Chinese
literature, which is virtually useless today, and two volumes of translations: one of prose, and the
other of verse. Giles’ main contribution was to make Chinese literature accessible to the English
reader.
14
History of Sinology 15
E. United States
19th Century U.S. Sinology
During the 19th century, Sinology in the United States was not a well-developed
discipline. The leading American authorities on China were missionaries, few of whom had good
scholarly training. American Sinology properly begins in 1832 with the publication of the first
issue of The Chinese Repository, founded by the missionary E. C. Bridgman. This journal,
published in China, was “the only sinological journal in existence at the time” (Thompson, 247).
Twenty large volumes were issued.
E1. Samuel Wells Williams (1812–1884)
One of the early editors and chief contributors to The Chinese Repository was Samuel
Wells Williams. Williams is best known for The Middle Kingdom (first published in 1848), “the
first attempt by an American at the type of synoptical, encyclopedic survey which had previously
been most successfully undertaken by the Jesuits...and Sir John Francis Davis (China, 1836)”
(Thompson, p. 251). Williams wrote the book from notes he had used in a lecture tour of the U.S.
in 1845–46. In 1848 Williams began a dictionary of Cantonese, which he published in 1856 (The
Tonic Dictionary of the Chinese Language in the Canton Dialect). In 1855, Williams became
Secretary and Interpreter for the American Legation in Peking, and much of his publication
during this period consisted of practical guides, notably the Commercial Guide, a handbook for
foreign merchants in China. In 1874, Williams published his Syllabic Dictionary of the Chinese
Language, which was the primary English language dictionary of Chinese until Giles dictionary
appeared in 1892. The dictionary lists 12,527 characters and gives pronunciation in Mandarin, as
well as Cantonese, Amoy, and Shanghai dialects. The most severe criticism made against the
15
History of Sinology 16
dictionary at the time was its failure to follow the Wade system of Romanization. In 1876
Williams was appointed to the first chair of Chinese in the U.S. at Yale University. Just before
his death in 1884 he issued a substantially revised version of The Middle Kingdom.
Perhaps the most notable contribution of the United States in Oriental Studies during the
past century was the founding in 1842 of the American Oriental Society, one of the oldest learned
societies in this country. In the issues of the journal published by the society (Journal of the
American Oriental Society) in the 1800’s, one can find only occasional Sinological articles, and
most of them are not of high quality. Typical of the sort of thing produced in this period is Rev.
Samuel R. Brown’s “Chinese Culture or Remarks on the Causes of the Peculiarities of the
Chinese” (JAOS 2, 1850: 169-206). Among the peculiarities Rev. Brown attributes to the
Chinese are their language and literature, about which he says:
The Chinese language is not only peculiar in these respects [in its lack of vigor and
freshness], but unsocial in its very genius. The tones of the human voice, that elsewhere
perform the high office of expression, conveying from mind to mind most intelligible
signs of the emotions of the speaker, are in China strangely forbidden to subserve this
purpose, and limited to the mere multiplication of words. It follows, then, that there are
slender means of indicating by the voice, either the tender or the severe, the joyous or the
sad,--that there is little room, in short for pathos in the language. Hence oratory is
unknown in China (176)....
There are few subjects on which the Chinese appear to be as readily excitable, or
capable of as strong emotion, as the people of the West, or even those of Central or
Southern Asia. Now this national characteristic is not to be attributed to any one cause
16
History of Sinology 17
alone; but is it not reasonable to suppose that the peculiarity of their language, to which
we have just adverted, has had some influence in producing it? If a muscle or limb be
long restrained from free exercise, it loses its power. Will not the mind also, if not
permitted to express its emotions in the natural way, gradually become torpid and
insensible? The feelings being cramped and confined, for want of a medium of utterance,
diminish in intensity, in proportion as this law of restraint is imposed upon them. If they
be denied the use of the tones of the human voice, they have no instruments of
expression left, but the countenance, gesticulation, and attitude. They are deprived of that
which is the best of all, because it was designed for this end, and hence relapse into
habitual stupor. There is much reason to believe that this is one part of the process by
which the Chinese mind has become so difficult to be rallied into a glow of strong
excitement. If the people made their language, it is not the less true that the language has
made the people (176-77).
E2 William Woodville Rockhill (1854–1914)
The leading American Sinologist of the 19th century was W. W. Rockhill. Born in
Philadelphia in 1854, he was educated in France where his mother moved after the death her
husband. Rockhill graduated from the St. Cyr military academy and immediately entered the
French Foreign Legion. He served in Algeria from 1873–1876, after which time he returned to
the United States. He spent a brief period as a rancher in New Mexico, then he returned to
Europe where he began the study of Sanskrit and Tibetan in Paris. In 1884 he published a French
translation of the Pratimoksha Sutra (Le traite d’emancipation) and The Life of the Buddha,
which appeared in the respected Trubner’s Oriental Series.
17
History of Sinology 18
Realizing the necessity of acquiring a knowledge of spoken Tibetan, Rockhill decided to
go to China. In 1884 he was appointed Second Secretary on the staff of the American Legation in
Peking. While he Peking, he studied Tibetan with a Tibetan lhama from Lhasa, and acquired
great proficiency in spoken Tibetan. He also was fluent in spoken Chinese. After serving as
Secretary of the Legation (1885) and Charge d’Affaires in Korea (Dec. 1886–April 1887), he
resigned his diplomatic post to undertake during the years 1888-89 a scientific expedition,
sponsored by the Smithsonian Institution, to Mongolia and Tibet. His account of this journey,
titled The Land of the Lamas (London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1891), was published in 1891.
In 1891-92 Rockhill headed another expedition to Tibet. For these two expeditions through areas
of Tibet that no Westerner had previously journeyed Rockhill received the Patron’s medal of the
Royal Geographical Society.
After his return to the United States in 1893, Rockhill held high positions in the State
Department, including Assistant Secretary of State in 1896. In 1901 he was sent to China as
Special Commisioner to negotiate the Peace protocol after the Boxer uprisings of 1900. In 1905
he was Minister Plenipotentiary in China and represented the U.S. at the funeral of the Guangxu
Emperor in 1909. In 1904, when the Dalai Lama had to flee Tibet after the British invasion of the
country, he appealed to Rock- hill for assistance. Rockhill visited him at the Buddhist monastery
in Wutaishan, Shanxi. All during this period Rockhill continued to produce scholarly works,
most notably a study of Sino-Korean relations since the fifteenth century (China’s Intercourse
with Korea from the XVth Century to 1895; London: Kuzac, 1904).
From 1909 to 1911, Rockhill served as U.S. ambassador to Russia. During this time he
published in St. Petersburg, in collaboration with Friedrich Hirth, then Professor of Chinese at
18
History of Sinology 19
Columbia University, a translation of the Zhufan zhi of Zhao Rugua (ca. 1225). The Zhufan zhi at
that time was a little known account of Chinese and Arab trade in the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries. Rockhill ended his diplomatic career as Ambassador to Constantinople in 1913. In
1913 Rockhill undertook another expedition to China to invesigate conditions after the founding
of the Republic. In 1914, he accepted a position as adviser to Yuan Shikai, but died in Honolulu
before completing his trip to China.
II. Twentieth Century
A. France
A1 Edouard Chavannes (1865–1918)
The most important French Sinologist of the early 20th century was Edouard Chavannes.
Chavannes was born in Lyon in 1865 of a distinguished family. His grandfather was a noted
botanist. He received his introduction to Chinese studies at l’École Normal superieure of Paris.
His initial interest lay in philosophy (his first work, published in 1891, was a study of Kant). In
1889, at the age of twenty-five, Chavannes left for China. He resided for three years in Peking in
the capacity of attache-at-large to the French Legation. He was thus able to devote himself fully
to his studies, and it was at this time that he began, with the assistance of a Chinese tutor, to
translate Sima Qian’s Shi ji. In 1890 he published in the Journal of the Peking Oriental Society a
translation of the “Feng shan shu” chapter. Between 1895 and 1905 he published a translation of
forty-seven chapters of the Shi ji in five volumes. In 1893, at the age of twenty-eight, Chavannes
succeeded d’Hervey de Saint-Denys in the Chair of Sinology at the College de France. In
addition to his translation of Sima Qian, Chavannes also turned his attention to Chinese
Buddhism, particularly the voyages of Chinese travelers to Central Asia and India.
19
History of Sinology 20
In 1907 Chavannes returned to China to undertake an archeological expedition to
Manchuria and the northern provinces of Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Shaanxi, and Shanxi. He took
numerous rubbings. In Shandong he climbed Mount Tai, and after his return to Franch he
published a monumental monograph on this great sacred peak (Le T’ai-chan, 1910).
Accompanying him on the expedition was the young Russian Sinologist Vassilii Alekseev (18801951).
According to Paul Demiévville (475), there was hardly any discipline that Chavannes did
not approach during his career: epigraphy, paleography, history of Serindia, Chinese documents
on the Western Turks, Chinese geography and cartography, and even Taoism, on which he
worked before his death. “He only lacked belles lettres, which he abhorred, and philosophy,
which however had been his aim when he made his first start in Sinology....”
A2 Henri Cordier (1849–1925)
A scholar of much less attainment than Chavannes was Henri Cordier. Although he
resided in China from 1869-1876, he did not know Chinese. His lack of Chinese did not prevent
him from making important contributions to Sinological scholarship. His most important work is
Bibliotheca Sinica, an exhaustive bibliography of Western languages publications on China from
the beginnings to 1924, the year before he died. He also is important for founding the journal
T’oung Pao in 1890 with the Dutch scholar Gustav Schlegel. For forty-three years Cordier held
the chair of history, geography, and legislation of the Far East at the Ecole des Langues
orientales.
A3 Paul Pelliot (1878–1945)
20
History of Sinology 21
Perhaps the most illustrious successor of Chavannes was Paul Pelliot. Professor
Demieville aptly characterizes him as “a philologist of genius. In philology he had all the gifts:
that of languages, which he learned as if they were games, curiosity, an unquenchable thirst for
research, a firm and steady judgment that guided him across the most perplexing problems and
thus on that account never did he say he was wrong” (476). Pelliot began his career as one of the
first members of the École française d’Extrême-Orient, then centered in Vietnam. From 1900 to
1904 Pelliot worked in Indo-China. In February 1900, he headed a mission to Peking to obtain a
collection of books for the École’s library. This was the time of the Boxer uprising, and Pelliot,
with his consummate skill in speaking Chinese, established contacts with the Boxer insurgents.
Pelliot’s earliest work concerned the history of Indo-China, particularly as reflected in Chinese
sources. He also did extensive work on Chinese bibliography, notably on Chinese texts that were
recently discovered in Japan.
Pelliot probably is most famous for his Central Asian expedition of 1906–1908 during
which he obtained numerous Central Asian documents. It was also during this expedition that
Pelliot visited the grottos of Dunhuang (February 1908), where he obtained a large collection of
manuscripts now held in the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris. The successes he attained on this
mission earned Pelliot a chair, especially created for him, at the Collège de France: the chair of
Langues, histoire, and archéologie de l’Asie Centrale. He occupied this chair from 1909 until his
death in 1945.
Most of Pelliot’s published work concerned Central Asia, the languages of which he
knew extremely well. He was also editor of T’oung Pao from 1920 to 1945. For this period,
21
History of Sinology 22
T’oung Pao might very well be called the “Journal of Pelliot Studies,” for most of its pages were
filled with Pelliot’s own articles and reviews.
A large portion of Pelliot’s work remained unpublished upon his death. After his death,
six volumes of his Oeuvres posthumes were published in Paris.
A4 Henri Maspero (1883–1945)
Another giant of French Sinology in the 20th century was Henri Maspero. Maspero came
from a distinguished scholarly family. His father, Gaston Maspero (1846–1916), was a famous
Egyptologist. The first published work by Henri Maspero was in fact on Egyptian finance from
the third to first centuries B.C. Like Pelliot, Maspero began his Sinologial career with the École
française d’Extrême-Orient. From1908 to 1920 Maspero lived in Indo-China. According to
Professor Demiéville, he lived near the people of Vietnam, mingling with them, and participating
in their rituals and festivals. He collected much information about Vietnamese popular relgion as
well as the Tai people of North-Vietnam. His later interest in Chinese religion can be traced in
part to his early exposure to Vietnamese culture.
Maspero also had an interest in linguistics, and one of his earliest published works was
his study on the phonetic history of Vietnamese (1912), which was important for preserving
ancient pronunciations of Chinese words.
After the death of Chavannes in 1918, the chair of Sinology at the College of France was
vacant for several years. Finally, in 1921, Maspero was selected for this post. In 1927 he
published his monumental history of pre-Qin China, La Chine antique. There still does not exist,
in any language, a comparable history of this period. The book should be required reading for all
Sinologists.
22
History of Sinology 23
Maspero was also a pioneer in Taoist studies. The strength of the Paris school of Sinology
in this field can be attributed directly to Maspero’s influence.
Maspero died tragically. He was put to death by the Germans in the concentration camp
of Buchenwald.
A5 Marcel Granet (1884–1940)
One of the first French scholars to introduce the methods of the social sciences into
Sinology was Marcel Granet. Granet held many positions. He was Professor of Civilisations de
l’Extrême-Orient at the l’Éccole des Language orientales, deputy professor at the Sorbonne,
director of studies in Sciences religieuses section of the École pratique des hautes études, and
administrator of the Institut des Hautes Études chinoises. His doctoral thesis, published in 1919,
Fêtes et chansons anciennes de la Chine, was a study of the folk character of the “Guo feng”
section of the Shi jing. Another of his great works was Danses et légendes de la Chine ancienne
(1926), in which he tried to reconstruct the social organization, mythology, and religion of
ancient China through original interpretations of many of the Confucian classics. Granet was not
a philologist, and in fact his work can be considered a reaction against the philological
scholarship of the 19th century.
A5 Paul Demiéville (1894-1979)
The last of the great French Sinologists was Paul Demiéville, who died in 1979 at the age
of eighty-five. Demiéville was originally Swiss. He was born in Lausanne, where his father was
professor of medicine. His early interest lay in the field of music. After studying in Munich,
London, Edinburgh, and Paris, in 1911 he received his doctorate from the Université de Paris
with a thesis on the suite as a musical genre. In 1912 he began study of Chinese at King’s
23
History of Sinology 24
College of London. He later took up more formal Sinological study in France, first at the École
nationale des languages orientales vivantes, and then at the Collège de France, where he studied
with Edouard Chavannes. Demiéville also acquired expertise in Sanskrit and Japanese.
In 1919, he became a “pensionnaire” (“fellow”?) of the École française d’Extrême-Orient
and resided in Hanoi from 1920 to 1924. From 1924 to 1926, he served as professor at Amoy
University, where he taught Sanskrit and Western philosophy. In 1926, he left China for Japan,
where he became “pensionnaire” of the Maison franco-japonaise in Tokyo, of which he
eventually served as director.
Professor Demiéville left Japan in 1931 to assume the post of professor at the Ecole
nationale des languges orientales vivantes, where he taught for fourteen years. In 1945, he was
named directeur d’etudes at the Ecole pratique des hautes etudes (in the section of sciences
historiques and philologiques), where he taught Buddhist philology. In 1946 Demieville
succeeded Henri Maspero in the chair of Langue et civilization chinoise at the College de France,
a post he held until his retirement in 1964. Demieville also served as co-editor of T’oung Pao
from 1945 to1976.
Professor Demiéville was first and foremost a philologist. According to Professor Jacques
Gernet, who wrote Demiéville’s necrology in the T’oung Pao, his philology developed in several
directions: Buddhist philology and the history of Chinese Buddhism, philosophy and the history
of religions, religious representations and practices, and the history of literature. One of his
important books is Concile de Lhasa (1952), in which he meticulously investigates the conflict
between the Chinese and Buddhist traditions in eighth century Tibet. Another book, Entretiens
de Lin-tsi, published in 1972, is a translation of a ninth century Chan Buddhist text. Although
24
History of Sinology 25
Demiéville did not write many books, his articles, many of them quite long, are important
contributions to many different fields.
Later in his career Demiéville turned his attention to the Dunhuang documents. One of
the great masterpieces of 20th century Sinology is Airs de Touen-houang (1971), done in
collaboration with the brilliant Chinese scholar Jao Tsung-i 饒宗頤. Just before his death he
completed a study and translation of the poems of Wang fanzhi 王梵之.
A7 Robert des Rotours (1891–1980)
Robert Marie Piat des Rotours was a French aristocrat whose family history can be traced
back to the twelfth century. In the nineteenth century the des Rotours family was prominent in
the area of Avelin, a small town located ten kilometers south of Lille. Robert des Rotours was the
youngest child of the Baron and Baroness des Rotours. He was first educated by private tutors.
At the age of fourteen he was sent to England to a Jesuit school. However, he ran away from this
school in 1906. He was then sent to Belgium, where he was a fellow student of Charles de
Gaulle. He completed his higher education at the École des Sciences Politiques in 1911. During
World War I des Rotours served as an enlisted man even though he could have obtained a
commision as an officer. During the lulls in fighting, having nothing to do, des Rotours studied
Chinese, which he had been introduced to at the age of twelve by a French missionary. “During a
leave in March, 1917, he attended Edouard Chavannes’ class at the Collège de France, perhaps
sitting next to Chavannes’ chauffeur, often the only auditor in his class during those troubled
times” (Holzman, 16).
25
History of Sinology 26
After the War, des Rotours undertook the formal study of Chinese. In 1919-20 he studied
at the École des Language Oriental Vivantes. In 1920 he went to China staying in Peking until
1922. During his stay in China, he rowed a canoe down the Yangtze River. He also took many
photographs of temples and historical sites.
Des Rotours returned to Paris in 1923. In 1928 he bought a huge house near Versailles.
The house had a huge library that he filled with his great collection of Chinese books.
Des Rotours never took a doctorate degree. He did receive a diploma from the École
Pratique des Hautes Études, Ive Section, in 1927. Des Rotours did not have an academic career.
His independent wealth allowed him to pursue his studies on his own. He is best known for his
two works on the bureaucracy and examination system of the Tang.
B. Germany
B1 Otto Franke (1863–1946)
Otto Franke was the leading German Sinologist of the first half of the twentieth century.
He began oriental studies at Berlin in 1882 first with Sanskrit. He began his study of Chinese
under Wilhelm Grube. From 1888 to 1901 Franke lived in Peking, Tientsin, and Shanghai where
he served in the German interpreter and consular service. He was able to travel widely in China
and other Far Eastern countries, and he acquired a good knowledge of the spoken language.
Upon his return to Germany he worked as a journalist for the Kolnische Zeitung (1902–1907).
He also began to devote himself to scholarship, particularly ancient Chinese history and
philosophy. In 1907 he habilitated himself (qualified himself for university teaching) in Berlin. In
1909 he received his first academic appointment, Professor für Sprachen und Geschichte
Ostasiens at the Kolonialinstitut of Hamburg. In 1923 he moved to Berlin, where he succeeded
26
History of Sinology 27
de Groot. He retired from teaching in 1931, only to begin his magnum opus, his five-volume
history of China.
B2 Richard Wilhelm (1873–1930)
Richard Wilhelm is to German Sinology what Legge and Couvreur are to British and
French Sinology respectively. He was primarily a translator of the Confucian classics and preQin philosophical texts. He was born in Stuttgart in 1873. As a young boy he was a talented
violinist. At age eighteen he was a student at Tubingen, where he studied poetry, music, art, and
philosophy. He soon acquired a strong interest in theology and entered the Tubingen Theological
Seminary. After serving several years as a minister, Wilhelm decided to go to China as a
missionary. In 1899 he arrived in the then small fishing village of Tsingtau (Qingdao). He did
not know a single word of Chinese before he left. His arrival in China coincided with the Boxer
uprising, and during his stay in China he saw the great Republican revolution take place. Richard
Wilhelm quickly learned Chinese, and he soon began to publish translations of Chinese literature
in the Zeitschrift für Missionskunde und Religionswissenschaft in Heidelberg. Between 1910 and
1928, Wilhelm produced transla- tions of the Lun yu, Laozi, Liezi, Zhuangzi, Mengzi, Yi jing,
and the Lüshi chunqiu. His best known work is the translation of the Yi jing, which he did in
collaboration with the Chinese scholar Lao Naixuan 勞乃宣 (1843–1921). In 1922 he served as
scientific adviser to the German legation in Peking. In 1923 he was professor at the Peking
Imperial University. In 1924 the University of Frankfurt gave him an honorary doctor of
philosophy degree and named him an honorary professor.
In 1927 an endowment was
established for him to assume a chair in Sinology at Frankfurt. Wilhelm established at Frankfurt
the China-Institut, which was the only center for Chinese studies in Germany at the time.
27
History of Sinology 28
Wilhelm also was on close terms with leading European intellectuals, including Karl Jung and
Hermman Hesse.
B3 Alfred Forke (1867–1844)
E. Erkes, “Alfred Forke,” AA 9 (1946): 148-49.
Alfred Forke was the leading German authority on Chinese philosophy. He taught at
universities, including Berkeley and Berlin. He is best known for his three-volume history of
Chinese philosophy.
B4 August Conrady (1864–1925)
August Conrady was born in Wiesbaden in 1864. His father was a minister. His
grandfather, Peter von Bohlen, was one of the first German Sanskrit scholars. Conrady’s early
interest was in classics and Indology. Conrady studied Chinese under von der Gabelentz at
Leipzig. In 1891 Conrady received an appointment as Privatdozent (lecturer) at Leipzig. He
became assistant professor in 1897. It was not until 1920 that he was named full professor.
Conrady’s early work was in philology, including the very young field of Sino-Tibetan
linguistics. Later in his career he turned his attention to sociology and the history of religion, and
Leipzig became a virtual school of Sinology, primarily devoted to using the methods of the social
sciences to study ancient Chinese texts. Conrady did not publish a great deal, but he had several
good students who continued his work. The most prominent among them were Eduard Erkes and
Bruno Schindler. Erkes continued at Leipzig. Schindler founded a new journal, the Asia Major.
C. Holland
C1 J. J. L. Duyvendak (1889–1954)
28
History of Sinology 29
Duyvendak is the greatest of the Dutch Sinologists. He received his first introduction to
Sinology at the University of Leiden, where de Groot was then teaching. After de Groot left
Leiden for Berlin, Duyvendak studied in Paris with Chavannes (1910–1911). He also continued
to work with de Groot in Berlin, where he also studied with Alfred Forke. From 1912 to 1918
Duyvendak served as assistant interpreter in the Dutch Legation in Peking, where he took an avid
interest in the events of the early Republic. In 1919 Duyvendak was named Reader in Chinese at
Leiden.In 1930 he became Professor, and was acknowledged as one of the leading Sinologists in
the world. He also founded in 1930 the Sinological Institute, which is now one of the most
distinguished Sinological research centers in the world. He also was co-editor of T’oung Pao,
first with Pelliot, and then with Paul Demiéville. He was a frequent visiting professor at
Columbia.
Duyvendak’s work was wide-ranging. His doctoral dissertation, published in 1928, was a
translation and study of the Shang jun shu. He also wrote several long articles on Xunzi. His
translation of the Laozi probably is the best philological rendering of this text. He also did an
excellent study of the maritime expeditions of the Ming eunuch Zheng He. He wrote extensively
about Sino-Dutch relations. One of his students, Piet van der Loon, aptly characterized
Duyvendak’s approach to Sinology: “Following the great example of Maspero, he regarded the
whole cultural heritage of China as the domain of the historian, who should, even when studying
the remotest detail, never lose sight of the framework into which it would eventually fit. Chinese
philosophy, law and literature should not be studied on their own, but all contribute to the
reconstruction of the historical picture” (3).
C2 Robert van Gulik (1910–1967)
29
History of Sinology 30
Robert van Gulik was not an academic, but a diplomat who published scholarly studies in
his spare time. Van Gulik was introduced to oriental studies while still a student at the gymnasium. He first studied Sanskrit and then Chinese before he entered Leiden University in 1930.
By the age of twenty-four he received his doctorate at the University of Utrecht.
Instead of taking up an academic career, van Gulik entered the Netherlands Foreign
Service. From 1935 to 1942 he served in the Dutch legation in Tokyo. He was in Chungking
from 1942 to 1945, where he served as secretary to the Netherland’s mission. After serving
briefly in the Hague and Washington D.C., he returned to the Far East in 1949, first in Tokyo,
then New Delhi, followed by an appointment as Netherlands minister in Beirut (1955),
ambassador in Kuala Lumpur, and finally, in 1965, ambassador to Japan.
Although his official duties took much of his time, he was able to devote considerable
energy to Chinese studies. He was connoisseur of Chinese art and had a good collection of rare
paintings. He was skilled at Chinese calligraphy and could write classical Chinese poetry. He
also could play the qin or Chinese zither, an instrument on which he wrote extensively. His
translation of Xi Kang’s “Rhapsody on the Zither” is excellent. He studied in the byways of
Sinology. Perhaps his greatest contribution is his book on sexual life in ancient China. He also
was interested in jurisprudence, and this interest led him into writing seventeen novels about the
great magistrate Judge Dee.
C3 A.F.P. Hulsewé (1910–1994)
Anthony François Paulus Hulsewé was born in Berlin-Charlottenburg (Germany) on 31
January 1910. His father, who was a native of Groningen (Netherlands), was employed as an
electrical engineer in Germany. Hulsewé lived long enough in Germany to become bilingual in
30
History of Sinology 31
German and Dutch. In 1928 he began study of Chinese at Leiden University. His teacher was
the Sinologist J.J.L. Duyvendak. After completing his “candidaats” examination in 1931,
Hulsewe went to China, where he studied spoken Chinese in Peking and read texts with Liang
Qichao’s younger brother, Liang Qixiong 梁啟雄.
After a brief period in Kyoto spent studying Japanese, Hulsewé went to Batavia, where he
worked in the Japan section of the Bureau for East-Asiatic Affairs. While on home-leave in
1939, he completed his final examinations at Leiden. When the Japanese invaded the
Netherlands-Indies in 1942, was interned in various prisons and concentration camps. After the
war he worked briefly for the Dutch navy until Professor Duyvendak invited him to return to
Leiden to serve on the faculty as lecturer.
Hulsewé served on the faculty of Leiden University from 1947 until 1975. In 1956 he
succeeded Duyvendak as Professor. He also became co-editor of T’oung Pao. Hulsewé
specialized in the history of the Han dynasty. His doctoral dissertation was an annotated
translation of the “Monograph on Punishment and Law” in the Han shu. In 1979, in collaboration
with Michael Loewe of Cambridge University, he published a translation of the biographies of
Zhang Qian and the “Xiyu zhuan” of the Han shu. His most recent work, Remnants of Ch’in law
(1985), is a study and translation of the Qin legal rules discovered in Yunmeng.
D. Great Britian
D1 Arthur Waley (1889–1966)
Arthur Waley was born in Tunbridge Wells in 1889. His father, whose last name was
Schloss, was a wealthy civil-servant in the Board of Trade. In the anti-German sentiment of
1914, the family adopted the maiden name of his mother, Waley. He received his university
31
History of Sinology 32
education in classics at King’s College, Cambridge. His family wanted him to take up a business
career in the export business. However, in 1913, he accepted a position in the Print Room of the
British Museum instead. It was at the British Museum that Waley acquired his interest in Chinese
and Japanese. He worked for the British Museum for eighteen years (1913–1930), during which
time he prepared a catalogue of Chinese paintings. He soon learned enough Chinese to begin
translating Chinese poetry. In 1918 he published A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems,
followed by More Translations in 1919, and The Temple in 1923 which was the first Western
language work to present translations of the fu.. Waley quit his position at the British Museum in
1930, and from that time on never held another official position. He devoted the rest of his life
to writing a prodigious number of books on Chinese and Japanese literature. Waley was a true
innovator in the field. He was the first to publish studies of poet’s lives as reflected in their
poetry. He was also an innovator as a translator, including the works he chose to translate as well
as the style he used.
D2 Evangeline Dora Edwards (1888–1957)
Edwards came from a missionary background. She studied Chinese in China from 1913–
1920. In 1921 she was appointed Lecturer at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the
University of London. While teaching, she pursued academic degrees. She received in B.A. in
1924, M.A. in 1925, and D. Litt. in 1931. In 1931 she was given the title Reader in Chinese. In
1939 she was named Professor of Chinese. She also was Head of the Far Eastern Department of
the School from 1939 until 1953. Her major work is Chinese Prose Literature of the T’ang
Period, which primarily is a summary and partial translation of Tang short stories.
D3 David Hawkes
32
History of Sinology 33
D4 Angus C. Graham (1919–1991)
A. C. Graham was born in Penarth, Wales, in 1919. He studied Theology at Oxford,
where he received a degree in 1940. He studied Japanese as a member of the Royal Air Force.
After World War II, he began the study of Chinese at the School of Oriental and African Studies.
In 1953 he received the Ph.D. for his dissertation on the Song philosophers Cheng Yi and Cheng
Hao. In the same year he was appointed Lecturer in Classical Chinese at SOAS. He became
Professor of Chinese at the same institution in 1971 until the time of his retirement in 1984.
Graham wrote widely on Chinese philosophy. His first book was based on his
dissertation, a study of the Song Neo-Confucian thinkers, Cheng Yi and Cheng Hao. Another
early work was his translation and study of the Liezi.
E. United States
E1 Friedrich Hirth (1845–1927)
Hirth was a German-trained Sinologist who was appointed as the first Dean Lung
Professor at Columbia University in 1902. He held this post until his retirement in 1917. Hirth
worked in a number of fields, but attained some distinction for his research on the contacts
between China and the Roman Orient. He also collaborated with Rockhill on the translation of
the Zhufan zhi.
E2 Berthold Laufer (1874–1934)
Laufer was born in Germany. After study at the University of Berlin, he went to Leipzig,
where he received his doctorate in 1897. His major professor was Wilhelm Grube. After
receiving his degree, he came to the United States. Laufer worked in the fields of ethnology,
archaeology, art, the languages of Asia, the history of cultivated plants and domesticated animals.
33
History of Sinology 34
He had a knowledge of many languages, including Chinese, Japanese, Sanskrit, Tibetan, and
Mongolian. He undertook several expeditions to the Far East. From 1901 to 1904 he led an
expedition to China, and from 1908 to 1910 he headed another expedition to China and Tibet.
Beginning in 1908, Laufer worked at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. From
1915 until the time of his death, he was curator of Anthropology. From 1930 to 1931 he served
as president of the American Oriental Society. Among his most notable works are Jade (1912)
and Sino-Iranica.
E3 Peter Boodberg (1903–1972)
Boodberg was born in Vladivostok in 1903. In 1915 he was sent to Harbin, where he
began the study of Chinese. During the Russian revolution of 1917, he was a student at the
University of Vladivostok. He left Russia in 1920 and took up residence in San Francisco. In
1921 he entered the University of California at Berkeley. In 1924 he received an A.B. in Oriental
languages. Even as a graduate student, he began to teach Chinese. Boodberg completed his Ph.D.
in 1930 with a thesis entitled “The Art of War in Ancient China: A Study Based upon the
Dialogues of Li, Duke of Wei.” Boodberg received his first teaching appointment in the
Department of Oriental Languages at Berkeley in 1932, where he taught until his death in 1972.
Boodberg was a philologist, who conceived of the study of China as a part of the Eurasian
continent. Thus, his scholarly interests focused on the linguistic, historical, and cultural
connections between China with Central Asia and further west. His most important contribution
was in the field of language, and in particular, the nature of the Chinese script. He was the first to
argue persuasively that the Chinese written language does not consist of pictures, and does not
stand for “ideas,” but represents words. In 1939 and 1940 Boodberg and Professor H. G. Creel of
34
History of Sinology 35
the University of Chicago debated this question in the T’oung Pao. Today, most scholars accept
Boodberg’s view that the Chinese script is logographic.
E4 Shih-hsiang Chen (1912–1971)
Professor Chen was born in Peking in 1912. He came from a family of scholars and poets.
He received his university education at Peking University, from which he graduated in 1935.
While at Peita, he studied both Chinese and English literature. After teaching in China, Chen
came to the U.S. in 1941, where he studied at Harvard and Columbia. In 1945, he received an
appointment to the faculty at Berkeley, where he taught until the time of his death in 1971.
Professor Chen’s main interest was Chinese poetry. One of his earliest works was a masterful
translation into English of Lu Ji’s “Wen fu.” He also wrote several brilliant articles on the Shi
jing and “Li sao.” His last work, uncompleted at the time of his death, was a translation of the
Qing dynasty drama, Tao hua shan. This was eventually completed and published by his
colleague, Cyril Birch.
E5 Yuen-ren Chao (1892–1982)
Professor Chao was born in Tianjin. He came from a family of scholars. In 1910, he
passed the Tsinghua government examinations that allowed him to go to the U.S. for study. He
went to Cornell, where his fellow classmate was Hu Shih. Chao majored in mathematics and
physics. After completing his B.A. in 1914, he stayed on for one year of graduate work at
Cornell, then in 1915, Chao went to Harvard, where he received his Ph.D. in physics in 1918. He
taught physics at Cornell in 1919–1920.
In 1920, Chao returned to China, where he was a leading participant in the May Fourth
Movement. He served as Bertrand Russell’s interpreter when Russell visited China in October
35
History of Sinology 36
1920. As a result of his interpreting experience, Chao became increasingly interested in
linguistics. From 1921 to 1924, he taught Chinese at Harvard. After his return to China in 1925,
Chao began to do research on dialects and phonology. In 1929, he assumed the directorship of
the phonology division of the Institute of History and Philology of the Academia Sinica.
In 1938, Chao went to the U.S. where he taught at a number of universities, including
Hawaii, Yale, and Harvard. In 1947 he joined the faculty at Berkeley, where he taught until his
retirement in 1963. Chao’s contributions to Sinology were numerous. His Mandarin Primer
(1948) was the principal textbook for Chinese until the late 1960’s. Chao’s A Grammar of
Spoken Chinese is the best study of the grammatical features of the vernacular language.
E6 Edward Schafer (1913-1991)
Edward Schafer is another one of the constellation of great Sinologists who taught at
Berkeley from the late 1940’s through the 1970’s. He was born in Seattle in 1913. He began his
university study at U.C.L.A., but completed his B.A. at Berkeley with a degree in anthropology.
He began his study of Chinese under Y. R. Chao at Hawaii, where he received an M.A. in 1940.
Before World War II he studied at Harvard. During the war he served in the Navy as an
intelligence officer.
After the conclusion of World War II, Schafer resumed his Ph.D. studies at Berkeley. He
completed his degree in 1947 with a dissertation on a Five Dynasties emperor. Schafer was
immediately appointed to the faculty of the Department of Oriental Languages, where he taught
until his retirement in 1984. Schafer was active in the American Oriental Society. He was East
Asia editor of the JAOS for thirteen years, and for six years even served as Chief Editor.
36
History of Sinology 37
Schafer specialized in the cultural and literary history of the T’ang dynasty. His most
important books include The Golden Peaches of Samarkand (a study of T’ang dynasty exotica),
The Vermilion Bird (on T’ang images of the south), and Pacing the Void (T’ang dynasty star lore
and imagery). He was an uncompromising philologist whose translation of classical Chinese
literature are models of fidelity to the diction of the original Chinese. He did not hesitate to coin
his own English equivalents of certain Chinese expressions.
E7 K. C. Hsiao (1897–1981)
Dr. K. C. Hsiao (Hsiao Kung-ch’uan/Xiao Gongquan) was a leading authority on Chinese
political thought. Born November 28, 1897 in Taihe, Jiangxi, from the age of six to eighteen he
lived in Chongqing, where he received a classical Chinese education from private tutors. After
obtaining his B.A. from Tsing Hua College in 1920, he received a Boxer Indemnity scholarship
to study at the University of Missouri. Professor Hsiao studied philosophy at Missouri, where he
earned both the B.A. and M.A. degrees. He then went to Cornell, where he completed his Ph.D.
in 1926 with a thesis on political pluralism (published in 1927). Dr. Hsiao returned to China in
1927 and taught at various universities, including Tsing Hua (1932-1937) and Sichuan University
(1937-1947). In 1949 he received an appointment at the University of Washington, where he
taught until his retirement in 1968. Professor Hsiao’s magum opus is the two-volume Zhongguo
zhengzhi sixiang shi (1945). While at Washington, he published two important books, Rural
China (1960) and Modern China and a New World: K’ang Yu-wei, Reformer and Utopian,
1858- 1927 (1975).
E8 Fang-kuei Li (1902–1987)
37
History of Sinology 38
Li Fang-kuei is a renowned Chinese linguist. He was born in Canton in 1902. He studied
at Tsing Hua College until 1924 when he was given a scholarship to pursue his studies in the
United States. He received a B.A. in linguistics from the University of Michigan in 1926. He
was accepted into the graduate program in linguistics at the University of Chicago, where he
studied under Edward Sapir and Leonard Bloomfield. Li completed his graduate study in record
time--he received his M.A. in 1927 and his Ph.D. in 1928. His dissertation was on Mattole, a
now obsolete Athabascan Indian language.
Professor Li returned to China in 1929, where he became a member of the phonology
section of the Institute of History and Philology in the Academia Sinica. He conducted extensive
dialect study as well as research on archaic and ancient Chinese phonology. He also continued
his research on American Indian languages and Southeast Asian languages, notably Tai. His
monograph on the Tai language of Longchow was published in 1940.
Li left China in 1946. After holding visiting posts at Harvard and Yale, he received a
permanent appointment at the University of Washington in 1950. At Washington, Professor Li
directed the Chinese language program, and taught first-year Chinese and Chinese linguistics. Li
became interested in Tibetan at this time, and was instrumental in establishing the Tibetan
program of this university.
Li retired from the University of Washington in 1969, and taught for a number of years at
the University of Hawaii, where he completed a major work on the relationship between Chinese
and Thai.
E9 Hellmut Wilhelm (1905–1990)
38
History of Sinology 39
Professor Wilhelm was born in Qingdao on December 10, 1905. He was the son of
Richard Wilhelm, the great German Sinologist. Hellmut Wilhelm received his early Sinological
education from his father. In 1928, he passed the State Examination in Law. He also worked for
his father at the Frankfurt University China-Institut. After Richard Wilhelm died in 1929,
Hellmut Wilhelm decided to continue his father’s work. He went to the University of Berlin,
where he studied under Otto Franke. In 1932 he received the Ph.D. in Sinology with a
dissertation on Gu Yanwu. In 1933, he went to China, where he remained until 1948. For a time,
he served as a correspondent for a Frankfurt newspaper. He also taught German language and
literature at Peking University. He spent ten years, from 1935 to 1945, compiling the Deutschchinesisches Worterbuch. Between 1942 and 1944, he published a series of lectures he delivered
to the German-speaking community of Peking. His best known work from this period is Die
Wandlung, a series of eight lectures on the Yijing.
In 1948, Professor Wilhelm obtained an appointment as professor in the Department of
Far Eastern and Slavic Languages and Literature and the Far Eastern and Russian Institute at the
University of Washington. At Washington, he taught both Chinese history and literature. He is
among the most broadly learned Sinologists of his generation, and he was a truly inspiring
teacher.
E10 Paul L-M Serruys (1912–1999)
Professor Serruys is a native of Belgium. He is a Roman Catholic priest, a member of the
Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (C.I.C.M.). He received his early Sinological
education at the University of Louvain in Belgium. In the mid-1930’s, he went to China, where
he worked as a missionary in a remote area of Shanxi until 1948. In 1949, he came to the United
39
History of Sinology 40
States and began graduate work in Chinese at Berkeley. He received his Ph.D. degree in 1956
with a dissertation on the Fang yan, a Han dynasty dialect dictionary attributed to the Han
dynasty poet and scholar Yang Xiong. After teaching at Georgetown University, Professor
Serruys came to the University of Washington in 1965. He retired in 1981.
Professor Serruys is a renowned philologist. He has done important studies of early
Chinese dialect expressions, the early script, grammar, and the Shang and Zhou oracle and
bronze inscriptions.
E11 George Kennedy (1901–1960)
George Kennedy was born in Zhejiang in 1901. He graduated in 1917 from the Shanghai
American School. After university study in the United States, he returned to China in 1927,
where he taught high school and college until 1933. In 1937 he received his Ph.D. in Oriental
Studies from the University of Berlin. From 1936 to 1960, he taught at Yale University. Kennedy
specialized in Chinese linguistics and was a pioneer in the study of classical Chinese grammar.
He excelled in dispelling many of the myths about the Chinese language. His best-known article,
which every scholar in the field should read, is “The Monosyllabic Myth,” in which he argues
that Chinese is not a monosyllabic language.
E12 Arthur F. Wright (1913–1976)
Professor Wright was born in Portland in 1913. He received his university education at
Oxford (B. Litt. 1937), Harvard (A.M. 1940, Ph.D. 1947). He studied in Kyoto from 1940-41,
1953-54, and in Peking from 1941–42, and 1945–47. He began his teaching career at Stanford,
where he taught from 1948 to 1959. In 1959, he was professor of Chinese history at Yale until his
untimely death in 1976.
40
History of Sinology 41
Wright’s specialty was the history of Buddhism in the medieval period. A series of
lectures he gave in 1959 was published in his Buddhism in Chinese History. Arthur Wright was
one of the founders of the AAS, and he served as its president from 1963–65. He was also
chairman of the American Council of Learned Societies Committee on the Study of Chinese
Civilization from 1964 to 1973. He, along with John K. Fairbank, Denis Twitchett, Hellmut
Wilhelm, and others, promoted the study of Chinese thought with a series of conferences held in
the 1950’s. Five volumes of outstanding scholarly contributions came from these conferences.
E13 Hans H. Frankel (1916– )
Hans Frankel was born in Berlin in 1916. His father is the renowned Classicist Hermann
Frankel. With the rise of Hitler and the Nazi Party, Hermann Frankel left Germany in the early
1930’s and became a professor of Classics at Stanford University, where Hans enrolled as an
undergraduate. He received his B.A. from Stanford in 1937. He went on to do graduate work at
Berkeley where he received his Ph.D. in 1942. Hans Frankel’s degree was not in Chinese, but in
Romance languages and literature. His dissertation was on a Spanish poet. While working for the
U.S. military during World War II as a monitor-translator for German, Spanish, and Italian, he
began to study Chinese. After the war he began formal study of Chinese at Berkeley. In 1947-48
he taught Western languages at Peking University. Here he met his wife, who is a well-known
calligrapher and a singer of Kunqu.
Professor Frankel soon acquired a good knowledge of Chinese literature, and he began to
write articles on classical Chinese poetry. He was appointed Assistant Professor of Chinese at
Stanford in 1959. In 1961 he went to Yale University, where he taught until his retirement in
1986.
41
History of Sinology 42
Frankel has written numerous articles and one major book (The Flowering Plum and the
Palace Lady) on Chinese poetry. Frankel’s work was unusual in its time for his attempts to place
Chinese literature in the context of world literature, particularly as it compare with Western
European literature. He is the leading authority in the United States on the yuefu, and he is
currently working on a study of Western-language translations of Chinese poetry.
E14 Homer H. Dubs (1892–1969)
Dubs was born in Deerfield, Illinois. At age six he went to China. Lived until his early
teens in Changsha. He finished high school in Oberlin, Ohio. He took his undergraduate degree
in psychology at Yale (1914). He has an M.A. from Columbia (1916) and a B.D. from the Union
Theological Seminary (1917). Dubs lived in Hunan from 1918-24 as a missionary of the China
Mission of the Evangelical Church. He returned to U.S. in 1925 to obtain the Ph.D. at the
University of Chicago, where he wrote a dissertation on Xunzi. He taught at various U.S.
universities, including Minnesota (1925–27) and Marshall College (1927–34). In 1934 he
received a grant from ACLS to begin translating the Han shu. In 1947 he won the Stanislas
Julien prize from the Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Institut de France.
He taught at Duke (1937–43), Columbia (1943–45), Kennedy School of Missions in
Hartford (1945–47). His last position was Professor of Chinese at Oxford, 1947–59.
E 15 H. G. Creel (1905–1994)
H. G. Creel, who taught at the University of Chicago from 1936 to the early 1970’s,
specialized in the history of the pre- Qin period. He was the first American scholar to make use
of the new archaeological materials discovered in China in the late 1920’s. He spent a number of
years in China doing research on bronzes and ancient Chinese culture. Creel summarized the
42
History of Sinology 43
results of his research in The Birth of China (1936), which was actually intended to introduce the
history of pre-Qin China to the non- specialist reader. Creel’s Studies in Early Chinese Culture,
which appeared in 1937, was a more technical and specialized presentation of some of the same
material.
In 1936, Creel published a controversial article in T’oung Pao, in which he argued that
the Chinese script was ideographic. The article elicited an immediate response from Professor
Boodberg, who in a succeeding issue put forth a rather convincing case that the script is
logographic, that is the characters or graphs represent words, not ideas.
Creel also is famous for his textbook for introductory literary Chinese (Literary Chinese
by the Inductive Method), which was used for many years in the United States.
Creel also had an interest in Chinese thought. He published a number of articles on such
concepts as Tao 道 and Tian 天. In 1949 he published Confucius, The Man and the Myth, in
which he attempted to separate the historical from the mythical Confucius. In 1953, his famous
Chinese Thought from Confucius to Mao Tse- tung appeared. This was a book that introduced the
history of Chinese thought to general readers. The book was translated into French, Italian and
Spanish.
One of Creel’s most scholarly books is his study of the pre-Qin political philosopher Shen
Buhai. He also wrote an important book on the origins of Chinese statecraft (1970).
E 16 Derk Bodde (1909– )
Professor Bodde went to China as a young boy. He lived near Shanghai from 1919 to
1922. He returned to the United States and obtained a B.A. degree in English from Harvard. He
returned to China in 1931 and studied there until 1937. He received his Ph.D. from Leiden
43
History of Sinology 44
University in 1938 with a thesis on the Qin dynasty minister Li Si. That same year he went to U.
Pennsylvania, where he taught until his retirement in 1975.
Professor Bodde specialized in Chinese thought. He is best known for his translation of
the Zhongguo zhexue shi by Feng You Lan. He also worked on Chinese festivals. His Festivals in
Classical China is a monumental study of Han dynasty rituals.
E17 James Robert Hightower (1915–
Professor Hightower was born in 1915. He received his B.A. degree in chemistry from
the University of Colorado. He then went to Harvard University to pursue graduate work in
Chinese. He studied in Beijing from 1940 to 1943 and 1946 to 1948. He received his Ph.D. from
Harvard in 1946. Hightower was appointed to the faculty of Harvard in 1948, where he taught
Chinese literature until his retirement in 1981. Professor Hightower generally is regarded as the
foremost American specialist on Chinese literature. His dissertation on the Hanshi waizhuan 韓
詩外傳(Harvard, 1946) is one of the best studies of this text in any language. In 1950, Professor
Hightower published a brief survey of Chinese literature (Topics in Chinese Literature), which
long has been a standard reference work. In 1970, he published his masterful annotated
translation of the complete poems of Tao Qian 陶潛 (The Poetry of T’ao Ch’ien, Oxford, 1970).
E18 C. T. Hsia 夏志清 (1921–)
C. T. Hsia was born in Jiangsu in 1921. He received a B.A. in English from the
University of Shanghai in 1942. He went to the United States for graduate study. He received his
Ph.D. in English from Yale in 1951. He held a number of academic appointments before
receiving a position at Columbia in 1962.
44
History of Sinology 45
Professor Hsia is a leading scholar in the field of traditional and modern Chinese fiction.
His first book is a comprehensive history of modern Chinese fiction. In 1968, he published an
important book on the major novels of the Ming and Qing periods. He also has edited two
collections of modern short stories.
E19 James J. Y. Liu 劉若愚(1926–1984)
James Liu was born in Beijing in 1926. He received a B.A. degree from the Catholic
University of Peking. He studied at Oxford as a British Council scholar, and received an M.A.
from Bristol University in 19??. He taught Chinese literature at London University, the
University of Hong Kong, New Asia College, Hawaii, Pittsburgh, and Chicago, before assuming
a post at Stanford, which he occupied from 1967 until the time of his death in 1984.
Professor Liu was a prolific scholar. His first book is the widely acclaimed introduction to
Chinese poetry (The Art of Chinese Poetry), in which he set forth his own original method and
theory for the interpretation of Chinese poetry. Another of his early books is on the literature
dealing with the so-called knight-errant (youxia) tradition in Chinese literature. In 1969 he
published a major study of the Late Tang poet Li Shangyin. In 1974 he produced an important
study of the Northern Song ci. In his later career, Professor Liu was primarily interested in
literary theory, and one of his major works is Chinese Theories of Literature, published in 1975.
E 20 Luther Carrington Goodrich (1894–1986)
L.C. Goodrich was an historian who had a long career at Columbia University, where he
trained a number of important scholars. Among his most important works are The Literary
Inquisition of Ch’ien-lung (1935), which was based on his dissertation; A Short History of the
45
History of Sinology 46
Chinese People (1943), which is still a useful history of Chinese material civilization; and
Dictionary of Ming Biography, which he edited in collaboration with Fang Chaoying (1976).
F1 Erwin Ritter von Zach (1872–1942)
Erwin von Zach was born in Austria. He was a member of the Austro-Hungarian consular
service from 1901 to 1919, and during most of this period he served in China. He had a profound
knowledge of Chinese as well as Manchu and Tibetan. Although he studied briefly at Leiden
under Gustav Schlegel, he seems to have been self-trained. His first major publications, which
were corrections to Giles’ Chinese-English Dictionary, were first published in China. In 1909 he
presented a portion of this work as a dissertation at Vienna University.
After the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1919, von Zach moved to
Batavia (modern Jakarta, Indonesia), where he worked for the Dutch consular service in the
Netherlands East Indies until 1924, when he resigned to pursue his scholarly studies full time.
Until his death in 1942 aboard a ship that was sunk by the Japanese, von Zach devoted himself to
the translation of Chinese literature. He translated nearly all of the poetry of Du Fu, Han Yu, and
Li Bo, and about 90% of the Wen xuan. von Zach’s irascible personality and penchant for acerbic
criticism of other scholar’s work eventually made it difficult for him to publish in established
Sinological journals. von Zach and Pelliot had a particularly bitter exchange in the late 1920s.
Pelliot eventually became so angered, he banished von Zach from the T’oung Pao with the
words, “Il ne sera plus question de M. E. von Zach dans le T’oung Pao.” See “Monsieur E. von
Zach, TP 26 (1929): 378. Nearly all of his publications appeared in obscure journals that were
issued in Batavia. He also issued some publications at his own expense. Fortunately, most of his
translations have been collected and published by the Harvard-Yenching Institute.
46
History of Sinology 47
F2 Jaroslav Prusek (1906–1980)
Jaroslav Prusek was born in Prague in 1906. After initial study at Charles University in
Prague, in 1928 he left Czechoslovakia to undertake Sinological study with some of the great
scholars of Europe, including Karlgren at Goteborg (1928- 30), Gustav Haloun (Halle), and Erich
Haenisch (Leipzig).
Prusek resided in China between 1932 and 1934, and in Japan from 1934 to 1937. After a
brief stay in the United States, he returned to Czechoslovakia in 1937 just at the time of the
German occupation of his country. Prusek, however, assumed a post at the Oriental Institute,
where he began to do research on Chinese vernacular literature, especially the traditional
vernacular short story. He published a number of important articles on this subject in the 1930’s.
After World War II, Prusek received an appointment as chair professor at Charles
University. In 1952 he was named director of the Oriental Institute of the Czechoslovakian
Academy of Sciences. During this period, Prusek’s interest turned to modern and contemporary
Chinese literature, especially that written by left-wing and Communist writers. One of his most
important books is Die Literatur des befreiten China, which is a study of popular literature
produced between 1942 and 1950.
Prusek also worked in more conventional Sinological subjects. One of his latest books,
Chinese Statelets and the Northern Barbarians, is a study of the non-Han peoples of northern
China in the ancient period.
F3 Bernhard Karlgren (1889–1978)
Karlgren was a gifted linguist while still a teenager. At age sixteen he published an article
on Swedish dialects. At the urging of his elder brother, who was a professor of Slavic languages,
47
History of Sinology 48
Karlgren began the study of Chinese. Most of his study was in Paris. He also traveled in China
during 1911-12. In 1915 he defended his dissertation, Études sur la phonologie chinoise, in
which he set forth the basic principles for reconstructing what he called Ancient Chinese. He first
taught at Goteborg University, where he served as president from 1931 to 1936. From 1939 to
1959 he was Director of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities in Stockholm. He also was editor
of BMFEA from 1940 until 1977, one year before his death.
F. Supplement
Stephen Owen
Stephen Owen did both his undergraduate and graduate studies at Yale University, where
he received a Ph.D. in Chinese literature in 1972. He taught Chinese literature at Yale from 1973
to 1982. He has been Professor of Chinese and Comparative Literature at Harvard since 1982.
Professor Owen is the leading American authority on Tang poetry. He has published three books
on Tang poetry: The Poetry of Meng Chiao and Han Yü (Yale, 1975); The Poetry of the Early
T’ang (Yale, 1977); The Great Age of Chinese Poetry (Yale, 1981). Owen also has written two
general books on Chinese poetry: Traditional Chinese Poetry and Poetics: Omen of the World
(Wisconsin, 1985), and Remembrances: The Experience of the Past in Classical Chinese
Literature (Harvard, 1986). He also is the co-editor of The Vitality of the Lyric Voice: Shih
Poetry from the Late Han to the Early T’ang (Princeton, 1986).
48