Henriot,Christian.Scythe and the City.A Social History of Death in Shanghai

Much has been written on Chinese death and funerary culture by anthropologists—far less by historians.This book is therefore a much-welcome attempt to fill this gap in the field of Chinese modem history.Its chronological scope encompasses one century:from the 1860s to the eve of the Cultural Revolution,but it is clearly more focused on the twentieth century due to the availability of a much greater amount of source materials from that period.     

Entering Tibet on Foot

In November 1967, when the chaotic “cultural revolution” was in full swing, Cheng Demei, at the age of 19, and his schoolmates made a three-month, 2,00 km journey from Chengdu to Lhasa in winter. Thirty years later, he wrote a book, Reflection on Tibet,recording this experience and the luck that brought him and Tibet together. This book has been published by the China Tibetology Press.In this article, an extract from the book is offered to entertain readers.     

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EGYPT AND PALESTINE IN THE MIDDLE BRONZE AGE （CA.2000-1550／1500 BCE.）

The relationship between Egypt and Palestine during the Bronze Age has been discussed since the 1940s. For the period of the Middle Bronze Age, the problem is both chronological and interpretative. The end of the Middle Bronze Age is fixed by the initial military activities of Dynasty 18 in Palestine around the end of the 16th century BCE. But the dates for the beginning of this period and the transition from one archaeological phase to another are still debated. Lacking a generally accepted solution, the chronology adopted here is that of Dever --- the transition from MB Ⅰ to MB Ⅱ occurred around 1800 BCE,     

My Sufferings and Hew Life[Ⅰ]

For half a century since he fled abroad after the military rebellion of March 19, 1959, the Dalai Lama and his clique have been trying by all means to undermine Tibetan security, unity and happiness so as to split Tibet from China and restore the feudal slavery system. He has told various lies to disguise this cruelest and most savage feudal slavery system and to fool people into believing that the Old Tibet before his escape was really as happy as Heaven.     

Tibet： A Tibetan Chinese View

Global opinion on and perception of Tibetan attitudes and affairs have been heavily shaped by one group of Tibetans, namely the Dalai Lama and his fellow exiles. They have done so on the claim that they speak for all sixplus million Tibetans, overseas as well as in China. On this claim they also seek autonomy of a so-called Greater Tibet from Beijing, which is the latest demand in their talks with Beijing. The adeptness with which the exiles use the English language and western political vocabulary, in particular, has greatly facilitated their presentation of those myths for the westem audience.     

The Day in Lhasa

Procession at Sunup As the sun rises,pilgrims,one after another,come from various directions and gradually form a procession around the Potala Palace.Undeniably,in the short term,this daily procession has been reduced due to the negative impact of the tragedy that occurred on March 14~(th) in Lhasa. Notwithstanding,today it seems everything has returned to normal.     

The Day in Lhasa

Procession at Sunup As the sun rises,pilgrims,one after another,come from various directions and gradually form a procession around the Potala Palace.Undeniably,in the short term,this daily procession has been reduced due to the negative impact of the tragedy that occurred on March 14~(th) in Lhasa. Notwithstanding,today it seems everything has returned to normal.     

Li, Feng and David Prager Branner,eds., Writing and Literacy in Early China: Studies from the Columbia Early China Seminar

This welcome new collaborative volume tells a story that has not been investigated adequately:the rise and spread of literacy in ancient China.While there is a large bibliography of studies of the writing system itself,few scholars have addressed the question of literacy,that is,how writing was used in society,how people were taught to read and write,and how the practice advanced both geographically from the center to the periphery,and socially from the elite to what one of the contributors calls "the lower orders." Feng Li and David Prager Brarmer are to be applauded for bringing together eleven engrossing articles representing the finest scholarship in English and immensely clarifying these crucial phenomena.Constraints of space preclude consideration of each chapter in this long and carefully annotated book;1 in what follows,I shall attempt to sketch what the book accomplishes and the evidence on which it relies.     

WHO WAS MAES TITIANUS?

<正>The Silk Roads of antiquity were used by many people.A certain Maes(or Maes Titianus)is one of the few travellers known by name.Modern research has treated him several times,1 however the evidence has been mixed up with a number of hypotheses,and some obsolete ideas are still alive.Thus,a revision may be helpful.The only source of evidence for this traveller is Claudius     

Jin Chengyu ed., Hekeben Zhongguo guyishu congkan （A Series of Ancient Chinese Books Missing from China but Preserved and Printed in Japan）

China has long boasted a time-honored tradition of reverence for books, but this tradition has been subject to periodic countercurrents that have occasionally led to the widespread, deliberate destruction of books by political authorities. The two most notorious historical examples of this phenomenon are the massive book-burning carried out by the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty,     

Steuber,Jason, and Guolong Lai eds.Collectors,Collections, and Collecting the Arts of China: Histories & Challenges

This volume,the third publication sponsored by the Harn Museum of Art and the University of Florida,contains a number of interesting discussions,investigations,and insights on the subject of collecting Chinese art in 1950s North America and Europe.Each chapter,dedicated to a single museum (in most cases),can stand on its own,in that each museum has its own history to share and its own challenges to face.I benefited from reading this work and learned much from its large quantity of information on museums' collecting histories and from the biographical accounts and studies of individual collectors.     

Jamyon Yeshi and His Driving School

<正>Sitting on the upper reaches of Lancangjiang River,Chamdo is the principal prefecture-level city of eastern Tibet.Since ancient times,it has been an important economic hub for merchants from Sichuan,Yunnan,and Qinghai.Influenced by this strong commercial atmosphere,there is a long and well-established entrepreneu rial tradition among Tibetans of Chamdo.In the fi rst half of the 20th centu ry,the legenda ry business mogul,Pangdatsang,was always someone the     

NEW BOOKS

FOOTSTEPS IN THE SNOWLANDAuthored by Wei Ke, who worked in Tibet from 1950 to1 970, this is the 19th volume of the Selected Tibetan Historical Data. Stories he experienced in the book are interestingand give readers knowledge. Running to 270,000 words, the32-mo book has been published by the Ethnic MinoritiesPublishing House. It is priced at 15 Yuan per copy.LIFE OF THE TIBETAN FARMERSAuthored by Xu Ping and Zheng Dui, the book is animprovement of the former book title…     

The opening of achievement report

The unified plan for Sharqu River has been worked out by experts from Yangtze Water ConservancyCommission,Yangtze Hydraulic Engineering Investigation Academy,and the Academy from T.A.R.A meetingof reporting their achievements has been hold in Lhasa.Sharqu River,a tributary of Yarlung Zangbo River,is located in the southern part of Qinghai-Tibet plateau,flowing along the valley between Kangdese Mountains and Himalayan mountains.It passes through severalcounties,including Kangmar,Gyangtse,Panam,Camba,Sagya,Lhazi and Shigatse,with 5.417sq k river basin.this project is to irrigate and generate electricity and to provide the source of the river,as well as to protectecosystem.The total investment for this project will be more than 4 billion yuan.It will play very important rolein improving water supply standard and farming and grassgrowing condition,as well as increasing their production.     

SOLVING THE PROBLEMS OF THE ASSYRIAN KING LIST： TOWARD A PRECISE RECONSTRUCTION OF MIDDLE ASSYRIAN CHRONOLOGY [PART Ⅱ]

5. The Reigns of Ninurta-tukulti-Assur and Mutakkil-Nusku
As noted above, the AKL records that both Ninurta-tukulti-Aggur and Mutakkil-Nusku reigned .tuppisu. The question of the meaning of this term has been a subject of debate among the scholars.     

PATROLLING THE MOUNTAINS OF LHAKHANG

<正>Lhakhang Township of Lhozhag County,Lhoka Prefecture,is located deep in the Himalayas.Affected by the warm moist flow from the Bay of Bengal,it has a mild and humid climate with an excellent ecological environment.Lhakhang has long been famous for its timber production.Every year,tens of thousands of planks are shipped from here to the hinterland.Today     

New Books

Outline of Tibetan Historical and Intellectual Theory In producing his book of seven chapters, the author Wang Pu sums up his study by finding that Tibetan historiography did not have any ＂precepts＂ in the compilation of Tibetan history over generations. This is because the motivation behind writing history, from the perspective of Tibetan historians, is neither the seeking of a professional position nor concerning employment, but rather the responsibility of inheriting a culture and obtaining happiness by sharing knowledge. The Tibetan historical and intellectual ideology has been formed by a rich and apparent Buddhist tradition with contemporary characteristics in the expression of each individual historian. The book is priced at 28 Yuan and published by China Social Sciences Publishing House.     

Songs Wafted From the Tea-Horse Trade Route(Ⅰ)

A small passage cutting through Hendu-an Mountains and the Himalayas in southwest China has been bustling with shuttling traders driving caravans of fully loaded beasts of burden for a millennium. Unlike the Silk Route that is known to all in the world, this route hidden away in high mountains and skirted by flowing streams is almost unknown to the outside world. Such a situation lasted until the 1990s when a number of young scholars surveyed its darkened byways and named it the Tea-Horse     

Koh, Khee Heong, A Northern Alternative: Xue Xuan (1389-1464) and the Hedong School

How did a Neo-Confucian scholar who built no academies,who actually discouraged interested students from studying with him,and whose followers did not have a strong sense of group identity become the first scholar enshrined in the Ming dynasty's imperial Confucius Temple? This is the question that Khee Heong Koh seeks to answer in writing this masterful study of the Ming Neo-Confucian master Xue Xuan.After all,admission into that temple's rolls was a rare honor,one carefully controlled by every imperial court.Only four men were enshrined over the entire Ming dynasty,and Xue is interesting not only because he was the first to be enshrined,but also because he was the only one of the four from northern China.Koh provides us with a detailed picture of this heretofore largely forgotten scholar-official and how he came to be thus enshrined.But this is not simply a biographical study;Koh also problematizes the monolithic understanding of Ming China as having been completely captivated by the Wang Yangming School of Neo-Confucianism.