The two parts of this book, "Nation and the History of Ancient China" and "Differentiation of Ancient Teachings on Life and Ming", are both written by Fu Sinian. "Nation and Ancient Chinese History" is a research collection on the history of ancient pre-Qin China. It contains five representative works in total, including "The Theory of East and West of Yixia", "Jiang Yuan", "Zhou Dongfeng and the Survivors of Yin", "Zhou Dongfeng and the Survivors of Yin", "On the So-called Five Nobles", which systematically explores the origin, early development and inheritance of Chinese culture. The historians have a systematic context to follow for the understanding of ancient Chinese history. "Diagnosis of Ancient Precepts of Life and Ming" is an important historical work by Fu Sinian. This book starts from the perspective of linguistics, from the oracle bone inscriptions, bells, tripods, and Yi vessels to the statistics of the two words "Xing" and "Ming" in the pre-Qin classics. It uses phonology, exegesis, and textual research methods to find the meaning of the characters through the glyphs. In the process of exploring the evolution of ancient characters, the author further explored the historical and cultural significance behind their evolution, sorted out the thoughts of Confucius, Mencius, Xun and Mohism through the interpretation of the two characters "Xing" and "Ming", and finally concluded that Neo-Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties was the culmination of Pre-Qin Confucianism.
Reader comments
I particularly like Fu Sinian's analysis of the different systems of the Eastern and Western Parts, which I find very enlightening. He mentioned in the book that "in the Three Dynasties and three generations ago, the evolution of politics, from tribes to empires, was based on the river, Ji, and Huai river basins." This sentence impressed me deeply, and I immediately understood the political structure at that time. I recommend you to read it, you will definitely gain something!
I particularly like Fu Sinian's analysis of the different systems of the Eastern and Western Parts, which I find very enlightening. He mentioned in the book that "in the Three Dynasties and three generations ago, the evolution of politics, from tribes to empires, was based on the river, Ji, and Huai river basins." This sentence impressed me deeply, and I immediately understood the political structure at that time. I recommend you to read it, you will definitely gain something!