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1.3.0 2026-08-26 brev Rådata 512423 arkivdokument Statens museer för världskultur - Östasiatiska museet SMVK-OM Dokument http://kulturarvsdata.se/SMVK-OM/arkivdokument/512423 E1A-17_0063-0064, E1A-17_0063, E1A-17_0064 00636 for their definitions of meanings, on the traditional, orthodox Sung philology, and shut the eyes entirely to the extensive and excellent philology of the Classics produced by a pleidde of great Chinese scholars from 1700-1900 A.D. (Kiang Sheng and Sun Ling-yen for the Shu king, Chen Huan and Ma Juei sh”an for the Shi Ling, Liu Pao-nan for the Lun ytl ete. eto.). The consequence is that 50 & of all difficult words are erroneously interpreted even in these new dåetionari . The mistakes have been aecertained long ago, but the perfectly reliable results of the best scholars of the Te”ing era have never been incorporated in Chinese lexicography. To a oertain extent 1t has been done in the Shuo wen t'ung htn ting sheng by Chu TsUn-sheng, but not in a form that oan be accepted without a tåorough "verarbaitung". 2, In the second place, the readings of the characters in their different sonsas are extremely maltreated in these modern diotionaries.. Te”i ytian 13 absolutely defactive and extremely bad in this respect. Kang hi tsi tien contains much of the correct material, but not in a form that is soientifically "verarbeitet", worst is the Chung kuo ta tsi tien, | which uncritically places side by side, as parallel readings, ancient phonetic glosses from the most varying sources, what are not really parallel and comparable, because they mere based on different medieve” pel te. siaply to convert all these "readings" in K"ang hi and Chung kuo ta tsi tien into moderna romanized Mandarin and to give the meanings under these separate "readinge" such as they are registered in K'ang hi or Ta tsi tien would give the most disastrous and erroneous results. The heterogenous material has to be investigated and on the basis of King tien Shi wen,the Te'ie ytin manuscripts etc. a reliable set of readings, refering to definite meanings and find-places in the Classics must be found. I have done this work in my mew book, but -3- only to the extent nec ary for my purpose the: It gan be done for a comprehensive dictionary, but only by a painsataking historical investigation of every one of the thousands of worde which offer intricate problems and riddles, Hearing of your great undertaking I became both happy and anxlous., It interests me enormously to learn what steps you have taken to get the new comprehensive dictionary efficiant on the one hand from the point of view of faits acquis established by the Ts'ing scholars, on the other hand of linguistics (true readings), With kind regatde Yours faithfully, Stockholm the 29tn of Aug. 1938. Professor 8, EFlisseeff, 75, Poulevard Peireire, Paris, Dear Professor Elisseeff, I have recently been visited by your very charming students Pope and Cleaves, and I have got a most favourable impression of them both. With their good training and some time spent in China, they will be sura to bacone sinologues of high quality. Cleaves told me about the lexicographical work golng on in Harvard, and this is why I write to you. I would be very mych interested to hear how you have planned this work, I am preparing myself at present a very stout volune about the history of the Chinese soript especially at the light of linguisties, and I hope to print it next year. The work on this has brought me deep into the problems of Chinese lexicography, and I realize perhaps better than any other Western student at present the difficulties and dangers meeting at every step. Not only are the Chinese dictionaries, and quite particularly the K'ang hi tel tien, full of errors; what is much worse, they work on methodically wrong lines. There are particularly two sides of this question which deserve our attention. 1. In the first place, even such modern works as Ts”1 ytlan and Chung kuo ta tsi tien comit exactly the same fault as Couvreur: they build Tillverkad 1938 image/jpeg https://collections.smvk.se/carlotta-om/web/image/tn/10243313/E1A-17_0063a.jpg https://collections.smvk.se/carlotta-om/web/image/zoom/10243312/E1A-17_0063a.jpg http://kulturarvsdata.se/resurser/License#by-nc-nd Östasiatiska museet Statens museer för världskultur image/jpeg https://collections.smvk.se/carlotta-om/web/image/tn/10243317/E1A-17_0063b.jpg https://collections.smvk.se/carlotta-om/web/image/zoom/10243316/E1A-17_0063b.jpg http://kulturarvsdata.se/resurser/License#by-nc-nd Östasiatiska museet Statens museer för världskultur image/jpeg https://collections.smvk.se/carlotta-om/web/image/tn/10242293/E1A-17_0064.jpg https://collections.smvk.se/carlotta-om/web/image/zoom/10242292/E1A-17_0064.jpg http://kulturarvsdata.se/resurser/License#by-nc-nd Östasiatiska museet Statens museer för världskultur http://kulturarvsdata.se/SMVK-OM/arkiv/204096 http://kulturarvsdata.se/SMVK-OM/arkivdokument/html/512423 http://kulturarvsdata.se/SMVK-OM/arkivdokument/xml/512423 http://kulturarvsdata.se/SMVK-OM/arkivdokument/rdf/512423
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00636 for their definitions of meanings, on the traditional, orthodox Sung philology, and shut the eyes entirely to the extensive and excellent philology of the Classics produced by a pleidde of great Chinese scholars from 1700-1900 A.D. (Kiang Sheng and Sun Ling-yen for the Shu king, Chen Huan and Ma Juei sh”an for the Shi Ling, Liu Pao-nan for the Lun ytl ete. eto.). The consequence is that 50 & of all difficult words are erroneously interpreted even in these new dåetionari . The mistakes have been aecertained long ago, but the perfectly reliable results of the best scholars of the Te”ing era have never been incorporated in Chinese lexicography. To a oertain extent 1t has been done in the Shuo wen t'ung htn ting sheng by Chu TsUn-sheng, but not in a form that oan be accepted without a tåorough "verarbaitung". 2, In the second place, the readings of the characters in their different sonsas are extremely maltreated in these modern diotionaries.. Te”i ytian 13 absolutely defactive and extremely bad in this respect. Kang hi tsi tien contains much of the correct material, but not in a form that is soientifically "verarbeitet", worst is the Chung kuo ta tsi tien, | which uncritically places side by side, as parallel readings, ancient phonetic glosses from the most varying sources, what are not really parallel and comparable, because they mere based on different medieve” pel te. siaply to convert all these "readings" in K"ang hi and Chung kuo ta tsi tien into moderna romanized Mandarin and to give the meanings under these separate "readinge" such as they are registered in K'ang hi or Ta tsi tien would give the most disastrous and erroneous results. The heterogenous material has to be investigated and on the basis of King tien Shi wen,the Te'ie ytin manuscripts etc. a reliable set of readings, refering to definite meanings and find-places in the Classics must be found. I have done this work in my mew book, but
-3- only to the extent nec ary for my purpose the: It gan be done for a comprehensive dictionary, but only by a painsataking historical investigation of every one of the thousands of worde which offer intricate problems and riddles, Hearing of your great undertaking I became both happy and anxlous., It interests me enormously to learn what steps you have taken to get the new comprehensive dictionary efficiant on the one hand from the point of view of faits acquis established by the Ts'ing scholars, on the other hand of linguistics (true readings), With kind regatde Yours faithfully
Stockholm the 29tn of Aug. 1938. Professor 8, EFlisseeff, 75, Poulevard Peireire, Paris, Dear Professor Elisseeff, I have recently been visited by your very charming students Pope and Cleaves, and I have got a most favourable impression of them both. With their good training and some time spent in China, they will be sura to bacone sinologues of high quality. Cleaves told me about the lexicographical work golng on in Harvard, and this is why I write to you. I would be very mych interested to hear how you have planned this work, I am preparing myself at present a very stout volune about the history of the Chinese soript especially at the light of linguisties, and I hope to print it next year. The work on this has brought me deep into the problems of Chinese lexicography, and I realize perhaps better than any other Western student at present the difficulties and dangers meeting at every step. Not only are the Chinese dictionaries, and quite particularly the K'ang hi tel tien, full of errors; what is much worse, they work on methodically wrong lines. There are particularly two sides of this question which deserve our attention. 1. In the first place, even such modern works as Ts”1 ytlan and Chung kuo ta tsi tien comit exactly the same fault as Couvreur: they build
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Östasiatiska museet
Statens museer för världskultur