Sun Yirang (; 1848–1908) was a late

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

Chinese philologist. A native of

Wenzhou Wenzhou; Chinese postal romanization, historically known as Wenchow is a prefecture-level city in China's Zhejiang province. Wenzhou is located at the extreme southeast of Zhejiang, bordering Lishui, Zhejiang, Lishui to the west, Taizhou, Zheji ...

Zhejiang ) , translit_lang1_type2 = , translit_lang1_info2 = ( Hangzhounese) ( Ningbonese) (Wenzhounese) , image_skyline = 玉甑峰全貌 - panoramio.jpg , image_caption = View of the Yandang Mountains , image_map = Zhejiang i ...

province, he retired from official employment early in his life to devote himself to scholarship. His most important works are ''Mozi Jiangu'' (墨子間詁), a corrected, definitive edition of ''

Mozi Mozi, personal name Mo Di, was a Chinese philosopher, logician, and founder of the Mohist school of thought, making him one of the most important figures of the Warring States period (221 BCE). Alongside Confucianism, Mohism became the ...

'', and ''Zhouli Zhengyi'' (周禮正義), an important commentary on the ''

Rites of Zhou The ''Rites of Zhou'' (), originally known as "Officers of Zhou" (), is a Chinese work on bureaucracy and organizational theory. It was renamed by Liu Xin to differentiate it from a chapter in the '' Book of History'' by the same name. To rep ...

''. He also contributed to the studies of the

bronzeware script Chinese bronze inscriptions, also referred to as bronze script or bronzeware script, comprise Chinese writing made in several styles on ritual bronzes mainly during the Late Shang dynasty () and Western Zhou dynasty (771 BC). Types of bron ...

and

oracle script Oracle bone script is the oldest attested form of written Chinese, dating to the late 2nd millennium BC. Inscriptions were made by carving characters into oracle bones, usually either the shoulder bones of oxen or the plastrons of turtl ...

. His work ''Qiwen Juli'' (契文舉例), published posthumously by Luo Zhenyu, was the first work of

decipherment In philology and linguistics, decipherment is the discovery of the meaning of the symbols found in extinct languages and/or alphabets. Decipherment is possible with respect to languages and scripts. One can also study or try to decipher how spok ...

of the oracle bone script.

Bibliography

* 『墨子間詁』 (Mozi Jiangu) * 『周礼正義』 (Zhouli Zhengyi) * 『古籀拾遺』 * 『古籀余論』 * 『契文挙例』 (Qiwen Juli) * 『名原』 * 『尚書駢枝』 * 『札迻』 * 『籀廎述林』

References

*He Jiuying 何九盈 (1995). ''Zhongguo gudai yuyanxue shi'' (中囯古代语言学史 "A history of ancient Chinese linguistics"). Guangzhou: Guangdong jiaoyu chubanshe. *'' Zhongguo da baike quanshu'' (1980–1993). 1st Edition. Beijing; Shanghai: Zhongguo da baike quanshu chubanshe. *

External links

Biography
at Guoxue
Mozi Jiangu
an
other works by Sun Yirang
at

Chinese Text Project The Chinese Text Project (CTP; ) is a digital library project that assembles collections of early Chinese texts. The name of the project in Chinese literally means "The Chinese Philosophical Book Digitization Project", showing its focus on books ...

1848 births 1908 deaths Linguists from China Qing dynasty writers Writers from Wenzhou Scientists from Wenzhou {{China-linguist-stub