Sun Ji (September 1929-June 2023) was an archaeologist and cultural relics expert, a lifelong research librarian of the National Museum of China, an honorary president of the National Museum of China, a vice chairman of the National Cultural Relics Appraisal Committee, a librarian of the ** Research Museum of Culture and History, and a distinguished professor of Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology. Sun Ji has profound attainments in the identification of ancient cultural relics and the study of ancient Chinese material culture, and he has gathered the essence of his life's research in the "Collected Works of Sun Ji" (hereinafter referred to as the "Collected Works"), hoping to benefit the scholars and inherit the civilization. 
Sun Ji's Collected Works (8 volumes) by Sun Ji, The Commercial Press.
The Anthology consists of four types of eight volumes, including two long-standing and influential works: "Ancient Chinese Material Culture" and "Illustrated Materials of Han Dynasty Material Culture". Among them, the "Illustrated Materials of the Material Culture of the Han Dynasty" was changed to the first and second volumes, and the "Research on Ancient Chinese Public Opinion" (the first and second volumes) was rearranged as an example, and the newly arranged "Treatise on Chinese Ancient Cultural Relics" (the first, middle and second volumes). The Collected Works contains the results of Sun Ji's major academic research during his life, but it is not all. The articles collected in the anthology were personally selected by Sun Ji. He said: "The articles included in the "Anthology" are relatively tight, they really solve the problem, and they can stand, and those articles that are a little loose will not be accepted. That's why it's called an "anthology" rather than a "complete work."
Treat academics as life.
Since the 50s of the 20th century, under the influence of Shen Congwen and Su Bai, Sun Ji has been committed to exhausting documents and using archaeological results to fill the gap in the study of ancient Chinese material culture.
At the beginning of 1949, Sun Ji took a carriage and went to the liberated area alone to Beiping at that time. At first, he went to North China Military and Political University as a cadet, and was arranged to learn to drive a tank. In 1951, he was assigned to work in the Literature and Art Section of the Propaganda Department of the Beijing Federation of Trade Unions, and his office was in the Working People's Cultural Palace, using the court room of the Forbidden City. At that time, Mr. Shen Congwen was transferred from Peking University to the Chinese History Museum (now the National Museum of China), and his office was next door to Sun Ji's office. At that time, the Chinese History Museum used the end gate and noon gate of the Forbidden City as exhibition halls, and there were often exhibitions. Mr. Shen Congwen was in his 50s at the time, and he went to the exhibition halls of Duanmen and Wumen every day to explain to the audience. The audience didn't know that he was Shen Congwen, but they only felt that this old gentleman spoke very well. Sun Ji also often went to listen to it, and he became more familiar with Mr. Shen Congwen after coming and going. Sun Ji said: "Mr. Shen has spent a lot of effort on the history of clothing, and no one has spent so much effort before. He also said that he didn't even know what it was at that time, and it was Mr. Shen who told him this knowledge, so Sun Ji regarded Mr. Shen as his teacher.
In 1955, Sun Ji was admitted to the Department of History of Peking University, majoring in archaeology, under the tutelage of Mr. Su Bai, graduated in 1960, and stayed in the reference room of the Department of History of Peking University. In 1979, he was transferred to the then Chinese History Museum, and since then he has continued to publish research results. In 2022, the School of Archaeology of Peking University held a centennial celebration and presented Sun Ji with the "Outstanding Resident" award, which he said was the most cherished honor in his life.
The author is familiar with Mr. Sun Ji because of the publication of the book "Ancient Chinese Material Culture", which was about 10 years ago. After the publication of "Ancient Chinese Material Culture", the praise and attention received greatly exceeded expectations, in fact, this is only a successful attempt to popularize academics, and Sun Ji's academic achievements have long been widely recognized by the academic community. As the editor of the book, Mr. Sun Ji and I have also strengthened our trust in many academic exchange activities over the years. Reading his manuscripts, each one is like solving a problem, the logic is rigorous, and the fog is peeled away layer by layer. For example, what is the text of exegesis, how is the literature recorded, what are the characteristics of the artifacts found in archaeology, and what is the situation of horizontal comparison between China and foreign countries, and vertical comparison of history. After reading it, I can't help but be in awe of the author.
The first half of Mr. Sun Ji's life can be said to have not been smooth, and in addition to communicating with the manuscript, we sometimes talk about some things he has experienced. He always spoke lightly. I once asked, "How did you get through those unsatisfactory and difficult times?" He said, "I just read, read, and I enter that world, and I forget everything else." "Everything looks forward. And with his characteristic gestures. Over the years, we have listened to him tell jokes more, and every time we have been amused, he has never taken the initiative to mention the past suffering, as if the years have been so quiet.
Many years ago, Sun Ji's friends suggested that he publish a collection of essays or complete works, but he always prevaricated, modestly saying that his achievements were limited, and there were still many topics to be completed, so he thought it was not time to publish an anthology. In 2021, Sun Ji finally began to compile the anthology, and out of years of trust, he finished the manuscript and delivered it to me. Generally, most of the anthologies are old works and new editions, but in addition to rearranging the examples, almost every page of the "Sun Ji Anthology" has been revised, some are rewritten in the whole paragraph, and some individual articles are still new handwritten manuscripts, such as the sixth volume of ""Stepmother Wuding" is not "Simu Wuding", "Say Jue", "Plum Blossom Inserted in **" and so on. I was deeply moved by the truth-seeking and meticulousness of this scholar in his 90s.
On August 1, 2020, Sun Ji was at home
In this publication of the "Anthology", we checked the citations and references of the whole book as much as possible, and replaced some of the **, so as to truly turn the back into the fine. The details of many hand-drawn illustrations have been strengthened, which are important additions to the content, and the illustrations are hand-drawn by Mr. Sun Ji. He has strict requirements for the location, size, etc., and how many sizes are enlarged are carefully drawn one by one.
The eight-volume "Anthology" is an inseparable set of books, which is not only reflected in the ingenuity and organization of the arrangement, but also in the mutual treatment of the contents. On the one hand, Sun Ji does not want to repeat the content in the same set of books, and on the other hand, he also hopes that readers can refer to each other in different narratives and get more information. However, each article and chapter in the "Anthology" is relatively independent, so you can read it by opening it at will.
The proofs of the eight manuscripts, Mr. Sun Ji read through them three times, and each time there were new revisions and some adjustments. After the completion of the third school, he originally asked to see the proofs again, but ** told me that there were about more than 1,000 words of content, and he had to add them. But unfortunately, he did not have time to complete this final work himself.
After Mr. Sun Ji died, his wife found a book and said that the only thing that could have added content was the previous edition of "Ancient Chinese Material Culture", which had annotations. I checked the proofs one by one, and found that some of them may indeed be something that needs to be added; Some have been altered in proofs; Some may be side notes; There are also some major changes from when it was finalized. I think it is safer to use the final proofs determined by Mr. Sun Ji before his death. There was one of them that I hesitated about. On the issue of "sunflower" in the chapter of "agriculture and diet", Mr. Sun Ji commented: "Wu Qijun's "Examination of Plant Names and Facts" said that sunflower is winter amaranth. However, winter amaranth's 'leaves are as round as pig's ears', which is different from sunflower. To be checked. "I think this may be a small issue that Mr. Sun Ji is researching, and I haven't had time to reach a conclusion, can this be regarded as part of the manuscript? After much consideration, I added this short passage as a parenthetical note to the proof, and I felt that it was an illustration of the endless learning - even at the age of ninety, he still did not stop researching, and it can be said that he struggled until the last moment of his life.
I once asked Mr. Sun Ji: "Your arguments on each issue are very detailed and you cite a lot of information, how do you do your learning?" He said, "I don't have any tricks, and I don't have a special sort card or anything." "When you see something new, or when you go to a museum and see something on display, sometimes you suddenly have an idea and think that you should talk about it more systematically. "There are some basic things in my head, and then I look them up in the process of writing, and that is the icing on the cake, rather than looking for a problem temporarily, and I don't know where to find it." "So the first thing is to read more books, and with a very rich accumulation of knowledge, it is natural to have ideas. After discovering the problem, we can confirm the problem and explain the problem through the verification of literature and physical objects, and I think this is the research method of Mr. Sun Ji.
A collection of essays that carry fruitful results.
It is difficult to summarize the content of the Anthology in one sentence, and I think it is not an exaggeration to say that it is an encyclopedia of ancient Chinese material culture.
Regarding the study of ancient Chinese material culture, Mr. Shen Congwen once said: "Due to the large number of excavations and the wide distribution area, it can still prove that a history of ancient Chinese material culture is still better preserved than underground." "By combining the discoveries of each department and studying them separately, the knowledge gained will inevitably open up an infinitely broad world than the previous historical research methods based on documents." Cultural relics will become a new and independent science, which has received due attention, and is worthy of investing more manpower and material resources in classified research, so as to provide rich and incomparable new raw materials for the history of technological development, art history, aesthetic history and cultural history. (Shen Congwen, "Research on Ancient Chinese Costumes: Introduction").
Due to the characteristics of material culture research, the Anthology is composed of one article, which is concise, accurate, direct and solid on the basis of profound academic background, and can be understood by readers without professional research foundation. With a large number of hand-drawn line drawings by Sun Ji, there are many auxiliary comprehension functions, so that the book is not difficult to read at all.
The Anthology not only has a systematic study of ancient China's material culture such as agriculture, industry, clothing, food, housing and transportation, so that readers can have an intuitive understanding of ancient China's material culture with words and images; It also includes detailed research on the identification of cultural relics, giving readers a profound interpretation of the theory of what a cultural relic is, how to name it, how to recognize it, etc., horizontal comparison, vertical combing, such as solving puzzles with clear logic and rigorous reasoning. The Collected Works is of great benefit to a detailed and in-depth understanding of ancient Chinese material culture and the identification of cultural relics.
Northern Song Dynasty pendant (unearthed in Nanjing Shogunate Mountain) Sun Ji hand-painted **Selected from "Sun Ji's Anthology".
The eight-volume "Collected Works of Sun Ji" mainly includes the following aspects.
The first is a systematic discussion of certain aspects of ancient Chinese material culture.
For example, in the "Illustrated Material Culture Materials of the Han Dynasty", Sun Ji systematically discusses the agriculture of the Han Dynasty in six units, from the perspective of agricultural tools, ploughs, sowing tools, irrigation facilities, harvesting tools, grain processing tools and crop varieties, etc., all aspects of agriculture in the Han Dynasty are explained clearly and meticulously. Ancient China was an agrarian society, since the Han Dynasty down to the past 2,000 years, in fact, the agricultural production tools, production methods have not changed much, many tools and production methods are still in use until the late Qing Dynasty. Therefore, if we thoroughly explain the agriculture of the Han Dynasty, we can get a glimpse of the agricultural production and life of ancient China for more than 2,000 years.
The second is the research and verification of certain issues
For example, Sun Ji put forward his own opinions on the golden wisp jade sheng (see the third volume of the "Anthology") and the stepmother Wuding (see the sixth volume of the "Anthology"), etc., and his arguments were rigorous.
Regarding the golden jade jade, he started from the text analysis, explaining that the jade sheng is the "coffin of the corpse", which is the inner coffin, which belongs to one of the tools, but it has been used falsely because it is called "jade clothes" when it is unearthed. He put it simply: "How can clothes cover the face? Another example is the heavy stepmother Wuding in the National Museum, which weighs 83284 kilograms, is the largest existing bronze tripod in our country. Because of its inscription, this tripod was originally interpreted as "Simu Wuding". After Sun Ji's research, he believed that this word should be the reverse of "after", and gave several examples of reverse words. Moreover, "Hou" in ancient times generally referred to the king, and the explanation of "Si" in the "Shuowen" is: "The minister is the one who is the outside." "It can be understood as a clerk. He said, "Would you make such a big tripod for a clerk?" ”
There are many articles like this in the Anthology, some of which may involve a specific scholar, but Sun Ji never criticizes in the article, but puts forward specific issues, points out the corresponding evidence of documents and archaeology in the form of discussion, and further deepens the problem, so that the problem becomes clearer and clearer.
The third is the case and method of cultural relics identification.
Perhaps the most influential in this regard is the identification of the statue of the tea saint Lu Yu. Lu Yu is the author of the "Book of Tea", is an important role in the history of Chinese tea, Mei Yaochen's poem in the Song Dynasty even said: "Since Lu Yu was born in the world, the world has learned spring tea." "The Book of Tea" tells Lu Yu's knowledge of all aspects of tea such as tea production, processing, cooking, drinking and utensils, which is a powerful impetus for the spread of tea drinking, and "The Book of Tea" is still highly respected today.
The statue of the tea saint Lu Yu is rumored to have been found in a batch of tea sets unearthed in Tang County, Hebei Province. Sun Ji said: "It is not only the same as the tea set, but also the dress and posture are not like ordinary people, nor is it a Buddha statue or a Taoist statue, so it is identified as a tea statue." This is the only known tea icon and the first time it has been exhibited publicly. (1994 "Ancient Chinese Tea Ware Exhibition" held by the Chinese Museum of History, now the National Museum of China, in Hong Kong).
Others, such as "Sanzi Hairpin", "Sanshi", "Thorn Goose Cone", etc., are named to show their research skills. Sun Ji's approach was to place the artifacts in the social environment of the time, and give appropriate names in combination with the literature, so as to provide annotations for the social life of that era.
Fourth, the function, application and value significance of cultural relics are carefully sorted out.
The research, naming and use of various parts of the ancient car system is a very complex work, and Sun Ji's research on the driving method is undoubtedly an important breakthrough. The introduction of the yoke-type driving method has highlighted the advanced nature of China's ancient car production. More importantly, Sun Ji's research was immediately confirmed by the bronze chariot unearthed from the Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang (see Volume 4 of the Collected Works). Another example is the Xia curtain pendant, which was once mistaken for a "sachet". From the perspective of clothing system, Sun Ji determined that this artifact should be named Xia Wei pendant, which was used in front of the clothes of aristocratic women (see Book 5 of the "Anthology"). In addition, in the Qin Dynasty, there was the word "Kei", which was once considered to be a thing to collect money, and according to Sun Ji's research, it should be a measuring instrument used to collect grain (see Book 7 of the Collected Works).
The No. 1 bronze car of the Mausoleum of the First Emperor is hand-painted by Sun Ji **Selected from the "Sun Ji Anthology".
The examination of ancient artifacts, people's understanding of them, often leads to misinterpretation because of ignoring subtle differences. Sun Ji said: "Cultural relics are actually practical things for people at that time, first of all, according to the literature, give it an exact name, know what people called it at that time, and then figure out what it was used for?" What are the social functions? After that, it is necessary to know what kind of cultural value it has in the history of Chinese cultural relics. Much remains to be done in this regard. ”
Fifth, it is a solid contribution to the collation of literature.
The fourth volume of the Anthology summarizes, sorts, compares the contents of the "Old Tang Dynasty Book and Public Service Journal" and "New Tang Dynasty Book and Car Service Journal", and sorts out and studies paragraph by paragraph, including version proofreading, traceability, interpretation, interpretation, etc., as well as in-depth elaboration of related issues. "Old Tang Dynasty Book and Public Service Chronicles" is only about 15,000 words, and "New Tang Dynasty Books and Chefu Chronicles" are only about 10,000 words, and after Sun Ji sorted them out, they occupy 210 pages in the "Anthology", which is enough to have more than 100,000 words. For example, there is a sentence in "Old Tang Dynasty Book and Yufu Zhi": "Sui system: the initial production of more than five products to take the car." After research, Sun Ji summed up the 20 types of car systems in the Sui Dynasty and their passengers, uses, and the number of types of animals that drove them, and also added detailed remarks, and the expansion was too rich. Moreover, almost none of the annotations have been carried out in a few words, and every small point has been rigorously examined, and hundreds or even more than 1,000 words can be seen everywhere, which shows the depth of the literature and the richness of relevant knowledge.
The above mentioned aspects are not enough to cover the whole of Sun Ji's research on ancient Chinese material culture, and his contributions in many aspects are milestones. After Mr. Shen Congwen and Mr. Su Bai, Sun Ji pushed the study of ancient Chinese material culture to a new height, and the research system of ancient Chinese material culture research jointly built with Yang Zhishui and other later scholars is of great significance to the academic development and discipline construction of ancient Chinese material culture. Sun Ji starts from many aspects such as words, documents and cultural relics under each topic, and his rigor can be seen. Yang Zhishui wrote a 10,000-character essay for the "Collected Works", which was included in the eighth volume of the "Collected Works of Sun Ji", quoting the letter that Sun Ji had written to her, showing the research method that Sun Ji has always adhered to: "Ancient cultural relics are witnesses of history. With conclusive evidence, history will become more concrete and vivid, so that today we can fully understand how the real world has evolved. In reality, however, there are still some deficiencies in this area, and many of the situations are still unclear. Because it is impossible to achieve this completely by only using the method of archaeology to emphasize the stratum and the form, and it is even more so to adopt the traditional method of evidence study. It seems that it is feasible to combine the documents with the physical objects accurately and appropriately. ”
Yang Zhishui said at the end of the text: "With decades of practice, Yu'an Shi has shown us the path of learning or the way to find problems, solve problems and the fruits obtained by this. ”
(Author: Li Jing, editor of the Commercial Press).
Content**: Bright**" February 1, 2024, 11th edition of "A Scholar Who Suffers from Loneliness - Sun Ji and the Study of Ancient Chinese Material Culture".
Courtesy of the publisher Copyright belongs to the original author.
Editor of this edition: Tan Hua.
WeChat editor: Tan Hua.
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