HERITAGE AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL NEWS BRIEFS

SONG DYNASTY ENCYCLOPAEDIA SURFACES AT AUCTION MARKET

On 15 May 2005, a set of 40 volumes of the long-lost Song dynasty encyclopaedia Jinxiu wanhua gu (Valley of ten thousand embroidered flowers) was auctioned for the record sum of RMB23 million yuan, almost USD3 million, at China Guardian Auction Company's spring sales, staged at the Kunlun Hotel in Beijing. The reserve price for the complete 80 juan set was RMB11-12 million yuan. Ta Xiaotang, manager of the Rare Books Division of Guardian Auctions, described the set as the prize item in a consignment of 178 works, totalling between 400 and 500 volumes, received from Suzhou's Guoyun Lou. Guardian placed a total reserve of RMB21 million on the consignment. Although some observers thought that the set would be acquired by a state museum or library reliant on funding being made available by the Ministry of Commerce as has been the case when some other "national treasures" surfaced at auction, the successful bidder was a private collector.

Guoyun Lou (Drifiting clouds tower) is an ancient mansion that once housed a rich collection of paintings, calligraphic works and rare books. Located in the Yi Garden in Suzhou, the exact date of the building's construction is not known, although a letter from Gu Wenbin, the building's owner in the Daoguang period (1821-51) of the Qing, to his son shows that it then housed a rich collection. Towards the end of the dynasty, under its owner Gu Heyi, Guoyun Lou housed more than a thousand calligraphic and painting masterpieces, as well as Song and Yuan printed editions of works, manuscripts from all periods and luxury Ming and Qing editions, as well as rubbings.

Weng Lianxi, deputy researcher in the library of the Palace Museum, said that for a long time very little had been known about the contents of the Guoyun Lou collection. Only in the 1930s, following the visit to Guoyun Lou by the authoritative bibliophile Fu Zengxiang (1872-1950), did scholars gain some idea of the richness of the collection. However, Fu Zengxiang seems to have seen only 14 juan (fascicles) of the encyclopaedia, the total recorded in his catalogue Cangyuan qunshu jingyan lu (Record of books seen in collections). However, the Gu family's most valued books were rarely shown to anyone but intimates, according to Ta Xiaotang, and it seems that even scholars such as Fu Zengxiang were given only a taste of the collection.

It had long been believed that Jinxiu wanhua gu was a companion set to one held in the Seikado Bunko Library in Tokyo, but Weng Lianxi's examination of the volumes showed that a different type of calligraphic "font" was used to produce the auctioned set.

Between 1951 and 1959, the Gu family presented more than 300 calligraphic and painting masterpieces from their collection to the Shanghai Museum (a practice common at the time whereby family treasures were offered to the state rather than being appropriated), and over subsequent decades more than three quarters of the rare books were presented to the Nanjing Library. The more than 170 remaining rare books disappeared from view, and have only now resurfaced.

NUMBER OF MUSEUMS REACHES 2,200 IN CHINA

On 18 May, International Museum Day, Xinhua News Agency reported that Zhang Wenbin, president of China Museum Institute, had revealed at a working conference held in Beijing that China now has more than 2,200 museums, which annually have a total of 160 million visitors. This figure does not include private museums, but the news agency pointed out that this is more than the number cited in the Report on the National Economy and Social Development, which included museums for the first time in 1980, when it stated that there were 365 museums in China. The number jumped to 1,012 ten years later. By the end of last century, museums increased to 1,373 in number, and by 2004 the reported number reached 1,509.

MUSEUM HOUSING PATRIMONY IN CONFUCIUS' HOMETOWN

On 28 March 2005 Xinhua News Agency reported that the city of Qufu, Confucius' hometown in Shandong province, will construct a museum to display more than 2,000 antiques collected and donated by Chinese-American collector Lu Ping. The museum will be located within the walls of Qufu. After several visits to Qufu, Lu Ping decided to donate 2,000 cultural relics from his collection to the ancient town.

CHINA BUILDS FIRST HUAIYANG CUISINE MUSEUM

China's first Huaiyang cuisine history and culture museum opened recently in Yangzhou, Jiangsu province, Xinhua News Agency reported in late April 2005. As the hometown of Huaiyang cuisine, one of the four major regional cuisines of China, Yangzhou has a rich culinary tradition. The museum is located in He Yuan (also known as Jixiao Shanzhuang), famed for its late-Qing garden and grotto maze constructed from rocks and artificial hills. The museum covers 300 sq m, and traces the development of Huaiyang cuisine from the Spring and Autumn period, an all too venerable pedigree that some might question.

YINXU MUSEUM TO OPEN THIS SUMMER

On 16 March 2005, the foundation stone of the new Yinxu Museum in Anyang, Henan province, was laid. Yinxu is the site of the later capital city of the Shang dynasty (c.16-11 centuries BCE) and it was here that large quantities of inscribed oracle bones were discovered over the course of the 20th century. Anyang municipality is constructing the museum in accordance with the General Protection Plan for Anyang Yinxu and in consultancy with professionals from the State Administration of Cultural Heritage and UNESCO. The new museum, which will open in August 2005, is located in the eastern part of the Yinxu site, where a palace and ancestral temple were located. It will cover 3,535 sq m, 2,354 sq m of which will be set aside for exhibitions. Attention is also being paid to the museum grounds and impressive gardens are being planted. The new museum will supersede the small Garden Museum of the Yin Ruins built in the 1980s, and visitors will be able to enter the restored tomb of Lady Fu Hao, which was excavated in 1976.

Anyang has a long association with gardens, one that dates from the time when an imperial-style mausoleum and garden were constructed for Yuan Shikai, who died in 1916 not long after an attempt to restore the Qing monarchy forced to abdicate by the 1911 Revolution. Before his demise, he planned for his imperial tomb to be located in the city. The Yuan Garden (Yuangong Lin, or Yuan Lin) is now part of the grounds of the Anyang Municipal Museum founded in 1968.

SHANGHAI TO OPEN 100TH MUSEUM THIS YEAR

Shanghai will open its 100th museum by the end of 2005, Chen Xiejun, deputy director of the Municipal Bureau of Cultural Heritage, was quoted as saying on 8 May 2005 by Xinhua News Agency. Clearly the museum is recognised as a barometer of civic achievement, and by 2010, Chen said, Shanghai plans to have 150 museums. This goal is not regarded as unrealistic. By the end of 2004, the city already boasted 91 museums.

Concerns have been raised over the financial viability of so many facilities in just one city. According to Xinhua, the annual cost of operating all 150 museums could exceed RMB 800 million yuan (US$96.39 million). Zhou Lizhong, chief of the museum and memorial administration division of the Bureau of Cultural Heritage, believes such concerns are unnecessary, saying that government funding and the museums' own ability to raise money will cover costs.

The current 90-plus museums can be categorized into three types: public museums supported by the local government, "trades and industry" museums sponsored by trade unions or the industries they represent, and privately-owned museums. According to the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau, the basic requirement for opening a museum is that it should have registered capital of RMB100,000 yuan (US$12,000). According to experts, 100,000 yuan is not enough to open a museum and the successful operation of a site relies on attracting large numbers of visitors.

To date Shanghai, and China generally, has only one "trades and industry" museum, the Shanghai Banking Museum, but there are plans for many more; Hangzhou will set up a Financial Museum later this year. Such museums will rely on sponsorship from trade unions and leading companies, and presumably their establishment will be a tax deduction. The Shanghai Banking Museum occupies 1,500 sq m of prime real estate in the Lujiazui Finance and Trade Zone in Pudong, and the museum's major investor is the financially strong Shanghai branch of the China Industrial and Commercial Bank. The museum opened in 2000 with investment in exhibits alone totalling almost 10 million yuan (US$1.2 million). Not including individuals, visitors in delegations touring the museum in a professional capacity have numbered over 10,000 annually. Chen Xiejun was quoted as saying that industrial museums should take the lead in future development plans.

MUSEUM SHOWCASES BEIJING'S URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND PLANNING

The Beijing Planning Exhibition Hall (Beijing Guihua Zhanlan), just east of the Old Beijing Railway Station on Qianmen Street not far from Tian'anmen, is proving to be one of the most popular new smaller museums in the capital. The museum, which opened in September 2004, has as two of its highlights a photograph of the city layout printed on nearly 1,000 illuminated glass floor panels and a giant model of the Beijing urban master plan placed at the centre of the photograph. The museum is designed to showcase Beijing's past, present and future. The exhibition can be visited on line at: http://www.bjghzl.com.cn

EXHIBITION OF ANCIENT BRONZE MIRRORS IN SHANGHAI

An impressive exhibition of ancient bronze mirrors has attracted collectors to the Shanghai Museum. The exhibition features 150 examples ranging in date from the Warring States period (403-227 BCE) to the Qing dynasty (ended 1911). The exhibition was designed to cater to mainland collectors who are increasingly attracted to bronze mirrors as collectibles. In 2004 Beijing-based China Guardian Auction Company staged two large auction sales of Chinese antique bronze mirrors and at their August special auction of ancient Chinese coins and bronze mirror lots - a total of 152 pieces - sold for RMB 3.59 million yuan (US$434,100). The exhibition runs for three months until 30 June 2005.

EXHIBITION OF UNEARTHED FINDS

In April-June 2005, an exhibition titled "Chinese Civilisation: An Exhibition of National Treasures" was staged at the China Millennium Museum in Beijing. The exhibit featured a total of 213 valuable antiquities selected from museums and cultural institutions in 15 provinces across the country. Around half of the exhibits are grade-one cultural relics from the most significant archaeological discoveries in the past 50 years. Among the items exhibited are: the Western Han dynasty jade suit unearthed at Shizishan in Xuzhou in 1996; terracotta figurines from the mausoleum of Qin Shihuang; and items from Famen Temple. This is the second large-scale national treasures exhibition co-organised by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, the China National Museum and the China Millennium Monument. The first of this kind was held in 2001, also in the Art Gallery of China Millennium Monument. These two exhibitions are successors to the spectacular Gems of Chinese Cultural Relics exhibitions staged through the 1990s in the Wenhua Hall of the Palace Museum. The next exhibition of this calibre will be staged in 2009.

IMPERIAL EXAMINATION SYSTEM EXHIBITION STAGED IN SHENZHEN

A special exhibition on the Chinese imperial examination system was on display in the Shenzhen Museum in May 2005. The exhibition was sponsored by the Jiading Museum of Shanghai.

ROYAL RELICS OF LOUIS XIV SHOWN IN FORBIDDEN CITY

One hundred antiquities celebrating the reign of Louis XIV went on display in Wumen Gate in Beijing's Forbidden City on 1 May 2005. Eighty-four of the 100 pieces are on loan from the Château du Versailles. The other pieces originally belonged to French Jesuit missionaries sent to China by Louis XIV in the late-17th century and are now part of the collection of The Palace Museum. The exhibition was a part of "The Year of France in China" which started in October 2004. [BGD]