Liu Xihai And His Research On Epigraphy

Liu Xihai was an epigrapher and ancient numismatist during the Daoguang and Xianfeng years of Qing dynasty.He spent his whole life on historical reseach,collected ancient antiquity,was good at identification,and he was one of the wealthiest collectors at one time.He worte a lot of books,while many of books have not been published yet.His published works include Chang’an Huo Gu Bian,Sanba Ni Gu Zhi,Haidong Jin Shi Yuan,Cangyudong Songren Timing,Quan Yuan Jing Hua etc.All of them are famous for their well-defined and accurate text.And Liu Xihai’s research on epigraphy studies inherited the Qianjia textology studies,and then connect the Daoguang and Xianfeng period when the epigraphy were fully developed.Liu Xihai composed epigraphy workers dependent on his collections.There are few fakes in his collections,which had been verified with historical data and have high credibility.At the same time,Liu Xihai’s epistemic research also has limitations and disadvantages:many writings have not been published in time because of too much pursuit of preciseness;the textual research is inaccurate and precise due to the importance of collection.In view of the current lack of systematic research on Liu Xihai in the academic field,in this article,we intend to focus on Liu Xihai’s life,epigraphy collection,friendship and research expected to explore Liu Xihai’s epigraphy research and achievements.The main body of this article is divided into four parts:1.Sorting out Liu Xihai ’s family life,official experience,offspring and relatives,outline Liu Xihai’s life,and his official career in Fujian,Shaanxi,Sichuan and other places,in order to know that he took the opportunity to collect local artifacts and to communicate with local scholars.The experience of working around was convenient for Liu Xihai to collect artifacts,and it also broadened the geographical scope and type of his epigraphy collection.2.Analyzing Liu Xihai’s collection types,collection sources,and comment to certificate that Liu Xihai’s epigraphy collection is aplenty in ancient coins and rubbings,and Tang Shanyeni Buddha statue were firstly discovered and collected by Liu Xihai.The main sources of his collection include three types:given from friends,purchases and personal researching.His thoughts on the exact collection and the evidence of mutual verification with history was reflected by the collection’s appraisal,inscriptions,and textual research;3.Sorting out the epigraphy communication between Liu Xihai and his friends,mainly centering on the activities of mutual identification of artifacts,correspondence by letters,writing prefaces and postscripts,and publications,etc.Liu Xihai’s friendship with Bao Kang,Jin Xichang,Chen Jieqi,Li Zuoxian,Wu Shifen and other epigraphers who lived in Shanzuo was detailed description.Exploration on the exchange of ideas between Liu Xihai and other scholars at that time,is a good reflection of the ecology of the epigraphy circle at that time;4.Explain Liu Xihai’s epigraphy academic achievements by using Liu Xihai’s writings,combing the compilation,publication and content of Liu Xihai’s writings and the evaluation of his writings form later generations,for the sake of summary Liu Xihai’s epigraphy research characteristics with four points:large number of collection,wide range and many categories,lack of textual research and skilled in identification.The last part of this paper summarizes the full text,generalizes Liu Xihai’s life,friendship,connoisseurship and collection and academic achievements,then points out that Liu Xihai’s epigraphy research has some insufficient point,such as multiple subjective judgments,and errors in writing,so as to have a comprehensive and objective evaluation of Liu Xihai’s epigraphy studies.