Study On Epigraph Connoisseurship And Collection Of Duan Fang And His Circle Of Friends

With the revival of epigraphy in the Qing dynasty,collection and connoisseurship of ancient epigraph stone inscription became an important approach to epigraph research.This paper,taking Duan Fang(1861-1911)and his epigraph collections as the research basis,combines studies of Duan Fang's collection process,official career and his intercourses with scholars for epigraph,digs into direct connections among them and explores epigraph interests and tastes of epigraph connoisseurship group with Duan at its core,characteristics of the era and cultural concern.Duan Fang's collections,huge in system and rich in category,were featured by collection style and method with his strong personal imprint,which triggered many topical collection events such as a whole collection of bronze Fanjin(a set of wine containers including a rectangular end table),a thematic collection of Qin Quan(a kind of weight used in the reign of the first emperor of Qin for measurement),a sequential collection of books of rubbings of several pieces of Huashan Stone Inscription and Liu Xiong Stone Inscription.These milestone events in Duan's collecting career built up his unshakable position in the epigraph collection field in the late Qing dynasty and those collections became representative and renowned in his collection system.Besides,a group of scholars,gathering around Duan Fang and linked by epigraphy,together crowned Duan's collection career,made abundant epigraph research achievements and brought a last golden period of epigraph connoisseurship and collection for the late Qing dynasty through such cultural behaviors as purchase,collection,connoisseurship,compilation and research based on Duan's epigraph collection.As new technologies from the West were introduced into China and the idea of exhibition became popular,Duan Fang with broad horizons combined these new technologies and ideas with his traditional epigraph connoisseurship and collection career to promote preservation,connoisseurship,exhibition and spread of epigraph antiquities and such tries included collecting foreign antiquities,taking pictures of collections,publishing rubbings of original stele and model calligraphy,calligraphy and paintings,publishing catalogues of his collections and founding personal museum.His collections,to which he dedicated all his life,were finally preserved and exhibited in his Taoshi Museum,the first personal museum with epigraph collections as staple in China's modern history,which,integrated with his epigraph collections and collection catalogues,constituted his complete epigraph collection aspiration.His breakthroughs and pioneering in traditional epigraphy deserve our reexamination in the contemporary time.