Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 1.pdf/242

Rh 10 chüan in the collection Chi-fu ts'ung-shu (see under ).

[M.1/265/1a; M.2/382/1a; M.3/252/1a; M.30/7/1b; M.39/8/1a; M.40/72/7a; M.58/上/1b; M.84/辛3/1a;, Ch'ing-hsiang t'ang wên-chi, 7/1a; Wu-ch'iao-hsien chih (1673) 6/10a, 10/8a; Wang Sun-hsi 王孫錫, Fan Wên-chung kung nien-p'u; Waley, Arthur, An Index of Chinese Artists, p. 28.]

2em

 FAN Mou-chu 范懋柱, July 9, 1721–1780, June 15, a native of Yin-hsien, Chekiang, was owner of the famous library, T'ien I Ko 天一閣, in the Ch'ien-lung period. This library, located in the city of Ningpo, was founded by his ancestor, Fan Ch'in 范欽, in the middle of the sixteenth century, and as the original building and part of the collection are still in existence, it is now the oldest private library in China. Fan Ch'in was a chin-shih of 1532 who became vice-president of the Ministry of War and also held posts in Fukien. He built up his library by purchase and by copying rare items in the possession of other collectors. He obtained other books from Fêng Tao-shêng 豐道生, heir to the Fêng family library known as Wan-chüan lou 萬卷樓. Later, according to reports, the library of Fan Ta-ch'ê 范大澈, a relative of Fan Ch'in, was combined with the T'ien I Ko. After the death of Fan Ch'in his descendants for generations guarded the library and its contents with scrupulous vigilance, and though it was little used it was nevertheless well preserved. The library building is constructed of brick and tile, and the use of fire or light, or indulgence in smoking, were strictly prohibited. No books were permitted to leave the building. The keys to the door were held by different branches of the family and the door could not be opened if one of the keys were missing. Punishment was provided in varying degrees of severity for any members of the family who entered it without permission, escorted friends through it privately, or took books from it clandestinely.

Fan Mou-chu was an eighth generation descendant of Fan Ch'in. When the bureau for the compilation of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu was instituted in 1773 (see under ) edicts were issued for a nation-wide search for rare books to be copied for the establishment of an Imperial Library. In response to these edicts Fan Mou-chu offered items from his family collection. After a preliminary sorting by the provincial authorities of Chekiang 638 items were sent to Peking of which 473 received descriptive notice in the Ssŭ-k'u Catalogue and 96 were copied into the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu. In recognition of Fan Mou-chu's liberality a set of the encyclopedia Ku-chin t'u-shu chi-ch'êng (see under ) was presented to him. When his items were returned to the T'ien I Ko two of them of special rarity were celebrated in poems composed and written by the emperor.

To provide for the housing in Peking of the completed set of the Imperial Manuscript Library (Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu) an official of Hangchow was dispatched by imperial order in 1774 to investigate and report on the architecture of the T'ien I Ko and its arrangements, in the belief that a structure of such perpetuity must have features worthy of reproduction. The new library building, Wên Yüan Ko, which in that same year was erected in the Palace precincts, and which is still standing, is said in general to have been planned after the T'ien I Ko. In the Wên Yüan Ko the first set of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu was placed. Later edifices erected elsewhere for the same purpose (see under ) were all constructed on similar plans. In 1779, 32 paintings, known collectively as 平定回部得勝圖 P'ing-ting Hui-pu tê-shêng t'u, commemorating the conquest of Chinese Turkestan, were presented to Fan Mou-chu and his library. In 1787, the emperor presented to the family 12 paintings on the conquest of the Chin-ch'uan aborigines, entitled P'ing-ting liang Chin-ch'uan chan-t'u (see under ).

An early catalogue of the Fan family, presumably the work of Fan Ch'in, is mentioned in various bibliographical works at the close of the Ming period, but that catalogue is apparently no longer extant. In 1673 visited the T'ien I Ko and prepared a catalogue of its holdings which was later supplemented by a member of the Fan family, Fan Tso-yüan 范左垣. In 1679 Huang wrote an account of his visit, entitled T'ien-i ko ts'ang-shu chi. , another celebrated scholar of Chekiang, visited the library in 1738 and made a list of its rubbings of inscriptions on stone and bronze. About fifty years later (1787) examined the library, and in collaboration with Fan Mou-min 范懋敏  and Chang Yen-ch'ang 230