The Bamboo Annals (Chinese: 竹書紀年; pinyin: Zhúshū Jìnián), also called the Jizhong Annals (Chinese: 汲冢紀年), is a chronicle of ancient China. It begins at the earliest legendary times (the Yellow Emperor) and extends to the Warring States Period (5th century BC–221 BC), particularly the history of the State of Wei. It has 13 sections.
The original text was interred with King Xiang of Wei (died 296 BC) and re-discovered in AD 281 (Western Jin Dynasty) in the Jizhong discovery. For this reason, the chronicle survived the burning of the books by Emperor Qin Shi Huang. Other texts recovered from the same tomb included Guoyu, I Ching, and the Tale of King Mu. They were written on bamboo slips, the usual writing material for the Warring States Period, and it is from this that the name of the text derives.
The original bamboo manuscript was lost during the Song dynasty. The text was known through various copies (most of which incomplete conditions) in Chinese history. In early 20th century, Zhu Youceng and Wang Guowei, through examination of quotations in pre-Song works, recovered the main portion of the old version. There is another more detailed and complete "new" version, printed in the 14th century, and it has been dismissed by some scholars as a forgery, while others consider it a largely authentic version of the original text.
The Bamboo Annals is one of the most important ancient texts on early China, along with others such as the Zuo Zhuan, Shujing and the later Shiji.
Famous quotes containing the words bamboo and/or annals:
“One bamboo does not make a raft.”
—Chinese proverb.
“The conqueror at least; who, ere Time renders
His last award, will have the long grass grow
Above his burnt-out brain and sapless cinders.
If I might augur, I should rate but low
Their chances: they are too numerous, like the thirty
Mock tyrants, when Rome’s annals wax’d but dirty.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)