Who Said There Was a Classic of Music

Bibliographic Data

ID20380584
AuthorsLuke Waring (The University of Texas at Austin, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume45
Pages467-514
Publication date2022-09-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEarly China (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0362-5028 • E-ISSN: 2325-2324
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/eac.2022.3
OpenAlexW4281712108
LanguageEN
References cited16

For almost a thousand years, Chinese scholars have debated the existence of a Classic of Music in pre-Qin times. Some say the text once existed but was later lost; others say it was incorporated into other works, or that it only existed as a collection of musical scores. Some say it never existed at all. Though Western scholars have tended to sidestep the issue, most have at least assumed that it was believed during Han that a music classic had once existed. Not only is there no convincing evidence that a music classic existed during the Warring States era, however, few if any in the Han believed that it had. Indeed, the first claims that a Classic of Music had once existed emerged only in the latter part of the Six Dynasties era. This article will introduce the debates that have animated scholars on this controversy, examine the evidence for the existence of a pre-Qin music classic, and identify when Chinese scholars came to believe that such a text had once existed. I will argue that the belief that a classic music text had previously been extant reflects early medieval misunderstandings of the role occupied by written texts in antiquity

Art · Extant taxon · Literature · Musical · Chinese history and philosophy · Eurasian Exchange Networks · History · Hong Kong and Taiwan Politics

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