Book/Printed Material Ji he yuan ben 幾何原本
More Resources
About this Item
Title
- Ji he yuan ben
Other Title
- 幾何原本
Translated Title
- The Elements of Geometry
Summary
- In 1690, Emperor Kangxi summoned two French missionaries, Zhang Cheng (Jean Francois Gerbillon, 1654--1707) and Bai Jin (Joachim Bouvet, 1656--1730), to Beijing to teach him mathematics. The missionaries initially considered using for this purpose the early 17th-century partial translation by Matteo Ricci (1552--1610) and Xu Guangqi (1562--1633) of Euclid's great work on geometry, Elements, but they found it too complicated. So they decided to translate instead Elements de geometrie by French Jesuit Ignace Gaston Pardies (1636--73), which drew on Euclid, Archimedes, and Apollonius. They gave their work, in seven juan, the same Chinese title, Ji he yuan ben (The elements of geometry), as Ricci and Xu had given their translation of Euclid. This very rare copy is handwritten. There are corrections in ink and numerous paper slips of corrections pasted on pages, and some editorial notes by the translators, one of which reads: "Zhang Cheng wishes to correct." The work was presented to Emperor Kangxi, who added comments of his own in the upper margins. The National Central Library of Taiwan owns another edition of this work, the preface of which notes that the Ricci work was grammatically unclear and difficult to understand, which explains why this translation was made. The text of this other edition is the same as the one translated by Zhang Cheng and Bai Jin, except that it incorporates earlier corrections. Both copies were previously owned by the book collectors Mo Tang (1865--1929) and Wang Yinjia (1892--1949).
Names
- Bouvet, Joachim, 1656-1730 Translator
- Gerbillon, Jean-François, 1654-1707 Translator
- Pardies, Ignace-Gaston, 1636-1673 Author
Created / Published
- [Place of publication not identified] : [Publisher not identified], 1690.
Headings
- - China--Beijing--Beijing
- - 1636 to 1673
- - Jesuits
Notes
- - Title devised, in English, by Library staff.
- - "Manuscript copy"--Note extracted from World Digital Library.
- - Original resource extent: 7 juan in 6 volumes : illustrations.
- - Original resource at: National Central Library.
- - Content in Chinese.
- - Description based on data extracted from World Digital Library, which may be extracted from partner institutions.
- - Title revised per Asian Division.--cc28 2023-01-06
Medium
- 1 online resource.
Source Collection
- Chinese Books, Manuscripts, Maps, and Prints
Digital Id
Library of Congress Control Number
- 2021666337
Online Format
- compressed data
- image