Mawangdui silk texts
The Mawangdui silk texts are manuscripts recovered from Western Han tombs at Mawangdui in Changsha, Hunan. Excavated between 1972 and 1974, the tombs yielded silk and bamboo texts alongside other funerary materials.[1] The manuscripts are important evidence for the early transmission of Chinese texts and for the diverse intellectual environment of the Han period.
Laozi manuscripts
The Mawangdui finds include two silk manuscripts of the Laozi. They are earlier than the received editions commonly associated with Wang Bi and Heshang Gong, and their sequence places the De section before the Dao section.[2] The tomb was sealed in 168 BCE, and the older of the two manuscripts was probably copied before 195 BCE.[2]
Huang-Lao context
The tombs also contained texts commonly identified with the Huangdi sijing (Four Classics of the Yellow Emperor). Their discovery has been central to modern scholarship on Huang-Lao, the early Han tradition associated with the Yellow Emperor and Laozi.[3]
See also
References
- ↑ "Changsha Mawangdui Han Dynasty Tombs Exhibition". Hunan Museum. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Laozi". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- ↑ "The Thought of Huang-Lao: A Reflection on the Lao Tzu and Huang Ti Texts in the Silk Manuscripts of Ma-wang-tui". The Journal of Asian Studies. Retrieved 2026-10-01.