Quan Tangwen

The Quan Tangwen (全唐文) is a collection of writings, mainly prose, from the Tang and Five Dynasties periods of China. It has 1,000 volumes and 2 supplementary volumes.

Overview

In the 19th year of the Qing Jiaqing reign (1814), the Qing court established the "Quan Tang Wen Office" (全唐文館) by imperial decree, and 107 people, including Dong Gao (董誥), devoted themselves to compiling this work.

The base texts were the Ming and Qing documents such as the Siku Quanshu (四庫全書) and the Yongle Dadian (永樂大典), along with the Song-dynasty Wenyuan Yinghua (文苑英華) and Tang Wencui (唐文粋), and it includes 20,025 pieces. The authors of the included works number 3,035. The writings of emperors and members of the imperial clan were placed at the beginning, followed by those of monks, Daoist priests, and others, and a short biography (小傳) of each person was attached at the start of each of their works.

The compilation also draws on a wide range of other sources, including the collected works of Tang-era figures, various encyclopedias (類書), notebook fiction (筆記小說), and inscriptions on metal and stone (金石文), and it shows rich content and a high level of textual collation. However, there are not a few shortcomings, such as the failure to state the source or date of each piece.

Editions

• Palace edition (殿本) - Qing imperial edition (內府本)
• Huainan Bookstore edition (淮南書局本)
• Guangdong edition (廣東刊本)