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Qin-Han yintong 秦漢印統

Jul 24, 2023 © Ulrich Theobald

The seal album Qin-Han yintong 秦漢印統 goes back to a common project of Gu Congde 顧從德 (1519-1587), who commissioned the seal carver Luo Wangchang 羅王常 (1535-1606), courtesy name Yannian 延年, from Zhangjun 鄣郡 (today part of Changxing 長興, Zhejiang), to reproduce his collection of ancient seals. The result was the catalogue Ji guyin pu 集古印譜, printed in 1572.

Luo – who also called himself Wang Chang 王常 – felt, however, that the book did not show the whole range of early seals, and therefore created a catalogue of his own, including more seals from other collections. This was the catalogue Qin-Han yintong with a length of 8 juan, and printed in 1606. It presents the imprints of metal and jade seals from the Warring States 戰國 (5th cent.-221 BCE) to the Southern and Northern Dynasties period 南北朝 (300~600), official and well as private ones, and such bearing names and official titles as well as seals with figures (xiaoxing 肖形).

Figure 1. Seal imprints from the Qin-Han yintong 秦漢印統
Small imperial seals (xiaoxi 小璽) inscribed in different styles of small seal script and birds-and-worms script. The annotations give information on the seal handles and quote from earlier catalogues. From Guangming zhi men 光明之門.

The seals were annotated by Luo Wangchang himself, Wu Yuanwei 吳元維, and Gu Jinheng 顧晉亨. The reproductions were created by Gong Shanzhang 龔善長. Some of the prefaces of the Ji guyin pu were adapted for the Qin-Han yintong, namely Huang Jishui's 黃姬水 (1509-1574) preface, and Wang Zhideng's 王稚登 (1535-1612) preface of the revised version of the book, Yinsou 印藪.

Sources:
Wang Hongjun 王洪軍 (2015). "Luo Wangchang Qin-Han yintong benmo kao 羅王常《秦漢印統》本末考", Wenxian 文獻, 2015 (3): 19-27.
Sun Xiangqun 孫向群 (2008). "Du Guojia Tushuguan cang Qin-Han yintong 讀國家圖書館藏《秦漢印統》", Shandong Tushuguan jikan 山東圖書館季刊, 2008 (4): 87-92.
Wang Chongren 王崇人, ed. (2002). Zhongguo shuhua yishu cidian 中國書畫藝術辭典, Vol. Zhuanke 篆刻卷 (Xi'an: Shaanxi renmin yishu chubanshe), 138.