The engraving of the Yongle Northern Canon was initiated by Emperor Chengzu 明成祖 (r.1402-1424) in Beijing in 1419. It was not until 1440 that the project was completed with a total of 636 cases. 41 cases were added during the early years of Emperor Shenzong 明神宗 (r. 1573-1620), totaling 677 cases with 6771 volumes.
Most of the prints were destroyed in the past five centuries due to natural disasters and social havocs. According to an investigation conducted by a group of curators of major libraries in China in the 1980s, a mere 30 sets of the Yongle Northern Canon were extant in various libraries, museums and temples. Many of them are fragmentary.
I started to examine the edition of the canon kept in Princeton University’s East Asian Library in 2009. As I found new materials which scholars had heretofore neglected, I proceeded to do research in the other libraries and temples where a set of Yongle Northern Canon is kept. I have traveled far and wide to libraries, museums and temples in China, the US and Poland, examining the extant copies. The more sets of the canon I examined, the more I realized that each edition may have its own characteristics, such as imperial decrees, colophons by the royal family members, seals, donators, and readers, and even front and back covers.
When the emperor donated an edition of the canon to a temple, it was the temple abbot’s responsibility to build a library to house the canon. A stele would be erected in memory of the event. As the canon was the treasure of the temple, monks would take measures to prevent damage by bookworms and natural disasters. Abbots usually invited lay devotees to assist with sunning the canon in order to drive away bookworms. These matters have generally gone unnoticed by scholars.
In the past twelve years, I have taken thousands of photos of the Yongle Northern Canon in temples, libraries and museums. I have made a preliminary analysis of the copies kept in the Princeton University library, the Liaoning Provincial library, Chongqing City Library and the library of Jagiellonian University in Poland. Additionally, I have analyzed the colophons of the canons kept in various libraries and temples. It is hoped that this rudimentary work will catalyze interest and further study of the Buddhist canon.
