>> From the Library of
Congress in Washington D.C.
[ Silence ]
>> Travis Hensley:
Good afternoon.
My name is Travis Hensley, and
I'm a Program Specialist here
at the John W. Kluge Center.
Before we begin today's
program please take a moment
to check your cell phones
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This afternoon's program is
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as well as our YouTube
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Today's lecture is presented by
the John W. Kluge Center here
at the Library of Congress.
The John W. Kluge Center
is a vibrant scholar center
on Capitol Hill that
brings together scholars
and researchers from around the
world to energize one another,
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library's rich resources,
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policymakers in the public.
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for senior scholars
and postdoctoral fellows to
do research in the Library
of Congress collections.
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which recognizes
outstanding achievement
in the study of humanity.
We will be holding the
Kluge Prize in 2018.
For more information
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visit loc.gov/kluge.
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Today's program is titled,
"Mapping the Landscape: Vision,
Memory and Place-making."
It has been presented
by Dr. Xin Wu,
who is an Associate
Professor of Art and History
at the College of
William and Mary.
She specializes in the history
of the representation of nature
in East Asian art and global
contemporary environmental art
and landscape architecture.
As a Kluge fellow for the last
year Professor Wu has leveraged
the library's collections to
help develop a book manuscript
on vision and place-making
in the neo-Confucianism
academies of Song, China.
Please join me in
welcoming Professor Wu.
[ Applause ]
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Thank
you for the introduction.
And good afternoon, everyone.
Thank you for coming
and for your support.
I'm very honored to be part of
the time-honored lecture series
of Kluge scholar lecturers.
Last year I was very
fortunate to be able
to spend a whole year
very productive here
as the Kluge fellow
while I was able to work
on my book manuscript
on Song Academy,
but also discovered
new materials
for many future projects.
So this progress would not
be possible without many
of the support from here in
the center, and in the library,
especially the interdisciplinary
environment of the center
and the research
sources at the library.
I'm indebted to many people.
And many are here.
And I'm sorry I wouldn't be
able to mention all the names,
especially, you know, from
Asian Division, Geography
and Map Division and [inaudible]
and Special Collections.
At the Kluge Center I thank
especially Mary Rurick [phonetic
spelling] and Travis
Hensley for constant support
and encouragement,
which you really need
in a long fellowship,
and also Chet Van Duzer,
devoted historian of cartography
and [inaudible] fellow
in residence.
He deserves special
acknowledgement
for calling my attention to the
Library of Congress collection
of rare Chinese historical
maps, and for inspiring many
of the questions I set
out to discuss right now.
As the Art Historian and the
trend architecture engaged
with historical maps
the materiality
of the artifact is
central to my concern.
I shall take the
art media employed
in traditional Chinese
maps as the departure point
of my inquiry, and proceed
to discuss three types
of related spaces
it [inaudible],
that is the cartographic
space, the pictorial space
and the physical space.
My focus here will be on mapping
as the action of positioning.
That is a process in
practice, rather than on maps
as the result of that process.
We are familiar with maps
created on the flat surface
of two-dimensional media,
such as paper or parchment,
and presented in various
formats, such as sheets,
books, albums, scrolls.
However, these media are
not to be taken for granted
as the only ones
for making maps.
Stela is in the Chinese
cartographic tradition typical
of a quite different medium
in three-dimensional form,
just like groves in the
Western cartographic tradition.
We have many groves
in our collection
in Geography and Maps.
But we don't have actually
a stele in the collection.
Steles are an important media
that carries symbolic meaning.
Major steles often stand over
20-meters high being decorated
at the bottom, at the base,
decorated with two
sons of dragon.
The one on top is the
literary [inaudible]
in the form of a dragon.
That's the picture up right.
At the bottom is the son of the,
on the base is the [inaudible]
who is in the form of a
turtle carrying the stele.
Legend has it that
[inaudible] the turtle was a
flood-causing monster.
It was tamed by the mythical
King Yu [phonetic spelling]
who led the people
through the deluge.
In an action named [inaudible]
King Yu forcefully put the
monster under control by
suppressing it with the stele.
The stele was engraved with
records of his accomplishment
at flood control that
guaranteed internal protection
to the land of China.
Thus launched the
Chinese civilization.
For millennia steles
bearing inscriptions
and images were erected
in the landscape
and in important locations,
such as palaces and tombs,
fulfill the dual function of
commemoration and of good deeds,
and suppressing evil spirits.
Following the unification
of China in 211 BCE,
the first emperor, for instance,
is erected the seventh stele
doing his inspection tour
throughout the empire to
commemorate his triumph,
and to mark the territory.
The first of these steles
was erected immediately
after the unification in
210 BCE in [inaudible]
to worship the mythical king,
precisely the person
we just mentioned,
who like the first emperor
and before him was believed
to have inspected all the
land of China doing the survey
of mountain and water in
the order of flood control.
All seven steles were placed
on the top of major mountains
after ritual worship
addressed to heaven and earth
that officially guaranteed the
divine power of the emperor.
They do not only mark the
boundaries of the new empire,
but also to indicate
the first emperor's rule
over the vast territory
from the Great War
to the South China Sea.
A stele has constituted a
very important cultural media
throughout Chinese history.
The Han Dynasty scholars
collected
and rectified the classics
of Confucius teachings,
which the first emperor
tried to destroy.
So they had them
carved on steles
in a standard calligraphic
script,
and displayed in the cities.
That was the famous
[inaudible] stone classics.
Record has it it
has 40 plus steles,
holds over 200,000
characters, and people come,
thousands of them, to view
and read and make rubbings.
It is erected in the
center of the capital city.
Following this president
and starting
in the 6th century CE
many Buddhist Sutras
and images were carved on
stele, and placed in mountains
around major temples
transforming nature landscape
into religious settings.
From the Sung Dynasty onwards
steles were used as records
for classic studies,
and presented
in government and
private schools.
Classics and canonical
texts were inscribed
on the stone tablets as
we see on the image here,
and placed in the gardens, and
throughout the academy compound.
By the 3rd century the
image scholars reading stele
to visit antiquity had become
a popular theme in literature,
and paintings soon
followed suit.
The Sung Dynasty painting
reading the stele [inaudible]
stone depict a scholar and
his boy, his attendant boy,
in front of a towering stele
looking upward in admiration.
All the [inaudible] trees in a
wintry landscape are testimony
to a Chinese sense of history
as the ceaseless dialogue
between the past
and the present.
The presence of the stele
and the timeless message it
carries transport this scholar
into historical time and space.
[inaudible] the agency at
work does not only derive
from the message engraved
on the stone surface,
but also from the
stele's physical existence
in the landscape as a monumental
and historical symbol.
One cannot separate the
message from the media,
and the media from its location.
Thus the physical
existence of a stele
in a place establishes
a reference point
for reading its content.
And in reciprocal fashion
inscriptions and images
on steles bestows in symbolic
meaning to places brought
to viewers' attention
by their presence.
This map we have a rubbing of
it in the library's collection.
Stele was the commonly
used media
in the Chinese cartographical
tradition.
This map of the ancient
city [inaudible]
in South Song China Dynasty
is the world's oldest engraved
city map.
The stele was engraved in 1229.
It was erected in
the Confucius temple
of [inaudible] prefecture
modern-day [inaudible]
in Jiangsu province.
The original stone has now been
removed from its original site,
and housed in the Museum
of Engraved Stone
Tablets in [inaudible].
The Library of Congress owns
a rare version actually.
It's a rare stone rubbing
of this stele dated
to the end of the 19th century.
That is the time of
the rubbing was made.
It was between 1858 to 1869.
It was a gift from the American
Presbyterian Missionary William
Gamble in 1938.
And it is one of the earliest
and the largest stone
rubbing maps in China.
This line drawing based on the
stele gives us a clearer view
of the relief on this 13th
century engraved stone.
The map is remarkable.
It detailed containing the city
wall, the governor's quarters,
buildings and gardens, and the
dense network of roads, rivers,
canals, over 250
temples and hosts,
and 65 gateways,
and 359 bridges.
North is on top.
And the chain of mountains is
depicted west of the city wall.
In the close-up view to the
right of the screen the network
of streets, canals and
the rivers is projected
as a typical plan view, while
the city wall, architecture,
mountains are presented in a
pictorial rendering as seen
from an elevated viewpoint,
exactly as in traditional
Chinese landscape paintings.
This I shall identify
as a juxtaposition
of cartographic and
pictorial space.
The engraved map measuring 9.5
feet to five feet is larger
than most maps created on a
single sheet of parchment.
The stele standing at nearly
9.5 feet tall and 5.5 feet wide,
and one foot thick, commands
an impressive presence
than a two-dimensional map.
This map as a monumental project
of object may remind
contemporary museum goers
of the time-honored literati
tradition of reading stele
to visit the ancient sites.
Imagine that the stele was still
in its original outdoor
setting, then what is a map?
Is it the image carved
on the stone surface?
Or is it the stele
bearing that image?
By focusing on the media here
the stele the question arises
about the relationship between
cartographic representation
of space and the physical
presence in space.
In this case we are
presented with condensation
of cartography and
physical space.
As shown in the painting
the stele
as the object provides a
connection to a longer history,
and the large space that
established the coordinates
for decoding the
content of a map.
Then changes of a stele's
physical location will alter our
understanding of the map.
This brief detour through
the media of stele as a media
of the map then draws our
attention to different types
of spaces that Chinese
cartography engaged with.
While it will be helpless to
try to define what is a map,
I have just highlighted
the three types of spaces
that are relevant to
my studies of mapping
as the action of positioning.
The cartographic space defined
by a plan and its coordinates
that provides the manifesting
meaning of this work.
The pictorial space
presenting a conic view
that triggers visual
images of place.
And then finally the
physical space on the ground
where a map stands, and
partially represents.
Next I shall proceed to
discuss the interrelationship
between these different types
of space, and their impact
on mapping the landscape.
The materials I use
are mostly visual.
Due to the time constraint
I shall not be able
to discuss the [inaudible],
which is an indispensable branch
of Chinese cartography tradition
that emphasized textual records.
Let's start with two [inaudible]
actually explore the question
around the two oldest
[inaudible] maps in China.
They are presently in the
Forest of Stone Steles in one
of the most impressive
museums in modern city Xi'an.
That is in the site of the
ancient capital Chang'an.
And the two maps were
engraved on the two sides
of the same stele during
the Sung Dynasty in 1136
at the government School of
Jizhou near the ancient capital
of Chang'an in the
Yellow River Tributary.
They were first studied and then
published in the western world
by French sinologist
Edward Siobhan in 1903,
and then later praised by the
British scholar Joseph Needham
as the most outstanding maps
of their time in his Science
and Civilization in China.
On one side of the stone we can
see Huayi tu the Map of Chinese
and Barbarians, or the Map
of Chinese and Foreigners.
It was based on the Map
of Chinese and Barbarians
within the sea completed by Tang
Dynasty cartographer Jat Jatin
[assumed spelling] in 801.
The cardinal directions
are marked
on four sides with north on top.
The map details the
mountains, rivers and the cities
of the empire, and indicates
not its northern border
by highlighting the
location of the Great War.
Actually this was the first
time the Great War was presented
at that time that we know.
Territories of neighboring
states
and nomadic groups were
not shown graphically,
but listed in texts arranged
accordingly around the map.
To a certain extent this
map may be equivalent
to a continental map serving
as a tool for the Sung court
to keep track of its
[inaudible] states and enemies.
Records has it that the same
map was painted in gold lacquer
on a screen behind the throne
of the seventh [inaudible]
Emperor [inaudible].
On the other side of
the stone is Yuju tu,
the Map of the Tracks
of King Yu.
That's the king we have
mentioned at the very beginning.
It is also called
the Map of the Lands
where the sage emperor
left his traces
from his survey for
flood control.
Historians of Chinese
cartography agreed
that the original maps made
use of for the engraving
on the stele were made much
earlier, probably before 1100.
Over 500 hidden Asian
and contemporary place names
are plotted on the map,
which represents a panorama
of China in Sung times.
The engraving of the hydrologic
system is especially detailed
with nearly 880 rivers and
over 70 mountains named.
Representations of
the Yellow River
and the Yangtze River
courses are very close
to their appearance
on present-day maps.
That is to say it's
rather accurate.
The contour of the sea coast
is also quite accurate.
Among surviving maps engraved
in stone this map is oldest
and the earliest to have
grade marks indicating scale.
It is the primary example
of the level of map making
in China during the
12th century at least.
Its title makes reference to the
mythical King Yu's inspection
of the ancient land of China.
The map offers a presentation of
mountains and the rivers listed
in ancient records of the track
of the king during his
flood-control survey,
which assumably covered
the whole land of China.
In this way the myth of
King Yu does give rise
to a Chinese cartographic
tradition
that refers place locations
to mountains and the river,
the water features on the land,
and stresses the functional
importance of water management.
Our early discussion has
underscored the importance
of a stele's existence
in physical location,
in physical space, and its
impact on our understanding
of the meaning of its content.
The engraving of two maps,
one continental, one national,
on each side of the stele
implies that the location
where it stood marked
both the divide of China
and its neighbors,
Barbarian, and the heartland
of the central kingdom.
But why so?
And how? And was the
stele intended to function
as we mentioned earlier?
That is to commemorate
the last empire
or to suppress its
aggressive enemies.
Before answering
those questions,
let's turn to a correlated
mapping event.
Six years later one of the two
maps, the Map of the Tracks
of King Yu, that is the
national map, was reproduced
in a different place in 1142.
This new stele was
engraved, and they erected
in the government
school in the city
of Zhenjiang along
the Yangtze River.
When we confront with
two identical map steles
in two very distant
places, let's engage
in a more detailed
reading for the sake
of comparison between the two.
They are almost identical,
disappointing,
with two noticeable differences.
First, the legend of the
1142 map, that is the one
to my right, yes, also to
your right, clearly indicates
that it was made after the
early engraving of [inaudible],
and that is the map to the left.
Secondly, the sea was
[inaudible] in wave pattern
on the 1142 map, and
not in the early map,
and left a blank in
the 1136 version.
The cartographer of the
original map remains unknown.
There is a fair amount
of debate going around.
It is attributed to the polymap
and the scientist Shen Kuo,
who had been a governor
near Chun,
and that's where the
first map was carved,
and then later retired to
his hometown Zhenjiang,
that's where the second map,
second stele was carved,
where he compiled the famous
Brush Talks from the Dream Book.
A look at a map made
by Shen Kuo.
A similar presentation
of the sea
on this map might
support this attribution
of possible authorship.
The map of the prefecture
and the counties
of the nine districts is the
early extent map on stele.
It was engraved in 1121
at the prefecture school.
It was excavated in
1936 in the [inaudible]
for cultural revolution.
It is now housed in the
Museum of Sichuan Province.
Besides its remarkable accuracy
the map boasts a uniquely
elaborated pictorial depiction
of the sea that is incomparable
to any other known
maps of medieval China.
Unfortunately, the library
does not have a copy
of a rubbing of this map.
The presentation of the sea
includes ships, dragons,
horses and fishes, all
sorts of celestial beings.
It is worth mentioning that
Shen Kuo also of this map
in his book The Brush
Talks from the Dream Book.
It's an encyclopedical
anthropology
of [inaudible] covering not only
science, but also humanities,
and that he is in the history
of art he's art attending,
he was the one who coined
at the time-honored the
landscape painting theme Eight
Views of Xiaoxian.
Now let's move back, return
to the two steles bearing
the Map of Tracks of King Yu.
The fact that the media of the
map was not a portable sheet
of paper that we can carry
around, but a heavy stele fixed
to the ground backs
further scrutiny
of the intention behind the
engraving and re-graving,
and the relocation
of this stele map.
By a paradoxical twist the
location of the original stele,
the former capital city of
Chang'an, also actually outside
of the Chinese border,
in the year of 1136
when the first stone
was engraved.
In 1127 China was defeated
by the invading [inaudible].
And the last is capital
city [inaudible].
Emperor [inaudible] and his
successor [inaudible] together
with over 3,000 members of
the court were captured.
The remaining of the Sung
court fled to the south.
And then reestablished
itself in [inaudible]
and modern-day Hangzhou.
This movement of the Sung court
marked the end of Northern Sung,
and the beginning
of Southern Sung.
The two maps to the left shows
the location of the border
of Southern Sung
and Northern Sung,
especially when in Southern Sung
[inaudible] we can see the size
of China almost shrank to half.
Management of a vast
former Chinese territory
with its far more advanced
agriculture and economy,
however, was beyond the
ability of a nomadic invader.
And there is a solution.
A [inaudible] called
[inaudible] ruled
by a former Chinese
official was established
between 1130 and 1137.
Precisely in that period
is the stele carved.
The original stele, therefore,
was engraved at a special moment
at history in between
the territory of China
and its Barbarian invader
under a [inaudible] government
established by the occupier,
but run by a Chinese
official in order
to rule a Chinese populace.
Although we cannot be sure of
the rationale behind the making
of the origin stele the
fact that it was located
at the ancient capital
of Chang'an instead
of the [inaudible] Northern Sung
capital may indicate a denial
of the defeat and nostalgia
for the expensive powerful
Chinese empire during the Han
and the Tang dynasties.
Given a stele's dual function
in commemorating good deeds
and suppressing evil, it may
also have embodied a claim
for legitimacy as
a Chinese emperor
by the ill-fated
[inaudible] ruler.
On the other hand, the action
of re-engraving a stele
bearing the same map,
and thus relocate
the map to Zhenjiang
in the south repositioned
the map of King Yu back
in the only legitimate
Chinese territory at the time.
Back to the Sung time.
The remaking and the relocation
of the stele from Chang'an
to Zhenjiang, as here we can
see, highlighted the shift
of the center of China from
the Yellow River region
to the Yangtze River.
Examination of the structure of
the land of China shows a divide
of north and the south along the
tributaries of the two rivers,
while the Great Canal,
that is the purple line,
provides a south/north
connection
between the two river systems.
When the north was lost the city
of Zhenjiang at the intersection
of [inaudible] and the
canal was at the heart
of a newly established
[inaudible] territory,
mainly expanding over the
tributary of the [inaudible].
The erection of a stele
here bearing the full map
of King Yu's track therefore
asserts the court's control
of China in its putative
[inaudible],
no matter how elusive
that vision might be.
The map was overly mistaken,
but political, not political,
yet the location of the stele
implies a political statement
of possession.
To underline the complexity
of such a map on stele
as a meaning making monument,
this stele derived a part
of its agency from its location.
And in return bestows a
symbolic value to the region
where it stood as
the [inaudible] work
against potential invaders.
This is only one example of the
recursive relationship implied
by a map on a stele that
allows its physical location
to inform the manifest
meaning of the map enduring it
with symbolic agency, which
in turn casts the whole site
in your light.
It is mapping as an
action of positioning.
Now let's turn to the
site of Zhenjiang.
As mentioned earlier,
the presence of a stele
in the landscape under the
timeless message it carries
transported a scholar into
a historical time and space.
Since the manifest content
of a map is a representation
of place the changing
significance of a place
through history in turn
can be reflected by changes
in the map's pictorial space.
To illustrate this point we
shall zoom in on the site
of Zhenjiang, and quickly
survey some changes in its fate,
and in the mapping
of its landscape.
Zhenjiang sits along the
Yangtze River at the crossing
between the river
and the Great Canal.
Its name literally
means securing
or surprising the
[inaudible] precisely.
It's the word I mentioned when
the mythical king was trying
to control the turtle.
The character [inaudible]
to suppress refers
to the action King Yu performed
to surprise [inaudible],
the turtle dragon, with a stele.
Here the subject of
suppression was flooding
by the Yangtze River.
Militarily the character
[inaudible] also means securing
and defending.
At the hot end of the 6th
century the city was made
into an important garrison
on the lower Yangtze River,
and will soon become
a commentary site.
And its importance grows
with the construction
of the Grand Canal
in the 7th century.
From the 8th century BCE
onwards Zhenjiang was the seat
of a future domain
under various names.
Legend has it that the
site's Feng Shui was so great
that the first emperor had
to order 3,000 prisoners
to dig a tunnel through
one of its hills in order
to dissipate its
spiritual energy.
During Northern Sung when
China was under constant threat
of Zhenjiang invasion
from the north,
the Yangtze River became an
important natural burial.
And the city of Zhenjiang at
the cross section of the river
under the canal gained further
attention from the throne.
The prefecture of Zhenjiang
was established in 1113.
That is 1, 1, 1, 3.
By [inaudible] the last
emperor of Northern Sung,
who resigned there
before he was enthroned,
and who was interested
in southern landscapes.
Politically [inaudible] was
remembered as a terrible king
who lost his whole empire.
But culturally he was remembered
as an accomplished artist
and an exceptional
patron for the arts.
The year of 1113 that gave rise
to [inaudible] prefecture also
saw the birth of a masterpiece
in Chinese painting history.
That's what we see
on the screen.
This spectacular blue-green
landscape [inaudible] of river
and mountains was completed
by a student of [inaudible]
in the [inaudible] Painting
Academy, although the title
of this 36-foot-long scroll
does not contain the name
of [inaudible], it
is often considered
to be the first attempt
in presenting the long
river in a holistic manner.
To order such a major
work the emperor reigning
in the north clearly
paid particular attention
to the [inaudible] in the south.
The scroll closes
with the mountain.
We are seeing the end
section of the scroll.
It closes with a mountain
on the shoreline overlooking
all the water implied the mouth
of the river.
It calls our attention
to changes
in Chinese visual culture.
And to the use of an imperial
style tradition the blue
and the green landscape painting
originated in Tang Dynasty.
[ Silence ]
The early surviving [inaudible]
prefecture was compiled in 1213.
That that is 100 years
later than the painting,
and the establishment
of the prefecture.
Following the Northern Sung's
defeat by the [inaudible]
and the establishment
of the Southern Sung,
the Yangtze River
replaced the Yellow River
as a natural barrier
between Imperial China
and its Barbarian invaders.
The importance of Zhenjiang as
the military defense position
and a cultural historical
site increased further,
which led to the compilation
of the multiple [inaudible].
When the north and the
south were rejoined
under the Mongol Court,
after the collapse
of Southern Sung Zhenjiang
remained significant
as the crossroad of two
of China's key water
traffic systems, the Yangtze
and the Grand Canal,
which explains why it is
mentioned by Marco Polo.
And Marco Polo's description
of China under the Great Han
in his book of The Marvels
of the World has led
to imaginary depiction
of Chinese cities
in several early
modern European maps.
[inaudible] map of 1455, for
example, Zhenjiang was depicted
in the fashion of a medieval
city so as other Chinese cities.
And the blue course
showing is [inaudible].
Another name of Zhenjiang
is [inaudible].
The term [inaudible] refers
to a challenging path
guided by high mountains.
In reality the three
mountains [inaudible]
and [inaudible] are
actually not very high.
Although they are now
surrounded by marshes as seen
in this satellite photograph,
two of the mountains [inaudible]
and [inaudible] islands in
mainstream and [inaudible],
which earned them the
name Floating Jade.
Alongside growing attention
for the Yangtze River the loss
of the north and the military
defeat spurred the development
of historical geography
and local history during
the [inaudible] Imperial.
Zhenjiang was presented in
an important prefecture seat
in two major works of
imperial geography combined
in the beginning of
the 13th century.
Almost [inaudible]
with the compilation
of this geography books a long
scroll entitled 10,000 Li Along
Yangtze River is created in
early Southern Sung period.
The 55-foot-long scroll
shows a bird's-eye view
of the Yangtze River from
its traditional source
in the mountains all
the way to the sea.
You can see on the screen the
scrolls ending section, again,
which shows how the Lower
Yangtze all the way enters
the sea.
Following the same convention
as the imperial vision the
landscape view is oriented
towards the south.
That is the river actually,
and to the left side
of the painting.
In reality the river
floats east.
Let's turn to a close-up
view of the one small section
which reveals the detailed
depiction of the city
of Zhenjiang standing where the
Grand Canal crosses Yangtze.
It's really difficult to see
at the bottom of the screen
that was just a little bit on
the original scroll barges come
from the city of
Yangzhou on the north part
of the Grand Canal would pass
the canal along Watermelon
Island where the canal goes
around, and across the current
and and enters the south
section of the canal
in the [inaudible]
Zhenjiang, sail all the way
down to the capital in
the south, Hangzhou city.
If we compare the two paintings,
what we can see is the location
of Zhenjiang in this location.
It's rather close to the
end of the painting already,
which indicates that at the
time it seems educated people,
highly cultivated people
who produced those
paintings does not know much
about the Yangtze further
down from Zhenjiang,
the point of Zhenjiang.
And when we check the travel
records or in literature,
we found support
to that argument.
Two of the major records
showing the travels all the way
down from Hangzhou, one
upstream and one downstream,
both indicates that they take a
break in the point of crossing.
And then it turns into the canal
system from the main Yangtze.
That is to say at
the time the travel
on Yangtze River will
be ended in the spot
when the boats can turn
into the canal system,
instead of going all
the way down to the sea.
Also on this painting we can see
that in the picture below
is showing the two islands.
And those are the two
islands in front of Zhenjiang.
The idea of Floating Jade
on the Big River has
become a pending theme
in the Northern Sung
period, as here we see.
[ Silence ]
On the other records we have
in the Asian Division an
illustrator [inaudible]
of [inaudible] prefecture
actually shows the
same mountain.
The Yangtze River and
the Grand Canal goes
into the northern section.
The same mountain
would be depicted
in very different medias.
And it's easy to recognize,
because there is this pagoda.
Later on in Ming Dynasty in 1512
the three mountains starting
to be presented as a whole,
as an iconic landscape,
and the [inaudible] were
produced in their name.
Two maps in a private
collection, the collection
by Wellesley Brown, shows very
interestingly two different
views of the three
mountains as a group.
The map, titled Floating Jade
of the Zhenjiang Prefecture,
shows the three mountains
in the shape of a tripod.
As the [inaudible] of
the Three Mountains
of Jingkou shows the
three mountains also
in the same format.
And on top of it we will see
details of these cultural sites
on each of the mountains.
At the far end of the map that
is [inaudible] prefecture.
on the north shore
of [inaudible].
The two maps give us
very different views
of the group of three mountains.
By this time in the Ming
Dynasty it's already become an
iconic landscape.
If the choice of viewing
perspective a precise cardinal
position as a horizontal
pictorial presentation could
carry symbolic meanings
in a sense like a stele.
Even through the symbolism it
would be entirely different.
One media could not
substitute the other.
The map in painting
of the 10,000 Li
of [inaudible] recorded an
expansive version of the land,
as intended for the
emperor's gaze,
since the throne was
always facing south,
the painting would look
towards the south as if it were
under the emperor's gaze.
Yet at the time of its
painting in South Sung
when the court was actually
located in the south,
and then looking towards
the north to [inaudible].
Interestingly [inaudible] map
did not follow the cartographic
convention of the time to put
either the east or the north
on top, similar to the
imperial vision in Chinese.
Instead he uses south
on top similar
to the imperial vision
in a Chinese scroll.
A strange coincidence
that [inaudible] himself
already tried to explain.
I do not want to
give the impression
that there is a linear
development for the presentation
in the Chinese tradition,
or that different methods
actually are used together.
Here we see, what do we
see, it's the [inaudible]
of the canal showing
precisely in the cross spot
between the Yangtze
and the canal.
The text accompanying the
map it no longer exists.
So it would be difficult
to reconstruct exactly
the information.
But we can see this
map is very accurate.
And it probably is intended for
military use or water control.
The fate of Zhenjiang changed
in the later 19th century
when during the the Opium War.
What we see on the screen are
maps, and by engraving made
by the British troops during
the battle of Zhenjiang.
The British took Zhenjiang,
and they eventually
forced the Chinese emperor
to sign treaties.
Eventually led to the opening
of Zhenjiang after the battle.
Zhenjiang was open to trade
after the second Opium War
hoping to foreign trade in 1859.
The British Consulate was
established there in 1864.
The city remained a British
concession until 1927.
After the Grand Canal lost its
importance to the railroads,
Zhenjiang declined in
the later 19th century.
While looking at after this
melancholic image I would
like to wrap up the
idea presented.
That is how the, oh, no, we
have observed the three very
different types of
space in the map making,
of the traditional Chinese
map making, which was carried
by very different art
medias ranging from stele
to long scroll and
the album pages.
It's difficult to isolate
them from one another.
And in the traditional sense
they were all juxtaposed,
and used together to build
up a very rich interpretation
for the place what
they're supposed to show.
The major change comes after
the 19th century when many
of the map making
adopted the modern method,
and that the Chinese myth
making has been seen in more
of a domain of cultural
practice and [inaudible] making.
And that is what I say.
In the traditional sense it
was much more of an action
of positioning in terms
of making of the map.
Okay. Thank you.
[ Applause ]
I guess I can take a
few questions here.
Do you have the time?
>> I did have a question.
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Okay.
>> It was [inaudible]
statement about the placement
of the maps having an
effect on the meaning
and the mass meaning
of [inaudible].
And, if I understood this,--
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Yes.
>> And I'm wondering
how that happens
to roll out into the culture?
I mean does it roll out
in literature [inaudible],
you know, a writer comes
into the stone art,
and sees them [inaudible].
And then, you know, some
new [inaudible] comes out,
or something.
But what your [inaudible]
speak to them.
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Yes.
Actually it's become a
very important aspect.
And, you know, as a continuation
of the literary tradition,
especially I didn't have time
to mention in my research
in the academy, okay, it's
very important for that kind
of engagement with the space.
As the space becomes
in a way flipped
over of carrying the message
that was on the stele.
And then how the
information located
in a particular space will
extend into a historical time
and space, and connect the
reader into the history.
So the physical presence of the
map actually becomes the vehicle
to drive the reader
into a larger context
that makes the map important.
>> Thank you.
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Yeah.
[ Background Noises ]
Dr. Xin Conan-Wu:
Well, if we have--
>> Travis Hensley: You
want to [inaudible]?
Did everyone [inaudible]?
Is that what you want?
No? Okay.
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Thank you.
>> Travis Hensley: Join me in
thanking Dr. Wu [inaudible].
>> Dr. Xin Conan-Wu: Okay.
Thank you very much.
>> This has been a presentation
of the Library of Congress.
Visit us at loc.gov.