BEAL, Samuel.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Abstract of Four Lectures on Buddhist Literature in China Delivered at University College, London. First edition. Beal's lectures, given in the period 1879-1880, discuss the Buddhist Tripitaka and were based on a 16th-century set of the texts that he, with help from the Japanese diplomat Iwakura Tomomi, procured for the India Office Library in 1875.Beal (1825-1889) was the first sinologist to translate early Buddhist texts into English directly from the Chinese. Following service in China as a naval chaplain, in 1877 he was appointed professor of Chinese at University College, London.The plates reproduce illustrations from a Chinese history of Buddhism.

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