A Critical Research On Annotation Of WamyoRuijusho

Ekisai Kariya(1775-1835),is a Sinologist born in late Edo period in Japan,who studied Sinology his whole life and deeply influenced by the collation approach of scholars of Qianlong-Jiaqing period in Qing Dynasty,with his expertise in exegesis &textual criticism of ancient books.Annotation of Wamyo Ruijusho is his most notable collation work.Wamyo Ruijusho was the earliest encyclopedia of Japan,it was compiled by Shitago Minamoto(911-983)in the Henne period.In the book Shitago glossed on words & phrases from ancient Tang Dynasty books,and made collation between Chinese & Japanese languages.After circulation of the book Wamyo Ruijusho in Japan for hundreds of years,there were many different versions and errors from the books that left over and the value of the book was significantly downgraded,which really concerned Ekisai Kariya,Ekisai Kariya then decided to annotate the book.He explained the book with a lot of ancient Chinese & Japanese books and made detailed notes,verifying errors and variances on spelling,characters as well as connotations of words,making revisions on where Shitago made mistakes.Ekisai’s annotation is a masterpiece of Textual Scholarship of the Edo period and also one of the best work among all Japanese Sinologists.His book of annotation brings great value in understanding sino-japan cultural communications history and impact of Chinese culture in Japan.The impact of textual criticism and Japanese mercantilism is obvious on the compilation of this book.And the book itself has positivism and pragmatism inside out.The author actually used Sinology as an induction of Japanese cultural independence.In terms of collation,Kariya categorized the errors & variances by breaking down root causes and sought best emendation,despite the fact that methods & structure of analysis is no difference from classical collation works by comparing ancient records.Kariya studied the basic version in great details while exposing himself to different other works and did a full angle verification,although the in-depth logic was not present in the book.In terms of exegetical studies,from both exegetical methods and exegetical practices,the dissertation listed down how Annotation of Wamyo Ruijusho deployed the definition of character,sound & meaning of each word,exploring how collation was carried out in Kariya’s work and his intention of making Japanese culture independent by the study of Chinese Culture.Meantime,with rectification of ancient works by the author,although it was with a bit of assumption,it made tremendous efforts in the collation of Japanese language.Putting Annotation of Wamyo Ruijusho in the background of Sino-Japan cultural communications,the imitation of scholars of Qing Dynasty is obvious,however,the renaissance the of Japanese culture is clearly shown on the papers.The technical aspects of <Annotation of Wamyo Ruijusho> is way below Qianlong-Jiaqing period scholars but it is a for sure an in-depth influence to the Japanese culture.