On Liang Jiabin’s Historiography

Liang Jiabin is a significant historiographer who immigrated fromMainland China to Taiwan in earlier time. Even in the1930s, he had been well-knownin the academic community for his monograph “Text Of The Canton Thirteen Hongs”,and became the forefather and an authority in this field. However, subsequent scholarsfailed to give deep and comprehensive study to Liang Jiabin’s historiography. On theone hand, they did not have enough thesis or monographs to turn to, on the otherhand, researchers tended to focus on Liang Jiabin’s contributions on The ThirteenHongs and Ryukyu issue, neglected his achievements in other aspects. Therefore, theyfailed to do the research systematically and universally, which has allowed morespace for us to continue the research on Jiabin’s historiography.Two factors have led Liang Jiabin to get into the research on historiography. Thefirst one is his family. Liang’s family values much on education. Liang Jiabin hasbeen influenced by Chinese traditional cultures when he was a juvenile, and itaccelerated Liang Jiabin to step on the road of historiography when his brother LiangFangzhong chose to study historiography. The second one is the time. Back to thattime, the foreign powerful countries casted greedy eyes on Chinese border territories,which prompting a batch of advanced individuals to open eyes to the world andcommitted frontier research.Under this influence, Liang Jiabin devoted himself to thethe research of Borderland History and Geography. Afterwards, Liang Jiabin had beeninfluenced mainly by three teachers in the process of history governance. One is JiangTingfu, who is his tutor when he was in Tsinghua University. Liang Jiabin enteredhistory department following Jiang Tingfu, and subjected to the advice to engate inthe study of The Thirteen Hongs shortly. Tingfu Jiang had made a significant impacton the road to history governance of Jiabin Liang. The second professor isChenYinge,who is his optional course teacher when he was in Tsinghua University,Liang Jiabin was captured by ChenYinge’s special way of teaching, and tried toimitate in his later teaching. Moreover, Liang Jiabin regarded ChenYinge as a leadingauthority with great knowledge in history circle. His way of history study wasinfluenced naturally by ChenYinge. The third professor is He Tianqing, who is histutor when he studied in Japan, Liang Jiabin read vast quality of original materialswith the help of He Tianqing, which had assisted him with his thesis writingafterwards. Moreover, He Tianqing’s some methods of history study also affected Liang Jiabin.Liang Jiabin owned a large quantity of brilliant works whose major historicalachievement was reflected in the following aspects: firstly, research on The CantonThirteen Hongs. Liang Jiabin led the research trend of the Thirteen Hongs and woncountless prestigious on the basis of Tex t Of The Canton Thirteen Hongs. Secondly,research on the issue of Ryukyu. Liang Jiabin consumed the longest duration andpublished most publications on this issue. Thirdly, some research on Portugal andSpain. Finally, in-depth research on important historical figures, such as Jizi, Xu Fu,William John Napier, Li Hongzhang, and so on. An important feature of thesecharacters was that they played an important role in the development of Sino-foreignrelations. From the historical achievements of Liang Jiabin, his historical achieveentmainly possessed the following several characteristics. First, focus on the practicalrole of historiography which was the important manifestations of traditional Chinesehistoriography. During the troubled times, the application functional requirements ofits history are even more intense and increasing. Living in internal and external crises,Liang Jiabin tried his best to maximize the practical function of historiography as wellas blended the concerns of current affairs and patriotism together perfectly. Second,endow with a strict textual style. Liang Jiabin, using the method of textual criticism topush and verify historical facts repeatedly, was scrupulous with study. There is nodoubt that it constituted the main feature of Liang Jiabin historical research. Third,take advantage of multilingual, multidisciplinary and multi-national archives. Duringthe process of governing history, Liang Jiabin made every endeavor to collect almostall relevant materials. In order to attain the objective, he conquered many languages,learning interdisciplinary knowledge and making full use of archive materials.Liang Jiabin’s research on historiography have had a major impact in history.First of all, Liang Jiabin made significant contributions to history education for theremoval of the influence of colonial education in Taiwan. He compiled relevanthistory textbooks and popular books from two angles of normal college students’education and popular history to promote patriotism and establish national pride andconfidence. Secondly, Liang Jiabin’s works are widely referenced and commented bylater scholars. Finally, Liang Jiabin had made a significant impact on the scholars inthe same field by means of conscientious attitude toward scholarship. For example,Zhu Jieqin, Wang Ermin, Li Enhan, Zhang Wenqin were all under the influence ofLiang Jiabin and has also made outstanding achievements.