Tang-Yin-Pi-Shih. "Parallel Cases from under the Pear-Tree." A 13th-Century Manual of Jurisprudence and Detection. Translated from the Original Chinese with an Introduction and Notes.

GULIK, Robert van.

Published by Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1956

About this Item

First edition, scarce in the jacket. Van Gulik drew on cases from the Tang-Yin-Pi-Shih as plot devices for his Judge Dee novels, and his long introductory essay in this publication is one of the earliest Western scholarly treatments of Chinese legal history. The Tang-Yin-Pi-Shih records over 100 legal cases. It was compiled by the Southern Song bureaucrat Gui Wanrong (ca. 1170 1260) and was widely consulted for hundreds of years. Octavo. With 2 half-tone plates; illustrations and Chinese characters in text. Original red cloth, spine lettered in gilt, front cover panelled in blind with lettering and publisher's emblem in gilt. With dust jacket. Contemporary ownership signature of one J. L. Hoyd on front free endpaper. Spine ends sunned, tips bumped, slight bowing: jacket flaps without price as issued, spine sunned, closed tear and couple of chips, a few old adhesive tape repairs on verso: a very good copy in like jacket.

Seller Inventory # 181300

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Tang-Yin-Pi-Shih. "Parallel Cases from under the Pear-Tree." A 13th-Century Manual of Jurisprudence and Detection. Translated from the Original Chinese with an Introduction and Notes.
• Publisher: Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1956
• Edition: 1st Edition