Description
Book SynopsisTian, or Heaven, had been used in China since the Western Zhou to indicate both the sky and the highest god. Examining excavated materials, Lillian Tseng shows how Han-dynasty artisans transformed various notions of Heaven—as the mandate, the fantasy, and the sky—into pictorial entities, not by what they looked at, but by what they looked
into.
Trade ReviewThis remarkable book readably represents a formidable effort of research, drawing on the rich studies of history, art, and paleography that have accumulated over centuries, and particularly on the last forty years of archeology. Lillian Lan-ying Tseng colligates images that no one earlier has studied side by side, and draws from them quite original conclusions. I find her arguments ambitious, ingenious, and persuasive. . . . They show once and for all that pictures are as important as verbal records for understanding the history of cosmology and astronomy. -- Nathan Sivin, Professor Emeritus of Chinese Culture and of the History of Science, University of Pennsylvania
Picturing Heaven in Early China makes an extremely important contribution to the history of Chinese art, culture, and science. Its comprehensive scope and analytical depth, its confident use of both primary textual sources and archeological evidence, its lucid synthesis of a vast array of scholarly literature . . . and above all, its cogent narrative and conceptual scheme make it the most convenient and reliable go-to volume on the subject. -- Eugene Wang, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Professor of Asian Art, Harvard University
