Mantetsu Dining Car Menu 满铁食堂车メニュー

Mantetsu menu. All rights reserved

I found a Mantetsu dining car menu 满铁食堂车メニュー. I didn't find similar pieces on line. Mantetsu used to have the fastest train in the world.

Mantetsu menu. All rights reserved.

滿鐵收藏展

満鉄旧跡陳列館

Fukushima Keido's 福島慶道 Seal of "Rinzai shoshu" 臨濟正宗

Seal of Fukushima Keido. All rights reserved

Many years ago, probably in 2001, I attended a lecture and calligraphy demonstration at Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard University by the late Fukushima Keido 福島慶道 roshi, who was the head of Tofukuji 東福寺 in Kyoto. I asked him to impress his seals of "Rinzai shoshu" 臨濟正宗 on paper and took it as a souvenir with me. Yinyuan always claimed he was the true sect of Linji and I suspected he made the use of this phrase popular among Rinzai monks in Japan. I found the imprints of these two seals lately in my archive. After Fukushima roshi passed away, a memorial tower was built at Jingshan Monastery 徑山寺 in China. I visited there and wrote a blog before.
Fukushima Keido roshi memorial stele in Jingshan Temple 福島慶道長老功德碑

Seal of Fukushima Keido. All rights reserved

Portrait of Chinese Zen Master Tiechuan who was Invited to Go to Japan

Portrait of Master Tiechuan, courtesy of China National Library

I recently received my order from China National Library for the materials I requested during my visit in Sept. 2015. Among them, I have the portrait of Master Tiechuan 鐵船 who was the last Chinese Chan master to be invited to Japan in 1720s. But it looks like he rejected the invitation and never sailed to Japan. I wrote a short blog about him last year. See Mystery of Master Tiechuan 鐵船, who was the Last Eminent Chinese Monk invited by the Edo Bakufu to Japan.

Conference announcement: The Formation of Regional Religious Systems in Greater China

RRS conference announcement:

We are pleased to announce that Department of East Asian Studies at the University of Arizona (Tucson) is organizing a conference on "The Formation of Regional Religious Systems in Greater China." Supported by generous funding from the Chiang Chingkuo Foundation and Su Wukang East Asia Research Fund, this conference aims to provide a new perspective to the “old question” of regionalism and localism in Chinese history, thus initiating a renewed research program of historical GIS and spatial analysis for achieving a more complete consideration of the role of religion in terms of regional formation. The conference, open to all, will be held on April 7 and 8 in Silver and Sage Conference Room at Old Main on campus. Please register through our website. In addition, two conference participants, Prof. Lewis Lancaster (ECAI Director, UC Berkeley) and Prof. Peter Bol (Vice Provost, Harvard University), will give separate lectures on Buddhist studies and online learning on April 6. Please visit our conference website at http://rrs.arizona.edu for details. We encourage our colleagues to spread the news by using the social media functions provided in the website.

The Formation of Regional Religious Systems in Greater China

April 7-8, 2016, Tucson, Arizona

The University of Arizona

Organizer: Department of East Asian Studies, College of Humanities, The University of Arizona

Funded by Chiang Chingkuo Foundation and Su Wukang East Asian Research Fund

Location: Silver and Sage Conference room, Old Main

1200 E University Bl

Tucson, AZ 85721

United States

Conference Program

Official Website: http://rrs.arizona.edu

Pre-conference Events

April 6, Wednesday

Buddhist Studies Lecture Series: Lewis Lancaster, Director of Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative (ECAI), Emeritus Professor, UC Berkeley, Former president of University of the West

Location and Time: Kiva auditorium, Student Union, 4-5pm.

Topic: "The Past, Present, and Future of Buddhist Studies"  

April 6, Wednesday

UA community talk: Peter Bol (Vice Provost, Harvard University), “Teaching and Learning in a Digital Age,” sponsored and funded by College of Humanities, UA Vice Provost Office for Digital Learning and Student Engagement, Department of East Asian Studies, School of Geography and Development, and Confucius Institute.

Modern Language Auditorium, 7pm-9pm

Conference Schedule

April 7, Thursday

8:30 Opening Ceremony

Remarks by Dean Mary Wildner-Bassett, Department Head Albert Welter, and conference organizer Jiang Wu

9:00-9:15 Group Photo

9:15-10:15 Keynote Speech

Peter Bol, Harvard University: “On the Spatio-temporal Analysis of Religious Institutions – A Case Study”

10:15-10:30 Recess

10:30-12:00 Panel One: RRS and its Application

Jiang Wu, University of Arizona: “Further Thoughts on Regional Religious Systems (RRS): Theoretical and Methodological Issues”

Shuming Bao, University of Michigan: “The Spatial Study of Religion: Theories, Methodology, Data, Technology and Applications”

Jiang Wu and Daoqin Tong, University of Arizona: “Transforming William Skinner's Macroregions into Regional Religious Systems”

Response by Lewis Lancaster, UC Berkeley

12:00-1:00 Lunch and Recess

1:00-3:00 Panel Two: RRS in Medieval Buddhist China

Jinhua Chen, UBC: “Hidden Links: The Recovered Identity of An Obscured Buddhist leader in the Sixth Century and the Regional Religious Communities Surrounding him”

Christopher Jensen, McMaster University: “Mapping the Imaginaire of Early Medieval Chinese Buddhism: Regionalism and Patronage in Gaoseng zhuang and Xu gaoseng zhua”

Jason Protass, Stanford University: “Towards a Regional History of Chan Buddhism”

Albert Welter, University of Arizona: “Marking Buddhist Sacred Space: The Aśoka Stūpa Cult in Wuyue and at the Court of Song Taizong”

Response by Lewis Lancaster, UC Berkeley

3:00-4:15 Recess

4:15-5:30 Panel Three: RRS in Early Modern Chinese Buddhism

Kaiqi Hua, UC Merced: “Local Patrons of Buddhist Canon Printing in the Hang-Jia-Hu Subregion During the Song-Yuan Period”

Weiran Zhang, Fudan University: “Regional Systems of Pilgrimages to Guanyin in the Yangtze Delta during the Ming-Qing Period”

Marcus Bingenheimer, Temple University: “ ‘Knowing the Routes of Pilgrimage’ - The Network of Pilgrimage Routes in 19th Century China”

Response by Lewis Lancaster, UC Berkeley

6:00-8:00 Dinner

8:00 Guests return to hotel (Lodge of the Desert)

April 8, Friday

8:30-10:00 Panel Four: Spatial Analysis of Contemporary Chinese Religion

George Hong and Jianfeng Jin, Purdue University Calumet: “The Spatial Study of Catholic Market in China”

Fenggang Yang and Jonathan Pettit, Purdue University: “Mapping Religions in Zhejiang, China”

I-chun Fan, Hsiung-ming Liao, Jr-Jie Jang, Joe Chen, Academia Sinica: “The Taiwan Religious Database and Case Studies by Using Geo-spatial Technologies”

Response by Lewis Lancaster, UC Berkeley

10:00-10:15 Recess

10:15-12:00 Panel Five: RRS Beyond China Proper

Karl Ryavec, UC Merced: “A Regional Systems Survey of the Early Spread of Bon and Buddhism in Tibet”

Nan Ouyang, University of Arizona: “Geostatistic Exploration of Religious Landscape: A Case Study of Buddhist Monasteries in Taiwan”

Kenneth Dean, McGill University: “Representing overlapping networks: Chinese Temples, Trade and Trust Networks Linking SE China and SE Asia”

Response by Lewis Lancaster, UC Berkeley

12:00-1:00 Lunch and Recess

1:00-2:00 Special Report on Maritime Buddhism Project by Lewis Lancaster:

“Maritime Buddhism: A New Look at Spatial-Temporary Study of Religion”

2:00-2:15 Recess

2:15-4:00 Training

5:30-6:30 Guest return to hotel

6:30-8:30 Farewell Banquet and reception (Lodge of the Desert): invitation only

A Chinese Almanac Printed in 1902 in Guangzhou

1902 Chinese Almanac in Mr. Brad Johnson's collection. All rights reserved.

Recently, Mr. Brad Johnson, an antique bookstore owner in Maryland, contacted me about his new discovery of a old Chinese book in an estate sale.  The book he discovered is actually a Chinese almanac printed in 1902 in Guangzhou. The title is Zhongwai tongchun 中外同春, which may be rendered as Same Spring in and outside China. The publisher is called Duowentang 多文堂, the Hall of Myriads of Letters. I searched Wildcat about this publisher and found they published a similar title several years ago and its digital version is available online and can be downloaded from HathiTrust Digital Library. I quickly compared the two and can see they are similar. The uniqueness of this is that it includes substantial knowledge about Western countries, considering Guangzhou (Canton) was an open port for many years. My guess is that the publisher compiled this title and kept updating it in different years for the market needs. I haven't seen any studies about this title. Here is the bibliographic information of a 1896 edition of this book.

中外褆福.

Zhong wai ti fu

Author: Duo wen tang.

Publisher: 多文堂, [Guangzhou] : Duo wen tang, Guangxu 22 [1896]

Chinese Almanac in Mr. Brad Johnson's collection. All rights reserved.

Chinese Almanac in Mr. Brad Johnson's collection. All rights reserved.

Chinese Almanac in Mr. Brad Johnson's collection. All rights reserved.

Chinese Almanac in Mr. Brad Johnson's collection. All rights reserved.

Chinese Almanac in Mr. Brad Johnson's collection. All rights reserved.

Also, the publisher is located in a central street called Longcang Street 龙藏街. There used to be a Buddhist temple called Longcang and right now called Dafo Temple大佛寺, which I visited in May, 2015.
There are studies of publishing culture in Hangzhou and Sichuan but very few on Guangzhou. Here is a few useful references in Chinese:

《出版志》

http://www.bookshopllc.com/id6.html

http://wxs.sysu.edu.cn/download/094.pdf
清代广州的文化街

清代广州书坊及私人刻书拾萃

http://www.jslib.org.cn/jslib_gxdl/jslib_gxdlgxyj/201409/P020140902351805506489.pdf
清代广东书访的新型径营模式

清末民国广州的书店业

清代广州海幢寺经坊刻书及藏版述略