"The Plant Illustrations in the Illustrated Treatise on the Names and Realities of Plants and British Natural History: On Wu Qijun's Academic Thought and the Thirteen Factories of Guangzhou"

Date(s)： 2026/08/24

Time： 10:00~12:00

Venue： Archives 2nd Conference Hall

Host： Prof. Chang Che-chia（Associate research fellow and Head of IMH Computer Service, IMH, AS）

Speaker：Prof. Teruyuki KUBO (Yokohama College of Commerce)

Organizer： AS Project "The World Landscapes of Cultural Images in the Pre-modern Period" and "History of Knowledge" Research Group

Abstract,
This talk explores the monumental botanical work Illustrated Treatise on the Names and Realities of Plants (Zhiwu Mingshi Tukao) by the Qing dynasty scholar Wu Qijun, focusing on the intersection between its realistic, precise botanical illustrations and the British natural history tradition of the 18th and 19th centuries. As a pivotal hub of early modern Sino-Western exchange, the Thirteen Hongs (Canton Factories) served not only as a commercial nexus but also as a vital gathering place for Western plant collectors, export painters, and the circulation of botanical knowledge.
The lecture explores how Wu Qijun transcended the textual and philological limitations of traditional materia medica (bencao) scholarship by integrating field investigations with life drawing—demonstrating an empirical spirit of gewu (investigation of things) infused with modern scientific undertones. By comparing the woodblock plates of Zhiwu Mingshi Tukao with contemporary export botanical paintings from the Canton factories, preserved in British institutions such as the Royal Horticultural Society and Kew Gardens, this study reevaluates Wu's intellectual contributions and maps the historical context of late Qing botanical knowledge production and cross-cultural visual exchange amid the global expansion of natural history networks.