GLOBALink | A glimpse of ancient "textbooks" for imperial exams carved on stone tablets

STORY: A glimpse of ancient "textbooks" for imperial exams carved on stone tablets DATELINE: June 9, 2022 LENGTH: 0:01:09 LOCATION: XI'AN, China CATEGORY: EDUCATION SHOTLIST: 1. various of Xi'an Beilin Museum 2. SOUNDBITE (Chinese): BAI XUESONG, Docent of Xi'an Beilin Museum STORYLINE: Ancient "textbooks" for imperial exams over 1,000 years ago are housed at Xi'an Beilin Museum in Xi'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province. The "textbooks" are 12 Confucian classic books in 650,000 characters carved on stone tablets. The tablets were completed in 837 during the Tang Dynasty (618-907). SOUNDBITE (Chinese): BAI XUESONG, Docent of Xi'an Beilin Museum "The stone tablets were housed in the highest educational institute, the Imperial College, in the Tang Dynasty. Before the examinations, students from various parts of the country would gather here to check the textbooks, and when they saw words that were inspiring, they would stop to copy the words in the Confucian classics. The stone tablets were seen as pract