Previous visitors to the Museum of the Institute of History and Philology at Academia Sinica will not quickly forget famous attractions such as the black pottery from Long Shan, cooking vessels and three-legged caldrons from the ruins of Yin, bronze inscriptions from the Chou dynasty, bamboo scripts of the Han dynasty, rubbings of the Shiu dynasty and Tang dynasty, rare books of Sung dynasty and Yuan dynasty, or the incredible oracle bone inscriptions of Southwestern China’s ethnic peoples. But it is often not known that these precious artifacts comprise only a very small portion of what the Institute of History and Philology collects. The visitor will regret not seeing the Grand Secretariat Archives, the Archaeological data from the Shihsanhang Museum of Archaeology, or the folk literature of Taiwan. There is much to see besides the famous attractions.

　　 In addition to the Institute of History and Philology, AS has many institutes with their own special collections. They are the Institute of Ethnology, the Institute of Modern History, the Research Center for Biodiversity, the Institute of Taiwan History, the Institute of Linguistics, and the Center for Geographic Information Science of Research Center for Humanities and Social Sciences. The collections include sculpture, art, weaving, pottery and ceramics of Taiwan aboriginals, paleography, historical maps, historical contracts from Taiwan, the diary of famous local personages Lin Hsien-Tan and Chang Li-Jun, the Taiwan Sotokufu Archive during the Japanese Period, specimens and ecological photography of Taiwan’s local fish, shells and plants, maps taken by U2 airplanes and ancient drama scripts of the southern Fujian Province and Hakka language.

　　After ten years of effort, AS has not only built a database called the “Scripta Sinica”, which is even bigger than The Emperor’s Four Treasures of Emperor Qian-long, we have also completed the digitization of all our archived historical data and cultural artifacts. We have already established the resource network, and we present the preliminary findings of the digitization to the academy and the general public. We hope it is a useful tool to navigate the unique and varied collections of Academia Sinica.

　　We wish researchers find the resource network an easy tool for acquiring information related to their research. We hope the public finds it a treasure-box of knowledge and cultural insight. For those involved in the industry of promoting and conserving culture, the resource network provides valuable information on the cultural heritage of Taiwan.

      Please vist the website Academia Sinica Digital Resources (http://digiarch.sinica.edu.tw/en_index.jsp) for more information! 
 

A short introduction of Academia Sinica's efforts for 2009 International Licensing Expo